October 17
Ethnographic Interviewing
Yongho Kim
Interview 1
Motorcylists
October 12, 9:00-10:00 am
Typed Oct 17
D: Yes. [laugh]
Y: Uh.. professor Guneratne told me that I could interview you about the microculture of motorcylclists. Is that…?
D: yes. There’s two things you can interview about. (uhuh) that, or.. I also work as a musician. So it could be either one. If you prefer motorcylces, that’s fine. It’s.. but.. what we’resuggesting is.. where is the microphone. Oh ok. I’ve worked in an organization called “Development road riders” GWRRA. And I have since 1983 so, I’m a [irrecog] member. And uh, we could interview me about that.. so if you wanna…
Y: Can I interview about the motorcycles? [I guess Dustin really wanted me interview him on motorcycles.. haha] (uhuh, sure) so… are you still a member of the [irrecog]
D: I am.. I edit their weekly newspaper. So, type set in, and eveyrthing. Yes.
Y: HOw often do you work or are you involved with the…
D: Well, not.. I’m involved all the time with editing the paper. I work too often, sometimes, how often, I’mnot sure.. I go to the national, I go to the state, we have a rally for what’s called the district which is the state, plus two other states.. north and south dakota, that’s called the tri-state “jamboree” [laugh] that’s what it’s called. So, I’ve got that every year and that’s usually somewhere in the state. I sometimes go to things called fundraisers, where you ride there and often you take a ride with people there. We just did one three weeks ago. [next time ask him about the fundraiser] where we rode all over Western Wisconsin, basically, I did 170 miles with the group that day. Uh.. I mostly there are chapers of this organization, it’s a national organization. So, overall 85,000 members in it. Every state is called a district and it’s all organized and then inside the state are chapters. So there are chapters, regular chapter meetings, called to get together. Every, every month. And I’ve only been a [ircg:031] all my life. I just can’t get away. It’s my grandchild, grandson. But, for that.. then during the riding season there are ride every week. That are organized.. uhm.. and let’s see.. ride night is tuesday. And there are a few rides on thursdsay, and now.. right now they’re doing “leaf runs” [laugh] where they are meeting on saturday, to go. Usually up north this time of the year, touring areas. [ircg:036]
Y: So, so, I am getting from you that your activities are.. writing for the newsletter? and..
D: yeah, I edit the newsletter and.. it’s uh.. it’s a sixteen page newsletter so it’s farily [ircg] job. So I get emails from submissions, and ads, and all sorts of things all the time. But that’s kind of another.. scene. (Y laughs) I need to know about that, what people do, but doesn’t involve directly involve writing. (uhum) The.. anything else..
Y: And then you go to fundraisers..
D: uh! yeah.. I go to fundraisers.. I could go to evening rides.. uh.. and I have a few of those. I’ve got to do more of that next summer. My wife doesn’t ride much, though. So I sort of hafta leave her with her grandchild now she gets stuck [ircg] I could do that.
Y: Uh.. is there a place where all these things happen?
D: Yeah. Uh.. it’s not as neat as you know, as you had a club house or something like that. We have a, what’s called a “ride point” which is where you go to meet and ride. And it’s up in the corner of 694 and uhm… I think, I think it’s state road five. With the… mobile station area. It’s a gas station. Uhm… then.. they get together. As they mostly say. A place called “pippins” a sharp nice.. where is that? It’s in river I think. And they get to hold their own meeting and.. stuff. (uhuh) And then.. that would be that.. sometimes people just get together and go for a ride. GThere are a lot of rallies this summer that people tend to like to gogo, I think. There’s a national rally, it’s done in Texas this year and it’s gonna be.. in [Winona?] next year. So people ride together. So you have these group rides where people ride in a group And.. it’s a lot of people.. this whole thing is based in an organization based on motorcycle [ircg: 068] Honda, Goldman. And and they sell motorcycles [chuckles. Y laugh] And you know, it’s made for touring and it’s actually made for carrying two people.. uhhh.. easily. So it’s very powerful and it’s large and lots of levage [?] space and stuff like that. So, touring [now he sounds excited] is really a kind of key activity for people and they like to get out and.. go distances, a lot of them take trailers behind these bikes.. and.. uh.. you know, I have ridden to every state in the United States, 48, I haven’t gone to Alaska.. except Florida. I’ve got to get to FLorida before I get too old. I got to 100 miles from Florida once but I ain’t take the side cut there to get in. So, we have actually.. we have vets sometimes out, sort of silly, but people are standers, I guess but you are vesting in those organizations have a back patch, and a nasa, and for every, everything that you have attended, just about. So if you go to a rally and it’s called a hanga, and the hanga goes on a.. a pin that says “tri-state jamboree”, it has the year on it. So you get it. If we keep going on I’ll show you the rest. It’s actually a… it’s good because it shows a lot about what’s important to people. And uh.. the number of years, you have a membership pin, and you have a new bar for each year you have been there. And uh, on your vest. And you know, any rally which you think will have ten [ircg:91] some people, I have so many pins I can’t put them in my vest, I put them in the drawer. cuz I’ve been doing it for so long. [definitely ask him about what he has been doing and his pins. this reminds me of Malinowski’s description of the Kula and its comparison to trophies as social institutions] that’s what we do..
