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Behind the Wheel - Vespa Culture
By Amy Maestas
Photo by K. Gasperini
It is nearly 10 p.m. in downtown San Jose, Calif., and the sidewalk in front
of Fuel, a storefront bar at 44 Almaden Street, is empty. Until April Whitney
shows up.
Whitney rounds the street corner straddling her 1978 P200E Vespa. Its
buzzing engine comes to an abrupt stop when Whitney glides to a halt on the
sidewalk. She has the perfect parking spot, because there is nary a free
space on the streets in downtown San Jose. The orange-red Vespa, with an
early 1970s Buick Wildcat emblem (part of the her ongoing effort to give the
bike a Josie and the Pussycats theme) is out of the path of any passers-by,
but still in the most convenient spot in the city. This is really why two
Italian men invented Vespas - primo parking in a crowded city.
There's probably a city ordinance in San Jose prohibiting parking Vespas
on sidewalks. But Whitney, a 29-year-old book publicist in San Jose, assures
me that she knows the bar owner, and he doesn't care that she parks there.
Never mind that the sidewalk is public domain.
Inside Fuel, a group of convention goers mingle at a post-happy hour
pace. Whitney and two of her Vespa-riding friends pick an out-of-the-way
table to get down to business. They have story after story about how they
came to be Vespitis (that's lingo for people who love Vespas and the
lifestyle they represent), and subsequent members of the Dana Scully Scooter
Club - an all-women group with 12 members. The club is so-named for its
members' adoration for "X-Files" character Dana Scully. Members describe
themselves as "Dana-licious." They promise, "the scoot is out there."
Club President Carrie Dubiner holds up a bag full of scooter-related toys.
She dumps the contents on the bar table - an ash tray with Vespas on it, a
Vespa porcelain party favor of a man and woman, a Vespa charm bracelet, and a
bandana with scooters on it.
Dubiner's toy collection is an example of her Vespa obsession, which
began 13 years ago in Berkeley, Calif. She ecstatically recounts stories of
being the only girl in the local scooter club during the mid-1980s. Her
lively personality puts the zing in every word she speaks while she tugs at
the Vespa pendant necklace around her neck.
Whitney and Lori Braithwaite, a 27-year-old industrial engineer in San
Jose, listen intently for a few minutes while Dubiner dominates the
conversation. Outside, no one touches Whitney's scooter, which is parked near
Braithwaite's 1974 Primavera. When there's a break, the conversation explodes
into the lure of Vespas.
Whitney and Braithwaite are drawn to the liberating lifestyle of being
scooterists. There are unparalleled advantages to riding a Vespa as opposed
to driving a car, excepting one thing: "You'd never pick your nose on a
scooter, but people do it in their cars," says Whitney.
"When you are on a scooter, you are part of where you are. You aren't
isolated like when you are in a car," she adds.
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