JAWA PARADISE

By Mario Mager

(Now with Thumbnails)

(Based on a holiday in Alanya. May 1998)

 You may well remember me mention in my last story about my escapades in Turkey, that Sadie and I decided that the next place we would visit in Turkey would be Alanya. We went on a day trip to Alanya, and found it so charming, that we wanted to spend much more time there. It had a picturesque harbour, an ancient castle on a mountainous hill, long golden beaches, Banana & palm trees growing all over the place. It was ideally situated for excursions to places of interest like Cappadocia. Might I remind you also, that when we went there, I found an old Jawa in nearly every street. You think I jest? Well read on.

 To get to Alanya, you need to land at Antalya airport. This is about a two hour transfer journey by coach. The road between Antalya and Alanya is quite straight, as it basically follows the coast. Such roads can be quite boring. To prevent myself from falling asleep after our flight, I decided for fun, I would count the number of Jawas I saw by the roadside, as we travelled towards Alanya. Interestingly, the first five Jawas I saw, were five different sorts! They were a Jawa-559, Jawa Laser (Turkish Jawa copy), Jawa 350, Jawa Yezdi (Indian Jawa copy), and a Xing-Fu (Chinese Jawa variant). As we got closer to Alanya, the regularity of Jawas increased greatly. By the time we disembarked from the coach, I had seen 83 Jawas in all. At the Alanya end of the journey, about 80% of the Jawas seen were old 559s.

We checked in to the Hotel Banana, which turned out to be one of the best Hotels we have ever stayed in while on holiday in Turkey, despite it’s funny name. The food was excellent. The restaurant was alongside the beach giving one a lovely view while dining. As we crashed out in our room for the first night, I couldn’t but help notice, that one could even hear the sound of Jawas in the street from the comfort of my bed! Who needs to count sheep to get to sleep, when you can hear so many Jawas from your bed! I didn’t need to count them, as after such a long trip, I was out like a 6 volt pal headlamp bulb!

 For the sake of brevity, and for the sake of JAWA-CZ enthusiasts, I will only mention the Jawa features of this holiday. We did, as a family, do a lot of other things, so don’t feel that they were neglected or abandoned in any way. I found many times, when my family were so tired, that they just wanted to lounge around the pool and soak up the sun, which gave me more than enough time to venture out and explore.

 Over the years I have found one of the hardest things to do, is actually locate a Jawa spares shop. This time though, even though I was new to Alanya, I had an ace card up my sleeve. My good pal Timo Mononen from Finland (A Jawasakki club member) has been to Alanya many times, and has always described Alanya as ‘Jawa Paradise’ on his postcards. So what I did last year, was to buy a street plan of Alanya. I made a photocopy of it, and sent it to Timo. I asked him if he would be so kind as to mark on the map the location of the Jawa shop. When it arrived back, accordingly marked, I put it safely away, so that I wouldn’t forget it when we actually came to go away. At that time, we had not made our booking, so I had no idea which Hotel we would be staying in. You can imagine my surprise, when I dug out this map, only to find the Hotel Banana indicated on the map, and situated very near to the location of the Jawa shop! It was in a large industrial estate, only five minutes walk from our Hotel. The industrial estate was tucked well away out of sight, and you would never have noticed it, or found it, unless you were deliberately looking for it.

 Timo hadn’t quite marked the exact location of the shop quite correctly, so I just wandered around through the labyrinth of streets, looking at all the different types of workshops and wholesalers present there. There were old Jawas everywhere! Mostly they belonged to the workers in these small industrial units. I then came across a small unit that had three engine-less Jawas (559s) outside. I couldn’t but help notice, that this was in fact a repair shop, specialising in repairing Jawas! Within five minutes, I was invited inside, sat down, and offered a drink of Turkish tea. There appeared to be the owner, and at least three lads working for him as mechanics on various tasks repairing these Jawas. Once I got my photograph album out, I was surrounded by a host of peering eyes, and a babble of amazement in their natural guttural Turkish. Despite my limited Turkish vocabulary, and their limited English, our mutual interest was discussed by means of gestures and sketches. It was soon apparent, that they wanted one of my photos to go on their workshop wall! Just by chance, I had one that I could spare. It was proudly pinned up on their wall. So take note Jawa fans. If you ever go to Turkey, be sure to have plenty of spare Jawa photos with you, the Turks just love them.