Y: So I was asking you all these questions to.. to get.. the idea of whether it would be “right” to ask you what would be a regular day be like? Would that apply?
D: no, no.. it wouldn’t because there isn’t a regular day, but, so, the thing that maybe think.. is what we sometimes call activities. Each chapters has activities sort of activities that the whole organization does.. and so, like, I don’t know. I’ve gone to rallies I go to activities, funraiser is a good activity, a mall show is too. Mall show is a good activity [laugh] and yeah, these things have a spot for eveyrthing. So
Y: Is.. “riding”… are “leaf runs” a kind of activity?
D: A “leaf run” is a kind of actrivty, Yes. I’ve never been to one so [laugh] I can’t talk about it. It’s like most “runs”, as we say (uhu) ah..
Y: Is that how other people in the motorcycling.. in the association, association call it? Activities?
D: Yeah, they talk about activities. And uh.. in the newspaper they have a column for the chapter activites, so. Yeah.
Y: Would you consider editing the newsletter an activity?
D: No. That’s a.. what is that? Yeah, we have a volunteers running the.. organization, basically. Nobody gets paid much. And uh.. I’ve held the position of “district editor” [laugh] that’s great. Now, actually something that people do together, basically, but, you know we have a “District director” it’s not an activity, it’s a position.. what would we call them…
Y: would “going to rides” be an activity?
D: Uh, right, yeah! “goin on a ride” (going ON a ride), yeah, that’s an activity
Y: what about “touring”
D: uhm, only if ti’s organized. That is.. everybody tours, but ah.. if if you are going to, you and six other couples are going to touring together, I suppose.. now it really has to have a name for it. Somebody has to say, “okay we are doing this”. For example, orange chapter decided to have a “friendship run” so, it got people, and they start on friday and get back sunday. and what they are doiung is riding a different part of the state, staying at places. So a group of couples, a lot of couples involved – men and women who are couples. Got together to do this run, it picks some people up. They get to the north, in the state, I can’t remember what town.. but they pick up some people from there, a chapter, and they rode across the west, and they stayed, there, and they came back. Uh, that’s, but that’s a kind of a ride.. so just the act, the act, I mean “I tour”, but sort of people don’t belong to this club at all. So it’s really gotta be something that’s organized.
Y: So you are saying that the friendship ride is a kind of a ride? “friendship run”? (laugh)
D: yeah I can’t rememebr if this is a run or a ride. Cuz I think they have made up a term for it. And I can’t rememebr what it was. and I can’t go to things like that. Cuz I work as a musician on sunday mornings, so I can’t go there.. but uh..
Y: Are there other kinds of rides?
D: Well, just there are “weekly rides” (uhu) okay, that’s that would be the term for chapter, chapter rides, or.. almost alternative term. Chapter rides, and… uh… let’s see. Then there.. the term “run” and “ride” is an interesting quesiton. I’ve never been able to sort this out. But there are “leaf runs” and “chapter rides” and these are kinds of activities, okay. An maybe other kinds of rides besides.. besides “leaf runs” Well, it was just that,… you know that wasn’t a chapter deal… cuz it’s something called the “club run” (club run) but that’s not a GW activity. It’s a state activity. They’ve got 20,000 motorcyclists down here, I swear I have never seen so many motorcycles down here [do motorcyclists care about the number of people showing up at rallies???] uh they go down the mississppi river, twice a year. Well it all started [gesture] [laugh] started in 1965 where there was a big flood in the Mississippi and the motorcycles went down there to Winona to help sandbags, and somehow it got going to a yearly ride, and it’s called the flood ride and nobody organizes it. Somebody announces when it’s gonna be, and nobody knows who announces it, and everybody shows up. And you get thousands of motorcycles (laugh) you know, every town along the way has thousand.. the fire household And it’s auxiliary and those of us who are volunteering get hot dogs and sell your stuff. Beer, unfortunately. These kids are clocked and going at 205 miles an hour, which she wasn’t… it can’t. but that’s what the police said, from the helicopter. It was on the flood run and we were way down south, but they “claim” it was going at 205. It’s not a Honda, it will not go at 130 (laugh) it just can’t be true! Made a mistake. Anyhow! Back to the GWs does these things. What else do they do? They have christmass parties, I’ve never been to a christmass party either so I don’t know. And I told you most things I told you most things..
