by Mia Shanley

It started a year ago when I first arrived in Taichung and realized that the city's public transportation system was sub-standard. For an entire month, I tracked one particular bus and tried to make heads and tails of its schedule. The pattern? No pattern. It arrived when it arrived -- on the hour, under the hour, over the hour, every other hour. Tell someone you ride the bus to get around in Taichung and they'll ask you how you've conquered the system.
Because Taichung tends to be spread out, with get-away mountains and the harbor a bit of a ride away, many foreigners and almost all locals get a scooter or a motorcycle.
Mine is a "Great Louis," a 90 cc forest green scooter with a black rusting basket. She is now one year old -- one year old in her life with me. If we're talking lifespan, she's nearing nine now. And Ms. Louis has done anything but grow old gracefully. She's temperamental. If the weather is bad, she feels it. If the weather is good, she'll feel it too. I bought her for NT$10,000, a little pricey for a used scooter bought in Taichung. But, come on, with a name like "Great Louis" splashed across the side, the money was justifiable.
It took me some time before I realized what kind of relationship I shared with Ms. Louis. But when the winds of Typhoon Zeb and then Typhoon Babs hit Taiwan, our relationship was put to the test as I became annoyed at her for who she wasn't -- my car at home. Call me a fair-weather owner.
It was during the second typhoon when she was taken away from me, towed from my office building. I had been taking taxis and buses during the storm, so I had nearly forgotten about her. I left her there too long and the authorities were called upon.
As I debated whether or not to pick her up from the tow station, I began thinking of all the ma-fan she had caused me. All the times she refused to start, all the money I had poured in to medicine for her ills, for her two dead batteries, for the rear-end which fell off as I was driving down a busy street in Taipei, for an entire set of keys which fell out of the ignition when I hit a bump in the road. Of course, I didn't realize they were gone until I had arrived at my final destination, far from the falling point. Her middle name is Ma-fan. Ms. Great Ma-fan Louis.
A friend had another good point -- what if I arrived at the tow station and she didn't even start? To what distance was I willing to go for her? Was she worth the fight? Or would I be able to walk away from her and the tow station guards, pretending not to know or recognize her? I could have passed it off as the wrong one, or the wrong tow station. And then I could have left her there in their lot -- ma-fan and all -- in their hands.
But when I arrived at the station, my heart melted. As unattractive as she was, covered with mud from headlight to taillight, she was still Louis the Great. It was our moment.
Back home, moments like those are rare. Scooters are rare and riding them is just not that cool. In Taiwan, it is. Get some blue bathroom sandals, slouch your back like a liu mang, forget the helmet and you're set.