Over 100,000 Chinese students join night-time bike ride in search of good soup dumplings

A night-time cycling trend that started with four Chinese students riding 50km for dumplings blew out to a reported over 100,000 people on Friday, jamming major roads, overwhelming a small tourist city and drawing the attention of authorities.

The pack of students, mostly on public share bikes, rode several hours through Henan Province from their campuses in Zhengzhou to the ancient city of Kaifeng.

“People sang together and cheered for each other while climbing uphill together,” Liu Lulu, a student at Henan University, told China Daily. “I could feel the passion of the young people. And it was much more than a bike ride.”

But Kaifeng quickly reached capacity, with accommodation, restaurants and public spaces packed to bursting, officials said. Video circulating online shows tens of thousands of cyclists filling the six-lane Zhengkai avenue, the expressway between Zhengzhou and the streets of the much smaller Kaifeng, as Police used loudhailers to ask students to leave, by bike or on a free bus.

To prevent a repeat of Friday’s event, authorities announced temporary restrictions on roads and cycle paths for the weekend, and bike share apps warned they would remotely lock any bikes taken out of designated zones in Zhengzhou.

Some Zhengzhou universities also enacted measures including banning bicycles on campuses and requiring students to apply for passes to leave the grounds. (The Guardian)

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