Y: so, so the events you go most to are the mall show, fundraisers, and rallies, and there are rides, of which there are chapter rides and friendship runs?
D: Yup, those are all.. all.. part of that too.
Y: Uhm.. could you tell me about the last time you went to.. a rally? (uhm?) or to a fundraiser?
D: Let’s do a rally. Since I was going to the state rally, which is now a tri-state rally, you gotta know when it is. It’s.. right now it’s all scheduled for the end of the last week in July.. maybe the first day to.. starts out on Thursday, on a Thursday and ends in a Sunday. So you’ve got that. And we just used to go to.. we used to camp out. We used to do some big beer.. fairgrounds of various towns, now pretty much we stay in motels so there’s host motel, and you need to book. Since I’m on the “state staff”, you know, since I’m in the district everywhere. I stay in the main place just so that I can see eveyrbody. And I know another activity.. we have an ops meeting. Operations meeting. We call them ops meeting – it’s coming in novemeber. Twice a year. Anyway, Okay, back to the rally. So you make plans, you book at noon, that is, if it’s pretty full, 500, or 560 people go on to these tri-states, so.. and uh, so, I was gone Thursday evening if I can, I’ll just pack up my stuff, in my motorcycle and my wife has been to only two of these, so I tend to go by myself. Now I take my banjo with me, because they have a talent show, and they need me playing that (laugh) So high pot! Put that under the bag on the motorcycle. (uhuh) Anyway, ride to wherever it is. Last year it was up in Fargo, this year it’s actually in Moorehead. This year, this year, is in MArshall, Minnesota. So ah… I have to Marshall, and pack there, and usually you see, if you go there pretty early, a few people are coming, that’s all.. I just check in, put my stuff in, and you go for.. people I know. Sort of “scope out” the place. Yeah well that’s my term. I just look for people I know, and see who’s around. And usually there’s an area where he has vendors, people selling stuff, so you need to find out where that is. Once a year is to register. That’s probably the first formal thing you do, to register, and there’s a registration table. And before you go… I pre-register. So I can register, you can send-in your money, and you don’t have to pay later and those things, that’s it.. $35 bucks this year, it’s not too bad. And you pick up your “registration packet” you get that from the table, and you probably by this, since I have been to a lot of them, I know most of the people, who are in the tables so I say hello and ask how they have been. There’s some people from North Dakota and they are very very stay involved.. but then we have one or two chapters, actually two chapters, and I have noticed that there’s not much to them, but anyway. They are there.. and then I usually take that up to my room just to see what’s the schedule in there.
Y: Do you take the regsitration packet to your room?
