Architect's cycling journey spins his intellectual wheel

On the road

A 45-kilogram bag and an 18-kg bicycle are all that carried Bouman on the long journey that crossed about 300 rivers, climbed over 100 mountains and traveled through three deserts and regions with 16 different languages.

Dedicating much of his professional life to architecture, Bouman has a broad definition of it, which makes him see the journey as a kind of design project. Normally, he would cycle 120 to 130 km in roughly seven hours per day.

"For many people, architecture is about designing a beautiful building or just making a building. But I think architecture is about the careful organization of space or spatial arrangement. Once you are very strong in spatial organization, you can apply it to a building but also to other things, including cultures, history, engineering, stories and values — even a long journey. I think an architect should learn about all these things, " says Bouman.

During the journey, Bouman continued teaching online once a week from one location, where he shared his observations along the road and discussed with students what he would see and experience the next week. Together, with his students, Bouman has designed an inspiring "architectural journey".

Every day, Bouman rode toward new horizons and different destinations. He tried to find a road that was smooth enough to make some progress, but not so smooth to gain new experiences. Such a journey has brought him many unexpected challenges and deeper thinking.

Among the many difficulties that he faced were heat, cold, headwinds, distance, mountains, floods, bad roads, nails and rocks on the pavement, wild animals, aggressive guards, and sometimes the necessary distrust to get out of a situation quickly, according to his blog.

A big challenge came in May when he ran into the extreme heat at the Flaming Mountains and the drought of the Gobi and Taklimakan deserts in Northwest China's Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region.

These unexpected encounters inspired Bouman to further explore a core argument during the journey, which he summarizes as "the clash between West and East, as well as the clash between modernity and nature, and how to overcome them".

Cycling from the West and capturing thousands of memorable moments, Bouman says he became more convinced that his journey was also about peace.