Why I choose to ride

From how all the adults been describing that riding motorcycle is a very dangerous thing to do since I was young,  I had grown up without the thought of ever riding a motorcycle myself one day. That was until one time in year 2011 when I was in Guilin (Guangxi province in China) that I rented a electric scooter to tour around the place. I immediately fell in love with riding. 

How is it different - riding a motorcycle versus driving a car ?

When you ride, you get to fully immerse yourself into the surrounding, experiencing the full view, the wind, the smell, the sound, the temperature. You can just feel the freedom of yourself moving  around efficiently without clumsily bounded into a big chassis of a car . Yes, there are issues when it rain or you have luggage/load that a bike can't handle. These are the rare occasions where a taxi should solve the problem.

What about the danger ?
Some unfortunate motorcyclist have accident due to irresponsible drivers who changed lane without checking blind-spots. Others got banged into when waiting for traffic light because the car behind was day dreaming and could not stop in time. However, the rest of accidents, which is the majority, are caused by the motorcyclist 's stupidity, lack of patience and recklessness. They lane-split between two fast moving cars, changed lane abruptly and ride at speed that is way beyond the speed limit. In my opinion, riding a motorcycle is as safe as how you want to ride it, the safety is in your hands.

So I finally register myself for the motorcycle licenses at CDCC sometime in June 2013. 

After 9 months of  pain and sweat attending lessons on each early Saturday mornings, I finally passed the Class 2B on 07 Mar 2014. Knowing that I am not going to stop at just Class 2B, I got myself a 2nd hand 12year old Honda Phantom TA200. It cost me $2,750 without insurance.

Apart from the kups you see on the roads, Phantom was once a very popular bike in Singapore.
It has unmatched fuel efficiency of 38km/litre, single cylinder and have the maximum power compare to the rest of 2B bikes available. Although it has stopped production sometime in 2009, there are still plenty of parts available in any motorshop. 

Since I obtain my car driving license(class 3) , I have changed two cars, mainly for the convenience. To be frank, I never enjoyed driving in Singapore due to the slow traffic and the headache of looking for car parking lots in where-ever I drive to. The parking lot in my office cost $350/mth, the one at home cost another $80/mth. With the convenience of getting taxis from the Comfort, Grab and Uber app, I finally made up my mind on giving up driving in Oct 2014 and sold away my car. Never looked back since and I was happy relying solely on my Phantom for daily commuting needs.

One year later after I obtained my Class 2B license, I immediately enrolled for a Class 2A lesson.
It took close to 7 months, after 2 failed TP test before obtaining my Class 2A on 02 Oct 2015. Immediately I changed my bike to the popular Honda CB400 Revo. It's a 400cc, fuel injection, four cylinder bike that can go into an VTEC mode that provides you the power that you have never dream of getting it from a 400cc bike. Fuel efficiency is not that good though (20km/litre).

Most people who have obtained Class 2A will not be contented with the 400cc limit. Me too. One year later after I passed Class 2A, I went to enrolled for Class 2 lessons. Got the Class 2 license five months later on the first test attempt.

I love the CB400, but there are so many interesting Class 2 bikes that is waiting for me to experience. Saw this 3 year old Triumph Tiger 800 with only 12k mileage for sale and immediately fell in love with it. Triumph Tiger have received very good review and it is, in a way comparable to the BMW F800S.

Decide to go for it and unwillingly sold my CB400 away.  I did not consider even a bigger bike (1200cc)  because I still rides to work everyday and a 1200cc bike will be such a pain even parking it. Surprisingly, at double the cc, the fuel consumption of Tiger is same as the CB400 at 20km/litre.

Even the 800cc bike is big and doing my day-to-day errand running to the hawker centre or supermarket seem like a hassle. So I invested in a small Vespa scooter for such purpose. It's fun, it's sooooo easy to handle and look the color, isnt it nice ? For a 150cc bike, this scooter acceleration can beat a lot of big bikes due to its light weight. It can cruise at 110km/hr, but not advisable to do it on an extended distance. The scooter is just too light and it will not be travelling stably at that speed. Fuel consumption is quite decent, 30km/litre. This is definitely safer than those E-scooters/E-bike that you spot on the roads or pavements and you don't have to charge it !