D: yeah and I get.. we get our ten year from our “bar” and I have to put one on. and just to check it. And we have.. door prize ticket. Just a.. bucket. And you should get your wristband. And there’s a number in your wristband that’s stamped on it, and that’s the number of your door prize ticket. And you have to carry a ticket or not. So you put your door prize ticket in this hand. And you got your wrist band and they clip it on. So that you are “legal” for the entire time. You are legal for the whole.. and we go up to the [ircg:214] now, just to sort things out, they decided to be next, and usually I come down for people. Because it’s that time of the day.. it’s two (?) unless there’s some [ircg:216] some things that need to be done, like they’re setting up a equivalent of vendors are.. these are some they all sell some other things there.. chapter tables now, which is kind of display a chapter activities, some of these help with that, and you .. I’ll rememebr chapter G so chapter G got a table. I help set it up though, they got it under control, I used to help set up the door prize table. and people, they beg people to donate stuff. to give away, this is a regular track for people to derive, I think, I don’t know. Anyway, so you draw tickets out of the pocket and take them on their prizes. So people come by and they look at your van, and they look for numbers and the [ircg:226] and various things. I had a plate, I think. It’s a horrible plate (laugh) it’s got.. nerves.. somebody donated that.. so I got that. uh.,. I always check in to the chapter, that the district ditrector, to see what’s going on. I have some of the particulars I know that, have escaped that because I deal with them all the time. So, hopefully. [ircg:232] and uh.. then if it’s near… very often on thursday, we go ahead on dinner rides.. that’s right, dinner rides.. we organize a dinner ride. we say at 4:30pm, we are gonna meet outside, and we are gonna have a ride to the restaurant, outside. so that will get out there at 4:30 and willt take a half an hour ride and we’ll go to the restaurant.. and we eat. and I made it four or three of those. Four.. four 4:30, 5-5:30, something like that. So we get different times deciding when to go. I haven’t been to one this year but I have been to those.. any circle. You ride together, you have a lot of rules for riding together now. And uh… the.. they ride in what’s called a “staggered formation” where, the ride.. two of them, normally two of them. But one guy rides ahead, so if you have the right track, you stay back here, as far as the outside track is.. on the street. You could be right next to each other. but you could cross, so you “Stagged” and this guy is here and this guy is here. so you have you are supposed to be one second behind the guy on your left and two seconds behind the guy in front of you. and normally, normally allow for about six to eight people to ride together. Then we meet a gap, and then we send out another group. And this group has a.. a need bike, and we have CDs and radios, most of us, so you are then.. there is a tail, this is called a bike. Let’s say you hit the red light. The idea is to get the whole group when it turns green, so that you don’t leave anybody behind. The guy in the front warns you of things lying on the road, watch it’s grab a lot, corner, I got a lot of this in the radio, it’s all this coming on. And people who don’t have a radio.. we have hand signals, to point out stuff, and everything they meet a guy.. filters in their motorcycles. you can dine out in the [ircg:256-260] whoever it makes sense. So we have headsets and helmets and you just have your CD label on. And people listen to it. That’s what they are talking about. And it’s kind of nice, I don’t have to worry about where I am going. I just can go to see them. (laugh) as we go by, and we stop and we have, stopped at a restaurant, and people they usually call ahead because you don’t want sixty people to pour in it. They kind of want to sit and rest together. And meet people, a lot of times we don’t meet people. And then when we’re done, usually the group goes back together. If people know where they are, some couples may go off and ride some more, it’s summertime. they like to meet. (laugh) and so it’s just fun to ride. And so when you return, you return back to the rally side, I usually after that, I kind of look for people who go to the bar and have a few drinks, frankly. Usually I can find somebody, sometimes two or four people and they just sit in there and drink, and see what’s going on. Since I’m also an anthropologist if I turn to ask them questions to see what’s going on, what peoples’ problems are, it’s really interesting to hear what problems chapter directors have. I asked them about that, I’ve never been to one, so I don’t know about the culture of being a chapter. Some of them have told me. And you know, normally I just go to bed. Then on Friday morning (Yongho laughs) whenever I have … but you have a list of that. So on the schedule, it would be like, vendors are open 9 to 5. Uh… then we have things called.. what are they.. seminars. We have seminars on safety, seminars on how to.. how to.. tell a trailer, seminars for co-riders. That’s who are riding behind the rider.
Y: could you, give me just a brief description of the activities during the day? so that I can have a general idea.
D: oh, ok, yeah. Alright. Sure. An activity during the day would be going out and seeing what the vendors have to say. So, an activity during the day, now I’m not sure if we call these activities. But things you do during the day, um… you might buy 50/50 tickets (uhuh) that’s kind of a raffle thing, you might buy raffle tickets at the education base, district educator. that has to do with safety, it’s a huge program on.. memebers take advanced driving courses, they take CPR courses, lots of stuff on safety. Anyway, we have a big gropu. So they get people down to raffle off them, and they are trying to raise money. a lot of money-raising going on here, because they don’t have a regular income at all – it all just has to be raised. But anyway! So you might buy stuff on raffles, you might just scan around and talk to people, you might go to a ride, rides are ordinarily self-guided tours. They call them tours at that point. It’s a ride, if it goes off, if somebody leads it. But when we call it a tour at that point.. you gotta piece paper with directions on where to go, and do this by yourself, or with others. Umm.. what else goes on. A lot of people stay around and talk and see each other. it’s sort of like going to a.. media national might [ircg:316], the american anthropological association, that’s you see the same people. You do it last year then you know them all. One thing people do is to look at bikes’ parts out there. They look at each others’ bikes a lot. What they look for.. on.. tons of accesories people have, and modifications and make them some different. What other things we have, are off-bike games. (Y laughs) that’s something we do. (as opposed to on-bike games? [laugh]) yes, there are on-bike games and off-bike games.
