“The Japanese raccoon dog, also known as tanuki (狸 or たぬき?) in Japanese, is a subspecies of the Asian raccoon dog. As the tanuki, the animal has been significant in Japanese folklore since ancient times. The legendary tanuki is reputed to be mischievous and jolly, a master of disguise and shapeshifting, but somewhat gullible and absentminded. It is also a common theme in Japanese art, especially statuary.”
The Tanuki is PN2K’s mascot, and also Phyo’s spirit animal. This Sunday, our tanuki joined us for a guest appearance at MIT PN2K’s Love to Velo bike event, where we welcomed back Bike Boom, our partners in Davis Square, to help us with our free bike safety checks! From Bike Boom, we learn that some of the bikes brought into the event are in critical condition (e.g., upside down forks), and we thank Roy and Ari this month for making these bikes ride-able again. You might have met Dingfang (who registered you when you came in via the iPad) and Will (bike safety officer, helping to fix many flats this weekend). Yaoming was snapping shots left and right (and might have even taken your photo with our PN2K wristband for our Banding Together gallery, in solidarity/support of bicycle safety); Jay was at the bike trivia station testing out your bike knowledge and handing out raffle tickets; and Nick was helping to register bikes with MIT Parking & Transportation (useful when reclaiming abandoned bikes or gaining access to campus bike cages). See the gang below.
Once next month comes up and the weather is warmer, we’ll have our pressure washer again. In the meantime, we kept our cyclists preoccupied in the long line with our “clean your U-lock” station, free food & music, bike registration, campus maps and info booklets, bike trivia, and opportunity to buy helmet gear ($20 helmets and $15 bike lights) and MIT PN2K membership. We hope you learned about our upcoming Saturday bike ride organized by MIT PN2K (open to members only) as well as our next meeting this coming Friday, 3/4 @ 5-7 PM in 1-132.
With the long lines, we had to close early at 4:15 PM (even then, we still finished probably about 40 minutes past the time of close). Lesson to learn: line closes early, arrive early. But we had a great time. A shout out to our volunteers, Bike Boom, sponsors, and the Boston cycling community (Peter Cheung, John Adams, John Carlo, Felix Arroyo) for stopping by, and Rebecca Albrecht for your donations of cycling advocacy and booklets for our future PN2K “biking library”. Thank you to our team and volunteers – we are having a blast!
Upcoming dates:
Friday 3/4 @ 5-7 PM, 1-132: MIT PN2K General Meeting & Event Planning/Training
Saturday 3/5 @ 6 PM: MIT PN2K organized 1 mile social bike ride for dinner in Boston (sign up here)
Friday 3/11 @ 7 PM: Meet at Copley Square, Boston for Boston Bike Party
Congrats to MIT PN2K’s Bike Trivia Raffle Prize winners – We thank all those who participated in our bike trivia. We hope you learned more about biking in Boston and staying safe on the roads:
Landry’s Bicycle $25 gift card: Cole Perkinson
Star Market $25 Gift card: Iris Fung
Starbucks Gift Basket: Jun Yong Khoo
Ferris Wheels Bike Shop gift card: Fernando M.