Accidental collection. Free storage while working overseas. My dream is two weird cars and two motorcycles. I need to drive a Saab 96 and a Citroen 2CV before I figure out what I'll end up with.

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Not Ted Simon since 1970!
http://nokilli.com/rtw

My first bike for riding round the fields when I was 11 - NSU Quickly.
Unfortunately, it quickly broke down

A decade or so ago I expressed some surprise that a thread, which started with a question about an obscure, half century old motor scooter, was still generating a bit of technical and philosophical interest. And here we are 13 years after the original post and the thing is still kicking.

So, for the few who might wish to spare a couple of literary minutes, here is the prequel to the girl in the tight skirt.

Parts of Montreal in 1964 (as is still somewhat the case today) comprised a virtual island of English speakers in the sea which was the French speaking province of Quebec. A noted novelist of the era coined the phrase "two solitudes" to describe the two communities. So it was with a bit of trepidation that I, an Anglophone kid, answered a classified ad for a scooter which was on offer in the east end of the city, definitely Francophone territory.

Now we're not talking crossing some green line here. This wasn't even remotely the sort of divided city that makes headlines, although a few years later there was a brief spasm of separatist violence complete with bombings. Call it a bit of cultural hesitation based mostly on the expectation that I would need to transact the purchase in French in a part of the city that I and my friends never frequented.

A long bus ride brought me to the home of the owner who indeed spoke only French. Anglophones in Montreal of the time often attributed little importance to learning French but I had attended a school that taught it better than most and my father, unusually. was quite fluent. I thought that I could stumble along well enough. That confidence dissolved as the owner delivered a rapid fire pre-purchase tutorial in very Quebecois French. I understood perhaps every fourth word. This was a problem for someone who had never operated a manual transmission vehicle or a two wheeled one of any kind. The seller, oblivious to my lack of comprehension took my $90.00, slapped me on the back and disappeared.

I beamed with pride as I pressed the electric starter and generated noise and two stroke smoke. Of course, the thing stalled within a few seconds. Repeat many times until the dual six volt batteries were dead as doornails.

No problem, I mused. I'll kick start it. I'd seen all the cool kids doing that with their Lambrettas and Vespas. Thus began a process which today might be described as gaslighting yourself. Searching as diligently as I could given the limited real estate, and feeling increasingly stupid, no kick starter could be found. Of course, the NSU engineers had, in a smirk of self confidence, omitted such a crude device from their design.

Push starting being a concept deeply unknown to me I sighed and proceeded to do what any 17 year old would with a lump of iron far from home. I set off to push the Prima to its new house. Hours of effort brought honking and motorists shouting in French until I crossed that virtual border into Anglo land at which point the harassment by cagers turned to English. Fatigued, I stopped in an Italian neighbourhood for a revitalizing plate of spaghetti.

Finally home I parked the misbehaving, two tone beast and gazed upon it. All was forgiven. It represented the opening road, freedom.