Y: going back to the accessories, I also wanted to talk about.. so you mentioned the sapi radio, and head sets, and helmets, that you usually use when you go to rides, are they a kind of something..
D: Well, they are not accesories. Accesories are things that go on the bike. You see, the radio itself is not an accesory. There’s a huge list of accesories. I could name them all. Their own kind of.. there are accesories and there are accents. And that’s two different things. I have.. one kind of an accesory is an after-market seat. That’s a seat that, motorcycles problems with a seat, you can buy a seat, for the motorcycle, it’s supposed to be more comfortable in that seat. So I have one. Wrestle all day long. You can get.. I have something called a.. ah.. “duck foot” it’s a company that made the thing, it’s a slightly enlarged.. looks like a duck foot, thing, that is attached to the side-stands, and leave them on, and this just attached to the bottom, so it won’ t sink, or into mud, or into.. the black tap, and hot weather.. when it’s parked. The sides down there try slowly dig in until they fall over, and so that’s an accesory. There are lots of aftermarket windshields. I have one. They are made by five, six companies that make a thousand accesories. There’s something called “boogie lights” that’s accesories. There are mostly neon-lights or albertie whites. There’s a “ring of fire” for your front wheel, those.. (laugh) they are little cone things that you put on the sides and your bike gets that descent.. it’s because of the things that one of the activities after the rally, there’s a light show. where eveyrone gets out there after dark and they have a parade – it’s a light parade, light show. And you turn on all the lights. and it’s great, except people have a couple hundred. and a guy used to carry a generator on the trailer.. (laugh) so anyway! back to accesories. What other accesories. do we have.. we can have a truck separator. Just a little plastic that you insert in little pockets and it will remain static-free. The motorcycle has a top box with trunk on top, for side bags, ok. On each side of your wheel that’s all “built-in” I’ll show you a picture sometime. Uhm, and so we can have a trunk separator. We can have a trunk rack, that sets, you have to buy it. And you have it on top of your trunk and the bike comes out.. and you can put bungie coords on top of it and stuff.
Y: what accesories do you have on your…?
D: well, I was thinking that way. I have a trunk rack, I’ve got an after market seat, I have.. what else do I have. I have after market hand grips. I have.. ah.. back foot, I have decorations in this . oh! I have the year(?) that measures amps, voltage and the temperature – the outdoor temperature that I’ve installed in this bike. (So what..?) it’s a gage. It’s a gage made for motorcycles and has a couple of buttons on it, and depending on what button your press, because the voltage that your generator is putting out, or the amperage it’s putting out, or the temperature, the outdoor temperature, it’s got a narrow thin sensor in the front. Most of the time I ‘ll ride with the temperature, cuz it’s fun to see how it goes up and down. But sometimes I have the amperage because these bikes have been known to either have their electrical systems overrun, or have problems with the generators so.. so I have that on hear. Do I have anything else? That the CD, I don’t think so. Well accents are these little just little con-sided basks that are sort of tacked on to areas where the extra chrome, and make a.. frnakly I don’t think.. but there are a lot of needs for those things.. but I’m not sure I can give them to you all, oh! I know what else I have. I have multiplex mirrors. They are illegal. There are times when.. you’ve got to know where the traffic is. On both sides. And these things, not only sort of, you know, your right hand corner, things look closer than they seem in the mirror and that’s because it’s slightly curved to show more space up here, but [ircg:414] but they also bent a little right on the outside edges. So if a car is right abou there, I can still see it on my mirror. So that’s how people save $90 whatever that is. and now states, don’t like them because people think traffic is too far away. but I know about it. And I don’t wanna give this motorcycle up, because it’s got that feature I really love it. So you can also have.. I don’t have a name for it.. it’s a pop vent. (pop vent?) pop vent.
Y: so all those things are accesories?
D: Those are all accesories?
Y: do you have any accents?
D: no, I don’t have any accents. I refuse to get any accents. (oh, what, what..) I was.. OH! I know something I’ve got. I have.. I have.. what do they call it? You get an extra pair of foot pegs or fllor boards that sit in front of you right there. your regular foot pads. So you can put things heat up in there. I have to think about what the terms are called. I have a term for that. I have three years ago, so it’s stretched out, and hardly ever used them. But they are good. Those are accesories.
