Lowrider bicycles: About as comfortable as stilettos

When you are riding a lowrider, it's uphill all the way. You need to push hard on the pedals, it's slow going, and it's not cheap.

So what's the appeal?

"It's stylish," said Aditya Agung Rhamadan, a 20-something lowrider biker from the Hell O Shorty community.

Lowrider bicycles are like stilettos, they are cripplingly uncomfortable but look hot.

The bikes, which are a cross between Harley and cruiser bikes, are definite attention stealers. Their seats are down at wheel level, with the pedals sometimes higher than the seats.

The difference between lowriders and stilettos is that bikers can be creative with their two-wheel vehicles, embellishing them to suit their personalities. True lowrider lovers assemble their bikes by themselves and are willing to go the extra mile in search of spare parts.

In Jakarta, lowrider bikes are becoming increasingly popular, with communities of lowrider bikers popping up all over town, and competing with each other to be the most fashionable.

The Sunset Riders Community, whose turf stretches from Menteng Park to Suropati Park in Central Jakarta, is one of the most prominent lowrider clubs in the city. Members have been riding in the area since 2004.

Other lowrider groups include Jakarta Street Lowriders, Hell O Shorty community, Pirate Lowrider and Ciputat Brothers.

"Only 30 percent of the appeal of lowrider bikes is related to function, the other 70 percent is about being fashionable," said 28-year-old Gandung Bagus Amento, the founder of Sunset Riders.

"We intentionally ride slow so people can admire our bikes," he said.

Lowriding began as a cultural element of Hispanics in the U.S., part of the street culture of the American barrio where Mexican immigrants maintained a lively urban culture. In the 1960s because of the expense of lowrider cars, kids could not afford to be a part of the lowrider car movement. Instead they began fixing up their own bicycles.

In Indonesia, young people picked up the lowrider trend from watching music video clips. Nowadays, lowriding is part of the music scene and has been adopted by hip-hop and R&B musicians as well as punk bands.

"I became interested in lowrider bikes from seeing them on video clips on MTV," Gandung said.

The bikes on TV reminded him of the bike he had as a kid, and he went off in search for parts in secondhand markets. Gandung works on his bikes at his old university, the Jakarta Institute of the Arts (IKJ).

With the rising popularity of lowriders, a growing number of people are buying them pre-assembled.

Twenty-two-year-old Ahmad Romero, a business student and lowrider lover, opened the first workshop for lowrider bicycles and chopper bicycles, Hell O Shorty, in March of last year.

He established the South Jakarta store as part of a business project for school and has sold 23 bikes to date, with prices starting from Rp 2 million.

However, originality is still widely respected in the lowrider community. For riders, building a bike from scratch is important. "It adds to their pride," Gandung said.