Making the Mighty Dragon 888 motorbike
BEIJING, China (CNN) -- Kenny Kan started customizing bikes more than 30 years ago, when he inherited his brother's old two-wheeler.
Kenny Kan made this 10-inch model of his motorcycle, customized in honor of the Beijing Olympics.
"It was jungle green, the ugliest thing you'd ever seen," he said. "I chromed everything I could chrome and added a golden phoenix to the body. People in town thought I was crazy."
The following year Kenny customized his first motorcycle, and a lifelong passion ensued. Now 61, Kan has harnessed his artistic talents and love of wheels to create the Mighty Dragon 888 -- a 1400cc, 900-pound Harley Davidson chopper in fire-engine red.
"I built it for the Olympics," he said proudly. "China has been poor [and] invaded for hundreds of years. Finally it came up to be a great nation again. And it has the ability to hold the Olympic Games."
As someone of Chinese origin, Kan wanted to contribute something meaningful to the event.
The Mighty Dragon's 3-meter-long frame is loaded with auspicious Chinese references, Olympic icons and cultural symbols of Beijing. A stainless-steel dragon's head sits between the handlebars, its body snaking over the gas tank and ending in a flicked tail past the backrest. A shiny pearl nestled in its mouth is a functioning headlight.
A miniature replica of the Bird's Nest (the National Stadium) serves as the chopper's seat, and the belt pulley guard mimics the geometric exterior of the Water Cube (the National Aquatics Center), two venues built specifically for the Games.
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On the backrest is the number 2008 and the five Olympic rings reorganized in a semi-circle around another ring to simultaneously resemble a triple 8 and the head of an Olympic mascot.
Even Mao Zedong makes an appearance; the fork stabilizer at the front of the bike is a mini version of the Gate of Heavenly Peace in Tiananmen Square, complete with a tiny color photo of the Chairman. On the side, a stainless-steel Temple of Heaven covers the air filter. The wheel guards are fashioned after the Great Wall.
"I made the front of the Great Wall steps to welcome people to Beijing," he said, pointing to three tiny stairs above the front wheel, "because the wall's not supposed to be a barrier anymore."
Kan is a short, robust man with cheeks that puff up under his glasses when he smiles. When he talks about his motorcycles, he gets positively giggly. A self-professed kid at heart, he is unapologetic about his love for speed and raw horsepower. He recounts a recent family outing in Beijing.
"We walked into a motorcycle dealership, and the salesmen got excited to see their potential buyers -- two young boys. My wife pointed them to me and told them not to endanger her sons. When the salesman asked about endangering my life, she said, 'That's his mother's problem!'"
Both Kan's parents were from Guangdong Province, in China's south. They relocated to Malaysia before Kenny was born. In a small town called Teluk Anson, Kenny's dad made a comfortable middle-class living running a sundry shop, a soy sauce factory and a timber mill.
As a kid Kenny gravitated to drawing, even winning a couple poster competitions. In 1971, he moved to the United States to study fine arts at the University of Texas at Austin. After graduating he headed to New York, where he spent five years as a struggling artist.
"I did everything -- illustrations for Chinese newspapers, paintings -- I was a jack of all trades and a master of none."
Marriage drove him back to Texas, this time to Houston. In pursuit of stable income, Kenny settled into the oil industry and spent the next 25 years importing and exporting industrial parts.
He kept in touch with his hobby, modifying about 10 different motorcycles through the years. But the Mighty Dragon is the first motorcycle Kan built from the ground up.
"I used mostly Mom and Pop places for the parts," he said. Building the bike in China cost over $60,000, but Kan estimates it would have cost more than double to build it in the U.S.
Kan did encounter setbacks. Government restrictions on air-polluting activities made it difficult to get the bike painted. Then a company he sourced for stainless steel was commissioned to make wheelchair-accessible railings for the upcoming Paralympic Games; they were too busy for Kan's orders. All told, the Mighty Dragon 888 took over six months to complete.
Despite the hefty time and financial investment, Kenny has no plans to sell the bike. Instead, he has applied to have it accepted into the permanent collection of the Olympic Museum. He is still waiting for an official response.
In the meantime, he is already thinking ahead to his next project.
"You have a dragon bike, you gotta have a phoenix one to match!"
