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« From cicle.org
First there were some rumblings
on the L.A. Crit Mass list about an anti-Bush demonstration starting at noon
today, Wednesday, November 2nd. Then Eric Einem (Pasadena Crit Mass list)
confirmed it and set up a meeting point at the Highland Park station for those of us in NELA who would be making the ride to Wilshire and Figueroa in downtown Los Angeles. I met Eric and a friend (who both rode from Arcadia)
and the three of us then rode downtown to the appointed location. Here we
met up with other bike riders, probably some of the L.A. Crit Mass group,
I recognized only one face. Also, a good showing from the downtown messenger
group, and of course, general non-biking protestors with signs, banners,
stickers, and making lots of noise.
Only Eric had brought a sign, so
we all took advantage of the “sticker lady” and adorned ourselves and our
bikes with this thematic material. After a few minutes of commiserating with
our fellow demonstrators, we formed up for the bike ride west on Wilshire
to MacArthur Park at Alvarado street.
As we departed, a news media camera (I believe KTTV channel 11) recorded
our Mass exodus for the 10 o’clock news. I rode straight at the camera, giving
it my meanest look, steering away at the last minute. Watch for me tonight,
film at eleven (actually KTTV news is at 10:00pm)
MacArthur Park was a much bigger scene than Wilshire and Fig. The sound truck was already
set up and a hard rock band was blasting out. A mosh-pit formed right in
front of the truck and frenzied, black clad, punkers showed all present how
much energy they could dissipate by just gyrating in place. It was great.
Many present covered their faces with black scarves. I suppose they wanted
to avoid making the FBI’s ’sedition’ list. Matters not to me, I probably
am already in an FBI file. There was not much police presence, just a few
bicycle-cops, and they did not seem overly interested in what was going on.
The band rocked out a few more tunes then announced they were taking down
the sound truck to move toward Westwood where they would set up again and
continue playing.
At this point, I decided that
I’d had enough fun for the day and headed back to NELA. Alvarado was a nightmare
of traffic and no room to ride, so I zigzagged north and east on quieter
streets. Through Chinatown with the ever-present odor of Peking Duck and
fried rice, along the west side of the Cornfields - with the last corn crop
still waving in the gentle breeze, past ‘five-points’ and onto those familiar
streets going into my ‘hood. My odometer showed 20.45 miles. Another busy
day of pedalling my ass around L.A.
Maybe another blogger could give us an account of what happened at points west of MacArthur Park.
Eric Says: After
Harv departed, about 10 other riders and myself continued all the way to
the Santa Monica Promenade. We had a meal there and hung out a bit and headed
back to the Westwood Federal Building for the 5 PM rally. It was the farthest I’ve ventured by bike from Arcadia, and it was far more fun than a day at work!
We passed a groups of protesters on the way down Wilshire Blvd. at about 4 other locations. The groups were of varying sizes with the biggest group of about 1500 at the rally at the Federal Building.
As we passed each group we exchanged chants and cheers. We also got some
cheers and shouts of support from elementary school kids in their playground
as we passed their school (several of us had large signs attached to our
bikes).
We were followed by a motorcycle cop in Beverly Hills
who instructed us over his loudspeaker to “Move over to the right side of
the roadway and ride single-file”. We kept to the right lane but continued
to ride 2-up. The cop repeated his request a couple of times and then followed
us until we were out of Beverly Hills.
When
we got to Westwood we rode around the Village and through UCLA. There were
numerous police on bicycles and motorocycles. Five police on bikes followed
us around westwood. There was also a group of about 100 marchers that we
passed. We stopped and I joined in their chant, “The World Can’t Wait - Drive
Out the Bush Regime”.
I stayed
at the rally only ’till about 5:30 PM. The traffic was quite jammed on Wilshire
blvd on my way back, probably because of the road closures due to the protests.
I enjoyed wizzing past numerous cars as I headed east to the Redline station.
- Brief video of Critical Mass riding through the Wilshire/Fairfax
Convergence Point.
*for identification purposes only"
E-mail: worldcantwait_la@yahoo.com
Phone: (213) 924-8571
Address: Los Angeles World Can't Wait
P.O. Box 48332
Los Angeles, CA 90048
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