Y: Is there.. any unusual, unusual accesories? (what is that?) could you talk about maybe an unusual accesory you have seen when you were looking at other peoples’ accesories? (what do I look for?) no, unusual, like, is there any accesory that’s not seen very often in other peopless (oh! unusual) yeah.
D: ok, I mean, you might.. yeah.. one accesory is a toe. what would you call them. a hitch! a trailer hitch. on the back of the motorcycle to tow trailers. (with a motorcycles?) yes! (Y: laugh) you tow trailers with your motorcycle. Lots of people take trailers. They are not huge trailers, although some are pretty big. These motorcycles are.. on the early Gold Wings, four cilinders, flat four configuration, mine is a 6 cilinder motorcycle, pulls about 82 horse power, the current one, is a 1.8 liter, six ciliender, it’s very powerful and the motor is very powerful too. so they are also very heavy. they’ve got trailers all day. they are big machines. so let’s see. Somtimes people will quit, although a platform, on the trailer hitch, and put a cooler on there, with beer [laugh]that’s not a good thing to do (to save space?) no you don’t wanna, you don’t want too much weight behind your back wheel. And I don’t do things like that. but you can get a cooler, I’m not suure, they probably have names for that cooler. they can go out there, right.. extra lights.. there are lots and lots of ways to put extra lights. Oh and guards.. there are fender guards.. they have pipe things that sort of protect people from hitting things. and there are.. [ircg:474] little bags you can buy.. very often they’ll have white valers in them. So extra lights , you know. And.. uh.. in a scuff plates, they go on the front, of you are your isolant when your lights not there, and the here [ircg:479] they don’t scratch them, they are.. cones, they scratch.. oh! yeah there is an important accesory I forgot, are “wind wings” wind wings attach to the sides of your motorcycle, and you can angle them out, to blow wind, or you can angle them this way to blow wind on you. and I would say 2/3 of the guys have wind wings. there’s some majors for these things. But there’s also “flip wings” I just bought one. Umm… for… honda.. 1500, which is what I own, and they go underneath the cilinders and they direct.. you know how those [ircg:494] get rode up behind your headlight office motorcycle. Those don’t give it. So, those are accesories. And I have both of them.
Y: could you.. could you give me examples of accents? what are those things?
D: I would have to look, I think. Umm… to see what they are all called. Since I have never owned one, each company has its own names for these things, so it’s harder to rememebr them. But the way to look for them is to look at ads, and there’s tons of them there. There’s just dozens of ways.. the phrases part of these machines that you can put on extra chrome on.. and.. long time ago they discovered they could chromium-plate-plastic (uhuh) so, it used to be too heavy to put on, with metal stuff on there. But they were able to .. put an electro-plate-plastic film on it I just found that out. So these are quite light, with little chrome (I see) but, they’re decorations. a lot of people go with pin-stripes, by you go to a rally, one of the things you do in a rally, kind of got off a rally, there’s usually a pin-striper or maybe an artist there, paintaing a mural on your bike, you know, airbrush them, or paint gun, on your motorcycle. airbrushinng is most popular, the mostr famous that got around here is a guy whose company name is “chicken-scratching” he comes every thursday around noon, and he’s pin-striped down the side of your tank or something, he will also do your names on the back of your travel trunk? another accesory you can get is a little map of the united states and you put little jewels on the states that you’ve been. (laugh) that’s one. but a lot of times people put their names, on, you know, jerome, and susan, on their motorcycles, a lot of them areon the backs of their helms, too. so your pin-striper would do that. if you go to a rally this year, you can get your bike “detailed” which mans absolutely get clean. for $100 a cost. and they sit there, polishing every knuckle and cranny in your motorcycle. stuff over, [ircg:536] now that”s if you are your windshiled patched, with designs, slogans, [ircg] get your tires changed (laugh) not often at the district rally, but the national rally get anything you want to [ircg:542] for your national rally.
Y: can we talk about the people who come to the national rally.. to the organization? like kinds of people..
