blackninjaninety

I was about ten years old when I got my first bike: A Kawasaki KX 80. It was without a doubt the bike that changed my life. Even though I was not the best rider by far, I managed to kick everybody´s ass on the track time and time again. I remember the look on my uncle´s face (who weighed about 110kg) when he got on the bike and it popped a wheelie with no effort whatsoever. I ended up dicing my dad, who had a souped-up 125 Yamaha scrambler, and it was hard to tell who won the most races. When I was 17, my dad got me a Honda MBX 50, for going to school and back. At that time, that was all you were allowed to drive legally when you were 17 in South Africa. I had it for less than a week, when one of my friends borrowed it and came back with a huge dent in the tank. He had stalled the bike, then lost his balance as he was trying to turn it around. I haven´t spoken to him in about ten years. Then, in March last year (2003), I inherited a small sum when my grandfather died. I started looking in magazines and did some research on the net, then finally came to the conclusion that there could only be one bike for me: The Ninja 900, otherwise known as the Kawasaki GPZ 900, or the ZX 900. After about two months of looking at fixed bikes, wornout bikes, resprayed bikes, you name it, I finally found my baby, a 100% original-never-crashed 1990 model, registered 1991. For the bargain price of R18 000. That´s about 2 500 USD, I think, at the current exchange rate. The guy had to sell, because he moved to a farm with a dirt road and as you probably know, the one thing a Ninja 900 does not like, is a dirt road. The first time I got on her I nearly shat myself. I wanted to phone the guy I bought it from and tell him I´m sorry, I made a mistake, I want my money back. Now, almost a year and a half later, if I had to choose between my girlfriend and my bike, it would be a mighty tough decision. They are both equally exciting, but my bike doesn´t give me nearly as much grief as my girlfriend and almost as much pleasure. I don´t know much about the technical stuff, though I bought a Haynes manual to help me with the basic upkeep. What I do know, is that she accelerates from 0-100 in about three and a half seconds, that I´ve taken her up to about 220-240 km/h, and that the only reason I didn´t go faster was that the cars moving so slowly on the highway freaked me out a bit. Not bad for a 14 year old bike that is stock standard, no performance pipe, no tweaking or tuning, just a beautiful big black bike that still turns heads and out-accelerates nearly everything I meet on the road. And in town? I have used her nearly every day to go to work and back, and varsity and back, and I never want to drive in a car again if I can help it.