 Then I was invited outside to inspect a Jawa 350 (638). It was started up for me, and I was invited to listen to the engine. The owner then invited me to take it for a ride! So off I went with my newly made friend riding pillion, going down what was to me, the wrong side of the roads. He shouted in my ear “You good driver?” I thought that it was a bit late to ask me such a question! I was doing well until I came to a traffic signal, which was displaying a red flashing traffic light. What on earth does that mean? Stop, Go, or what? To be on the safe side, I pulled up. Then to my amazement, my pillion then jumped off! He said that the bike needed Benzene (Petrol) and indicated that the bike was mine to borrow for as long as I wanted, just as long as I put gas in the tank! This was an amazingly friendly gesture from a person who I had only known for half an hour! How on earth would I find a petrol station, and how on earth would I ask a Turk for a tank full of two stoke? When I looked inside the tank it appeared bone dry! I must have been running on fumes, or just a float chamber full! The gesture was champion, but not necessary, as I had no intention of trying to ride around Turkish style with my family, in other words three up! So I begged my new found friend to get back on board. I successfully navigated my way back to his premises, and thanked him for the ride. I gestured, that I would came back and see them another day. As I walked down the road still recovering from the experience, I had totally forgotten that my feet were only clad in sandals! When I looked down, my right big toe, was black as a lump of coal from changing gear! You have heard of Rudolf the red nosed reindeer, well here was Mario the black toed Mager! It was time to return to the Hotel. Perhaps I would find the Jawa shop tomorrow?

 During my next attempt to find the Jawa shop, I realised it would help if I had the map the right way up! I soon tracked down the TWO shops marked on the map. It seems hard to imagine how two shops selling Jawa & honda spares can survive on opposite sides of the road to each other! I picked the one which had the most interesting parts in easy view. Once again, once I introduced myself by means of my photographs, I was asked to sit down, and share some Turkish tea. Don’t think that this was preferential treatment, as most customers in most Turkish shops are offered a seat and refreshment. I have made purchases for as little as £1.50, and been offered a seat and a drink.

By means of gestures and drawings, I was able to purchase many hard to get spares for my ancient Jawa, including a replacement speedometer glass! The main item on my shopping list was a new seat. I had noticed the last time I was in Alanya, that in this area, and in this area only, I saw Jawa seats fitted with a sort of see through waterproof cover, blue in colour. I thought that one of these would go nicely on my grey & blue Jawa (1964-354) that I am restoring. I pointed to some black seats that were in the shop, and asked for one with a blue cover. The owner held up three fingers, indicating to me, that he would have some in  three days. I was wrong, he then pointed to his watch, and implied that one would be here in three hours!!! Now that is what I call service! I told him that I would be back another day. Sure enough, the next day, there were a pile of new seats in stock! Now where this new stock came from I do not know. They obviously did not come far. They must be produced somewhere reasonably locally. That is the unusual thing about Turkey. You see things that are peculiar to a certain area, and never see them anywhere else! For example, in Alanya, white footrest rubbers, and yellow twist grip rubbers, seem to be the norm here. Rarely seen anywhere else if at all.

It was impossible to walk down any street without seeing a Jawa! 

