A scared night with bikers
It was at the beginning of July 2009 and I just arrived in that city two days before.
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"Hey guys, let’s hit downtown tonight. Rachel will be driving us all. She has a car. We can go together” one of my friends proposed a seemingly interesting plan as we gathered together in one of my friend's apartment. “What are we going to do in downtown?” I asked. “There will an annual festival tonight; it is a biker’s night” said my friend. "Usually they have this festival around the 4th of July. It is part of Independence Day celebration in this city and it will be great!” said another friend enthusiastically. We will get to see all kind of classics motorbike. "There will be hundreds of Harleys parking in downtown tonight, there will be a fireworks show too". My friends are all excited. They've been in that city for about one or two years that time. I didn’t say anything. Deep in my heart, I was not sure. Mostly because I was not sure what were they talking about. Bikers? I got no idea about that.
It was almost 7pm that night, when Rachel and three other girls arrived
at the apartment where I and a friend stayed. The girls said "we are ready, let’s go!" So, I and my
friend, followed them to the parking lot. Four girls and two boys packed into Rachel’s
car that night. Rachel pulled out the car from the parking lot and drove us to the
downtown.
At Downtown, It was already very crowded. We need to park the
car about 1 km away from the venue because there was no more closer space for parking. As we walk to the center of the venue. I started
to feel that this might be not right. Something might be wrong, about this place. I didn’t
know. I just scared. The lights along the street as we walked were kind of dim.
I expected that it will be brighter. It is USA, a rich country, why are those lights
so dim? We met several visitors who also were walking toward the venue, some
other people walk in the opposite direction. We didn’t exchange any words with
them. My friends have their own conversations and I was quite, keeping a lot of feelings in side my head.
As we walked, I was busy with my own thought. What is this thing I was about to see? We arrived at the venue in about 15 minutes. It is 6th street. One of my friends
was very excited. She asked me to take her picture with the street name. “I want
to have a picture here, with this street sign” She said that while handed me her
camera. I took the camera and look around confused. What is so exciting about
this place? There was no fascinating background. Only that one stupid street
name, she holding, behind her was only an almost dark view of an old building.
Why do you want to have picture here” I asked her. She just replied “It is 6th
street baby, 6th street!!”. I felt so stupid, so stupid that I hold
back my question about what is so excited about 6th street in this
city?
6th street was very crowded that night. A lot of
bikers flooded the street. I am so scared. Those bikers scared me to death.
First was because they look so strange. Very big guys, tattoo all over their
body, some with long hair, other bald, piercing everywhere-nose, ear, chest,
lips. God, what kind of people they are? As we walk along the street I can’t
help but scared. Too scare that I can’t speak it out. I was too shy to
ask. My friends seemed just to enjoy the party. Moving from one bike to another,
they great those big guys, said what a beautiful-awesome bike they had. I didn’t care
about the bikes. My eyes were moving from one biker to another, men and women.
Their dark accessories, black tattoos, thick eye liner, dark lipstick, and
dirty talks, to a new stranger like me, they just look like rebellion people. They look like pirates in
the ocean ready to take down a stranded innocent ship. This place will be very
easy to fall into a riot soon. Well, these unruled guys seemed didn’t have any
attitude. Yes, just a little bit of alcohol or drugs maybe and they will fight each
other, and when that happening what should I do? Where should I run? I don’t
know about this place. I was really really terrified.
That night, I was really really horrified. Horrified with with my own stupid and judgmental thought. Guess what, in the following year. I visited that same fest, in that same place, the fabulous 6th street in that city that I will always remember. What more? I went there alone, yes alone. I went to see the same fest on the next year alone. :)
source : http://nobodylikesit.files.wordpress.com/2011/07/biker.jpg
That night, I was really really horrified. Horrified with with my own stupid and judgmental thought. Guess what, in the following year. I visited that same fest, in that same place, the fabulous 6th street in that city that I will always remember. What more? I went there alone, yes alone. I went to see the same fest on the next year alone. :)
after reading the first chapter of 14 prompts by John Bunting
BalasHapus