April 17th, 2012 
AstroNerdBoy ハヤテのごとく！/Hayate no Gotoku Chapter 357
SPOILER Summary/Synopsis:
Hina and Hayate visit Ruka at her latest concert, seeing her more like an idol than ever before. Sometime later, Ruka comes by the apartment house and as she eats udon, she tells Hayate that her latest ad campaign is to feature her riding a bicycle, only she can’t ride one and no one knows. Since the shoot is the following day, the surprised Hayate decides they can spend the day teaching her how to ride a bike. Ruka is not convinced, revealing her fear of falling off, but since Hayate is a former bicycle courier (and the fastest), he assures her he can help her.
Using the small yard as a training area, Hayate installs training wheels on the bike, though Ruka is embarrassed by this. Chiharu comes home and asks what’s going on as Ruka accidentally destroys Maria’s vegetable garden.
That evening, they’ve made no progress, so Chiharu suggests they use the Hakuou campus for the training since it is private, thus keeping Ruka out of the spotlight.
Thoughts/Review:
OK, another new character that I’m not aware of — Ruka. *lol* So, now there’s an idol in the mix along with all the other girls. It will be interesting to learn how she came into the picture.
Being that this is just a setup chapter for something more, there’s not a great deal to discuss here. However, the chapter did remind me of when I was a little kid and got my first bike. At five, I was too young to care about training wheels, which my first bike had. At seven, I’d scored my BMX dirt bike, which back in the 70’s, was THE thing for a boy to have. I’ll never forget that first outing though. A dirt bike had a different feel from a banana-seat bike, and I biffed it a few times on that dirt bike. It didn’t take long to get used to the new bike though, and it served me well. ^_^
Still, I can understand and appreciate Ruka’s fear of the bike. At five, I was scared of the bike too. ^_^;;;
Anyway, I’m interested in seeing where Hata-sensei takes this story.
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Hi ANB
I’m around the same age as you and got to know about your blog due to Tenchi Muyo series.
Speaking of the 70’s…..i remember having a ‘chopper’ model as a kid….the kind of bike where the front wheel is much smaller than the rear one and you had a large seat with a back rest. I never did own a BMX but had ridden one a few times.
The last bike i owned was a street ‘racer’ bike in the 80’s during my high school days and i had it till the mid 90’s until it was given away to a family friend’s teenage children.
Cheers
I remember a neighborhood kid having a chopper bike. *lol* I’d forgotten about them. Most of us had dirt bikes though and did the whole ramp building thing to make jumps and the like. We did ALL that without a helmet too. *lol*
By the mid-80’s, I’d changed to a 12-speed racing bike, which I used until it broke.
Today, I often think of how I’d love to have a bike again. I’d probably get a mountain bike this time around.
If you really want to know about Ruka’s history, she had a similar problem as Hayate by being left with a huge debt to pay off. And the way she went about it was to become a huge idol and earn the money needed to pay it off.
Hmmm. Well, I guess that would explain their connection.