Ability to ride a bicycle

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I grew up in the rural settings and there were some basic requirements & responsibilities that a child of 6-12years must possesses and perform in order not be classified as a lazy child and they are what our parents used to measure growth as of then.

The most commonest one was riding of bicycle. It's seen that a child must be acquainted with bicycle before he reaches 10 years of age. To a good extent, the bicycle riding isn't just for fun but it'll be of good help in making some errands easier especially when it comes to going of farm and fetching of water.

When I was around 6years, I wasn't ready to learn how to ride a bicycle because there's a stigmatic believe on it, which has it that an injury must be sustained by the child before he or she would master fully the act of riding.
I believed on this so much because I had seen a lot of people that got the said injury, so I became sluggish in my attempt to learn how to ride because I wasn't ready to sustain any injury on my soft body.

Although I always see myself as being lazy whenever I see my mates are riding bicycle with easy, some use it to do racing but there I was, I can't even do any.

It was when I began to receive mockery words from friends and siblings that I decided to sacrificially venture into learning how to ride. My mind was made up to get the "sacrificial" injury because the mockery was just too much.

We had three bicycles at home, they were local bicycles and not the modern type of bicycles. So I picked one and called for some of my older cousins to be my coach.
Two of them volunteered to coach me and we kicked off the learning process. I found it difficult to catch up quickly because I was being careful in order not to have the unavoidable injury.

Yeah, within two weeks, I got it mastered and I joined my colleagues in racing.

The shocking part was that I didn't sustained any injury, so I don't know where they cooked up the believe on the compulsory injury from.

My parents were so proud of me because to them, I've grown. I became very fast in running some errands, fetching of water from river with a small handy gallon was increased to a big gallon due to my capability to use a bicycle.
Some days, I made use of bicycle to go to school because it was faster and trekking looked like a "suffer head".
I got my dad relieved from carrying me on his bicycle whenever we are going to farm, I compete with him on the road with my bicycle.


Thanks for reading



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15 comments
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(Edited)

In a way, this is a 'coming of age' story. In your case, coming of age meant learning how to ride a bike. It's easy for us to relate to your fear. Each of has had to meet some challenge as we were growing. Maybe it wasn't bike riding. Maybe it was dancing, or speaking on front of a class. In every case, we had to overcome the fear, as you did with bike riding. In that sense, your story represents almost everyone.

Thank you for sharing this story with us, @kingsleyy. Have you engaged with other members of the Inkwell community this week? Thank you.

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Till tomorrow I'm still scared to learn how to ride a bicycle because of that stupid stereotype too 😂😂. I don't want to get hurt but I love to learn how to, but thinking about the injury part, I just withdraw 😂.

Lucky you, you learned how to ride without sustaining any injuries, I want to be like you oo 😁

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Wait, are you serious about YOU NOT knowing how to ride a bicycle. I used to think you're a kpako but I got it wrong. You are the other one. That's nice, softkid 🤭

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Hahaha, I'm a kpako oo, I just don't know how to ride a bicycle, which softkid is that one? 😅🙄

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Lol😂. Na you know.
Whether you like it or not, one of the major ways to differentiating a kpako from an ajebo is through bicycle riding.

Use Google to search😂

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Hahaha, that's really funny, but I don't agree jhur 🤣🤣🤣

Okay I will

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You no go agree because you know where you belong 😂😂

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Is you that know what you are saying oo, lolz. Better free me oo 😅😅

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It is a good thing, you were determined to learn how to ride a bicycle, despite the cooked-up story about unavoidable injuries, you must be proud of yourself.

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I think i almost related to this. U know what? I was able to ride a bicycle when i was 10 or 11 😅
I learned to ride a bicycle since i was 4. I don't know why i was so sluggish, even though i didn't care about any injuries that occurred to my body.

By the way, thanks for sharing ur story with us. U have a great experience 😊👍🏻

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You learnt when you were at 4? That great display of braveness by you! Wow!

At four, I was still scared of the injury 😂😂.

Thanks for reading

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Haha! They were teasing you about the injury and also giving slight warning on what could happen in the process of learning. Still great job, I'm not a teenager anymore but I still don't know how to ride a bike.

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Hahaha. Seriously, you still don't know how to ride? It seems bicycles are not common at your end there 😂.

About the injury, I don't know how they came back it😂😂

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I was also scared when I wanted to learn but like I just had to face my fear and now, I love riding bikes. Like there's just a feeling of being free and the breeze blowing through you.

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Wow! I love to know that you can ride a bicycle. Among the ladies that commented, you're the only one that know how to ride.... that's superb💪.

Riding bicycle is just sweet, no other way to express the feeling 💯.

Thank you for stopping by☘️

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