Female bikers compose a group called “The Litas Manila” who describe themselves as strong women with common interests. From right to left: Carol Karthe, Gaki Azurin, Sarie Cruz, Cal Soesanto, Nikki Orial and Erika Fernandez. Photos by Jamillah Sta. Rosa

Even standing still, the Litas draw a crowd.

It’s only a Wednesday afternoon coffee run, but passersby at the BGC cafe stop to gawk as the girls park their Ducatis, KTMs and Harley- Davidsons by the entrance. Security guards on motorcycles brake to see what the commotion is about. A boy of about 8 or 9 stands agog.

“Mga riders ba ’yan?” he asks.

Female riders are an increasingly common sight on Manila’s mean streets.

You see them everywhere, zipping around on their scooters, underbones or even E-bikes, sometimes with a child clinging to the back or a bag of groceries hanging from the handlebars.

It’s easy to see why: Women have places to go, too, a motorbike is the quickest way to get from A to B in Metro traffic, and everyone knows public transport is for chumps.

Another story

But a woman confidently handling a big bike on the road, or riding just to ride, is another story.

She’s still a rare bird in these parts, where anything above 400cc is considered a “big bike,” and still elicits double-takes from other motorists on the road.

When I first heard about them, I guessed that the name was short for something, like “Angelitas” or “Diablitas,” but no, they’re just “the Litas.”

“We’re not a motorcycle gang,” says Erika Fernandez, one of the three founding members of the Manila branch. “We’re a group of strong women with a common interest in adventures and motorcycles.”

That just about sums it up.

The Litas is a global collective of women who ride motorcycles. It was founded in the US in 2014 by Jessica Haggett, a rider who felt the need to build a community of other female riders. As it turned out, she wasn’t alone. Far from it. Today the Litas number over 3,500 members in 150-plus cities in 19 countries. As of now, eight of them are here.

Three founders

The Manila chapter only started up last month, after the three founders met at a dirt track during a riding clinic for women.

Gaki Azurin, a personal fitness trainer by day, musician by night and motorcycle video blogger the rest of the time, had been looking for other women to ride with since starting her YouTube channel under her online moniker GakiMoto last year (see https://lifestyle.inquirer.net/251760/gakimoto-roams-city-bike-films-ride/).

She heard about the Litas while traveling abroad, and broached the idea to Fernandez, who runs her own digital advertising company, among other corporate pursuits, and Carol Karthe, a swimming coach, polo player and avid adventure rider.

“It’s a sisterhood. We always say, ‘go at your own pace, I’ll ride beside you.’”

“We were all looking for other girls to ride with,” she recalls.

The three e-mailed Haggett, got the imprimatur, and within days of launching their Facebook and Instagram pages as The Litas Manila, other women riders were getting in touch to join up.

It’s not hard to understand why. Despite the growing number of female riders, motorcycling is still pretty much a guy thing. With all the testosterone emitted during a typical group ride, it’s easy to feel left out.

“Guys are more daring, it’s hard to keep up with them,” says Nikki Orial, a 32-year-old IT specialist who currently rides a Ducati Scrambler Full Throttle.

“They really push it, sometimes more than 200 km per hour. I get dragged along. It’s really challenging, having to keep up. I don’t like getting special treatment when I ride with the boys. With the Litas it’s more toned down, we’re more equal, and they’re more fun to talk to. With the Litas out there, I hope more women will be encouraged to try bigger bikes.”

Completely different

Fernandez puts it another way: “Women and men are completely different in general. Women like to take care of each other. Men like to measure dicks. So, pabilisan ’yan. Girls like to take care of each other, it’s like a maternal instinct that we possess. It’s a sisterhood. I don’t think we’ve ever told another girl, ‘o bilisan mo.’ We always say, ‘go at your own pace, I’ll ride beside you.’”

Men also tend to run in cliques, often dictated by the kind of bikes they ride. In the Philippines there’s a BMW owners’ club, a Harley-Davidson owners’ club, a Royal Enfield club, a Ducati club, and so on. There are also groups that revolve around kinds of motorcycles: café racers, vintage classics, sport bikes, offroad bikes, touring bikes.

In contrast, the Litas value diversity and inclusiveness.

Azurin rides a Ducati Scrambler Sixty-Two as well as a KTM Duke 390, a nimble street bike. Karthe rides a Ducati Scrambler Urban Enduro and a BMW GS 650 touring bike. Fernandez rides a 1979 Yamaha RS 100, a classic two-stroke dirt bike.

Cal Soesanto, a former club DJ who seems to be the most petite of the Litas, rides the biggest bike, a Harley-Davidson Iron 883 Sportster. Filmmaker Sarie Cruz doesn’t even have a bike yet—she’s still deciding what to get.

Riding experience

There’s also a wide range of riding experience within the group: Orial, who’s only been riding seriously for about a year, considers herself a “newbie.” Karthe, who’s been riding for 26 years, has logged the most saddle time.

“I’m the most experienced but I’m also, like, twice their age,” says the 46-year-old who’s ridden Tibet in minus 10-degree weather, and New Zealand during a freak storm when a tree fell on her and her bike.

“It was the strongest recorded typhoon in New Zealand,” she recalls. “When my husband stopped to help me, the wind blew his motorcycle away. I was in four hospitals in two weeks. I lost my calf muscle.”

Even more painful was a large circle of raw flesh on her side where the road abraded her jacket, shirt and skin off.

That doesn’t seem to have dampened her enthusiasm for motorbikes.

“I need to ride,” she says. “This December I’ll be riding from Sydney to Melbourne. It’s going to be a one-month ride.”

Meanwhile, she’ll be riding with the Litas, which has its own appeal.

“The camaraderie between women is different,” she says.

“We are women of a certain persuasion,” Fernandez agrees. “We talk about the same things: our love life, our menstrual cycles, TV shows. We have nothing else to prove.”

Among other things, the Litas is also about breaking out of stereotypes.

“The moment you put a girl in a male-dominated hobby, it’s seen in two ways,” she continues. “They’re either looked at as a dyke, or as the girl they could never be with for the rest of their lives. There’s nothing in between. They don’t like the idea of women who are strong, women who have their shit together, basically.”

Liberal membership

Membership in the Litas is fairly liberal. Apart from excluding scooters, there are few rules.

“We’re supposed to have an event at least once a month, but it doesn’t have to be a ride,” says Azurin. “It can be a ‘wrench night,’” she adds, meaning learning how to fix their bikes, or some other technical session.

The group is a platform for women to be able to ride together, and ride safely. Apart from sharing riding tips, the group encourages its members to attend riding courses and clinics to upgrade their bike-handling skills and boost their confidence.

For now, the Litas is still building up its membership. In the future, Azurin foresees the Litas becoming an advocacy group for female motorcyclists, but for now the focus is on fun.

Last Sept. 24, three of the Litas “crashed” the Distinguished Gentleman’s Ride, ostensibly an international fundraising event against prostate cancer, but really an excuse for men to dress up like dandies and show off their vintage or classic scooters and motorcycles.

“We want to show the boys how it’s done,” says Azurin.