Everybody has something they’re overly attached to. Whether it’s that old stuffed tiger you had as a kid, or the ever-growing jungle of houseplants taking up your entire living room, we often develop emotional attachments to the inanimate objects that colour our lives. A select few, however, take this a step further. For a certain class of Mile End fuckboys, dads going through a midlife crisis, and general gearheads, bikes are more than possessions. It’s hard to explain what makes cycling so attractive; some do it for the aesthetic, some for the health benefits, and others just like turning an old piece of junk into something new.
For Elias Andraos, U3 Science, part of the appeal is being able to roll up his sleeves and get his hands greasy. In his spare time, he runs a bike salvage shop out of his backyard and kitchen.
Andraos’ love affair with grease and gears began when he started commuting to school on an old beater because of his chronic knee pain. One fateful morning, his rear axle snapped, and he was left bikeless and stranded. Devoid of options, he entered McGill’s bike co-op, the Flat Bike Collective, and found just what he needed.
Nicknamed “the Flat,” “ the Flat Bike Collective is a hub at McGill for all things bike. It offers concrete education, inviting students to come to learn how to fix their bikes with their own tools, and it also offers workshops on bike maintenance. But the Flat also makes bikes accessible to more students by selling them for cheap.
“This one guy Tommy helped me take a look at it,” Andraos recalled. “He kind of just showed me how easy it was to fix these things. Of course, you do need some tools, but the tools are fairly minimal. It just kind of blew my mind that you could just fix bikes that easily. So then I started tinkering more on that bike.”
Andraos’ fascination quickly grew, and after messing around with a few trashed bikes given to him by friends, he decided to make fixing up old bikes a mainstay in his life. He has made a practice out of finding scrap bikes for almost nothing and fixing them up for free and gifting them to his friends.
“I started just browsing Kijiji for broken bicycles, and it’s amazing,” Andraos explained. “You can find someone’s broken stuff there and fix them up. After a while, I didn’t have any friends without bikes anymore, so I started selling them on the listserv of the outdoor club.”
During the many lockdowns last year, repairing beat-up bikes was a great way for Andraos to occupy his hands and mind.
“I just really needed that kind of aspect of working with my hands and seeing the progress,” Andraos said. “You have some unreadable piece of junk, and you work on it, and it becomes better.” Since the re-opening of in-person activities at McGill, Andraos has started volunteering at the Flat.