Nearly two years into my move to China, I can say with conviction that if I had to do it all over again, I would do one thing differently: buy a bicycle as soon as I arrived.

Few things have given me more joy in my time here than being able to go out the back door of my apartment building, unlock my bike, hop on it and ride off to some not terribly distant part of the city. I have found no better way to take in the sights, sounds and, yes, even smells of my temporary home. And Beijing, being flat as a pancake in most of its parts, seems as if it were custom-made for bicyclists. Knowing I'd almost never have to ride up a hill, I didn't even bother buying a bike with gears.

But why, I've asked myself several times, did I wait a full year-and-a-half to get one? Well, first, there were safety anxieties. Of all the things in Beijing that have undermined my sense of ease, a significant concern has been drivers' frequent habit of using designated bike lanes as all-purpose shortcuts.