5.1.2012 von Ines.

I love the coincidences making life so interesting! Today a Chinese woman came into Natooke. I was in the office and could only hear her asking my empoloyees. Isn’t your boss German? What is her name? I have a friend who says he thinks he knows her. My employee asked me to come down and I finished writing something and then reluctantly went down thinking this might be another Chinese person wanting me to teach their brother or child some German (which I of course do not do and never did). When I came down I saw Volker Zwack from Herzogenaurach. Oh my god! We had gone to the same school but I have not sen or heard from him since 1997. That was so cool!

But that of course by itself would not be too much of a coincidence.

They actually decided that they would have a look at Wudaoying Hutong as their friends told them it is becoming a really nice street to go. When they were walking past my shop he stopped and he remembered that he had read somewhere about 6 months ago that I have a bike shop, but he was not sure if I actually live in Beijing. Of course he also had no idea about the name or what kind of bike shop it is or where it is. They had the feeling it could be mine as we have a huge German flag hanging on the outside of Natooke. So they decided to come in and ask. So great!

We went and had a nice hotpot dinner together and talked about the old times and some of the people we are still in contact with. Unfortunately Volker is already flying back to Germany tomorrow.

Geschrieben in Natooke, Germany, Beijing | 1 Kommentar »

5.1.2012 von Ines.

Two Natooke bike polo teams as well as our own Natooke bike polo coach went to Taiwan last December. We had a Natooke men and a Natooke girls team. Today I saw the official video of the Takao Cup of Asian Hardcourt Bike Polo Championships 2011 in Kaohsiung Taiwan. Watch on youtube.

I also stumbled across another video of our Natooke team dancing away and trying to get others to join in. it is hilarious. It is always fun with the Natooke guys! Here’s the link

My pictures from the bike polo cup are all on the Natooke website in this gallery.

Geschrieben in Natooke, Bike Polo, Cycling, Fixed Gear, Asia, China | 1 Kommentar »

2.1.2012 von Ines.

Last year we have been busy all kinds of amazing custom bikes for so many people. As we are re-doing our Natooke website I am uploading pictures of the bikes we built for customers, as well as our happy customers and friends. Here are just some pictures of Flying Banana bicycles.

Geschrieben in Cycling, Natooke, Fixed Gear, Asia, China, Beijing | 1 Kommentar »

1.1.2012 von Ines.

First of all: Happy New Year!

It has been many months since I last regularly wrote blog entries. Because some friends and some fans complained about that I decided for the year 2012 I will try to update my blog.

Natooke shop has been very amazing last year and I hope we can continue the same way in 2012. I am happy to have met so many interesting people that just walked in either by coincidence or because they had read about us or seen us on TV. Let us have lots of fixed gear riding fun together in this year.

New Year’s Eve we had a Natooke fixed gear bicycle ride to end off the year 2011 and greet the New Year while cycling along Beijing’s streets. We waited for the countdown on a huge clock near Xidan.

Recently we have some really enthusiastic girls come to rides and events. Keep up the hard riding!

Beijing is getting colder and there are not many people on the streets at night. That made for a huge space for us cycling especially on the extremely wide bicycle lane of Chang’An Boulevard that goes right through the center of Beijing.

The remaining group did a very brief stop on Tiananmen Square before the guard came to tell us to keep moving on.

Then we went to get some early morning food at a small Chinese restaurant. We just stacked our bikes outside of the restaurant. Unfortunately a drunk driver in a SUV drove past and drove too close to our bikes so his car must have touched the most outside bike and the drove over that bikes’ back wheel.

But we figured a bent wheel in the first hours of the year brings good luck. More pictures are all in this gallery.

Geschrieben in Natooke, Cycling, Fixed Gear, China, Beijing | 2 Kommentare »