We the Healthy

I have now been living in California for two months. I have exercised more in the last 2 weeks than the last 2 years combined. My poor aching bones. The fitness fever - it surrounds you, it embalms you, thousands upon thousands of fitness fanatics with their talk of carbs and aerobics and running and power and rock climbing. It's inescapable due largely to do the excellent stridently sunny weather and the the large green open spaces. Then there is that surface venner of good Californian smiley feeley West Coast cheer. Cheering you on to self-actualisation, to spirituality, and to good wholesome exercise.

For a city known for its back-breaking hills, San Francisco is a bike city. Down from the hills, there are large regions of flat, bikable plains. There are many bike shops, and like everything else, bikes are fashion accessories. There are bikes that are stylish expressions of the self. Curvy metalic mobile sculptures, with their Easy-Rider handlebars and their earthy low centres-of-gravity. Well-marked bike lanes criss-cross the cities, ferrying socially-aware bike-riders from one hot-bed of activism to another. Yes, biking is a green form of transport.

On weekends, people from work go mountain-biking, rock-climbing, recreational (?) running, ultimate friss-beeing. If you don't sweat or hit the zone, you're not having fun. For me, I have fallen victim to the soccer fever. Every week on a Monday and Wednesday afternoons, we descend onto the pathetic patch of green outside the building to play this quintinsensually un-American game, even though it is. Soccer is played big time in primary and high-school, but there is no professional league. More importantly, it's a popular game for girls to play. So it's a wonderfully mixed gender game we play.