D: well, it’s… GW people and it’s the GWRRA, GW for short there. And it’s just [clear throat] usually, let’s see if you’ve got a 5,000 bikes you’re gonna 10,000 people which is one out of every 8 members of the national association. so, from all parts of the country, more from close, fewer from far away, usually, there’re international campers too. chapters not only in canada, but also in most european countries, china, japan has one, although korea doesn’t have one.. maybe one or twoo.. you have to import your bike from here to get there. I haven’t seen forgot those.. list of countries every year.. it’s in the natioonal magazine.
Y: when you say that there’s a chapter director.. (the chapter director, right?) chapter educator (chapter educator) and the newspaper editor, or
D: there may be a chapter editor, but there may be not. usually there (the district editor) I was a district editor. same thing there. there’s a district director, and an assistant district director. chapters are supposed to have an assistant chapter director too. so you’ve got a director and an assistant director and educator. educators keep a lot of records and stuff. then, chapters have ride captains, or “road captains” (rogue?) road. road captains I can’t rememebr another.. there may be affiliation, maybe state, but! you know, they lead rides um.. they may have they sometimes make up office to keep people involved (Y laugh) like they have a chapter photographer.. chapter before email.. or usually before the website, or webmaster. chapter webmaster. chapter webmaster. and a district webmaster, forgot. at the district level, what else have we got.. district director, assistant district director, a distirct editor.. we’re supposed to have an assistant district editor.. we don’t. we have area editors, we have advertising coordinator, and we have a membership coordinator who keeps members on memebrship.
Y: you said that the chapter and the districts are levels, are there other kinds of levels..?
D: this [ircg:600] this would be an chicken and an egg here, probably should go like until 10am
Y: are there other kinds of levels? or, are they levels?
D: levels? yeah. I mean.. what we call them.. there’s chapters, chapters are organized into districts. districts are organized into regions, within regions, “E”, the exciting region. (uhuh) and.. (and what about the areas?) what about an area.. you have “regions”, “districts”, “regions” and the “nationals”.
Y: districts regions, and chapters?
D: it starts from the top, the national organization, which has some paid members at the top, and it’s called “the national” by everybody, I’ve met some of those guys, kind of interesting. then the we, the comprehended world, is divided into regions. so there’s a region director, there’s a region educator, and so forth. oh! we have trainers too, there’s a district trainer. chapters usually don’t have trainers. but we have a district trainer, we have a national trainer, and there’s also couples of the year at every level. they are called COYs, C.O.Y. couples of the year. so chapters often have a couple of the year, so chapters often have a chapter of the year. they choose a couple to be a couple of the year. they compete for district couple of the year, who compete for regional couple of the year, who compete for national couple of the year. so there’s a national.. I just met the national couple of the year. district..
Y: so there’s regions..a nd within the regions are the nationals.. (nationals are the largest, regiones are second) and then it’s the districts (then there’s the districts which is really the state) and then the chapters (and then the chapters) and then the chapters. (there’s nothing below or above that.) what about the people who are not.. so you dsaid that director.. and asst director and educator are officers? (they are called district officers) district officers? (yeah, district or chapter offices. officers) officers. well what about the people who aren’t officers. are there names for them? (for who?) people who aren’t officers (they’re just members) members. (uhuh) but you said that there were couples too. (yeah. couples are not officers. they are couples.) [laugh] ok. are couples kinds of members.
D: well… [puzzled expression] (Y: laugh) that’s a good question. yeah! I mean… yeah, if you took, it’s one of those odd taxonomies, where the general term is “the membership” the membership is divided into offciers, and to couples and into members again. but at the lower level you use the term “memebrs” but you repeat the term ,which you shouldn’t. but it works, ok? uh… and then by “road captains” aren’t officers (the district captains? oh the road cpatains) yeah. they’re not officers. they just positions in the chapter. and I don’t know how to suggest that.. oh there’s treasurers. (treasurers)- see? once you get into one of these lists, you start thinking about these. so there’s chapter treasurers, district treasurer, I think the region has a treasurer, I’m not sure. and I assume there’s a national treasurer. but.. manage the money.
Y: well, I think it’s time.. and I’ll try to get more stories from you next time
D: yeah.. you could.. we haven’t finished it yet..
Y: you haven’t finished the rally yet?
D: no, we haven’t finished the rally yet!
Y: oh the rally! [laugh]
D: there’s a lot of stuff going on the rally!
Y: we got stuck in the friday morning
D: we got the grand parade, and the banquet (the banquet) in there..
Y: and then there’s the fundraiser and the mall show..
D: uhuh, a lot of those things.
Y: I’ll ask you abotu those things next time. thanks for your time.
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