In the town centre near Attaturk’s statue, I saw a row of at least 6 Jawas. At first, I thought that they must have been parked up while they were shopping. I was later to discover, that they were actually motorcycle taxis! The Turks regard these as an intermediate form of transport. Regular Taxis are quite expensive. The Dolmus, which is like a regular mini bus service  (Dolmus by the way is Turkish for ‘stuffed’) which can get a bit crowded at times with a fare of only 25pence, which is very cheap. The motorcycle taxis are in between. A trip back to your Hotel would only set you back about £1. I never did get around to going back to the hotel in this manner, as I preferred to walk everywhere, as you saw much more on foot, and could always stop where and when I wanted. Needles to say, I always seem to spot the most unusual and interesting bikes while riding in the Dolmuê or coach! (See Sinbad Returns). Three bikes which I saw were a new MZ 125 fitted with a four stroke engine (CG 125 I think) and a Russian bike that appeared to be a twin cylinder version of the 350cc Planeta! Would it be a 700cc two stroke twin? I don’t know, and will never know, until I find one parked up somewhere. The third came as a nice surprise to me. It was a modern Jawa 350 (638), that had built in panniers, and a fairing. I did see one of these up north last October, but when I saw it, I thought that some Turk must have got himself a fibreglass kit, and customised his 638. Now after seeing a yellow version hurtling down the street, I could see that the panel work was identical! So somewhere in Turkey, they must be producing a customised fairing and pannier kit. At first glance, one would think that it was a jap bike. So until I get a good photo of one of these bikes, clad with one of these kits, I will be unable to make any further enquiries about them in the Jawa shop. All I have is a photo of a machine that is draped with an coat over it, so much detail is lost on photograph. The good news is, that Jawa 350s fitted with 638 engines, seem to be in production in Turkey now. I knew that they were producing MZs, but I did not know that Jawa production had started, even though I assumed that this would eventually happen when the mother factory in Czecho switched to four stroke bikes. You can easily identify a Turkish built Jawa 350 from a Czech built one simply by examining the headstock plate. The Czechs have the regular date stamp ‘1996’ etc, but the Turks include the year of manufacture in the frame number, and there is no separate line where one would normally find a date stamp. I got talking to guy who spoke good English. He says that they don’t even talk about model numbers! To them a Jawa 350 is Jawa 350, no matter if it is a 638TS or a 640 Style! I showed him the engine serial number on a bike, and pointed out, that it started with ‘638’. He said “Oh! We never look at those numbers! To us it is Just a Jawa 350!” So if you plan on getting any 638/640 parts from Turkey, you will have a whale of a time explaining to the guy in the shop what you want!

 One day I decided to purchase a few postcards to send to a few friends. At the top of my list was of course Timo Mononen. Without his help, I would have taken a lot longer to find the Jawa shop. But with having the Jawa shop so close, I am sure that if I started my search by looking for an industrial estate, then I guess, that I would have stumbled over the Jawa shop eventually. I decided though, on this occasion, just to venture a little deeper into the Industrial estate, to see if I could find any particularly interesting bikes parked up.

One interesting bike I found was 1955 Maico 350cc twin!        

I also came across a lad repairing a CZ 450 (60’s 125cc) outside a woodworking shop. After capturing him on camera, I went up to him and showed him my photos. The next minute you know, I was surrounded by a crowd of intrigued onlookers. The Turks just cannot understand why anyone would strip a bike down to it’s frame, then built it up like new, when the bike could have been used in it’s un-restored condition. It turned out, that this old CZ (Which were quite scarce in this part of Turkey) was not his, but belonged to his boss! He was putting the wheel back, after repairing a puncture. I moved on to try and find some more interesting targets for my camera. When there are dozens upon dozens of old Jawas to be seen, you end up having to find one that is unusual in some way, or else you would be out of film within the hour! I did see one two stroke machine, that at first, I could not identify. It looked more like a

I decided that I would steer clear of the road which had the Jawa repair shop, as I knew, that if I went past, that I would be immediately invited in. I wanted to spend a little exploring, and not socialising for the moment. Then after a few minutes walkabout, I heard the familiar sound of a Jawa 350 twin approach. I turned around only to see it was the guy from the Jawa repair shop! He gestured for me to jump on the back seat, so within moments I was back at the Jawa repair shop, sitting down drinking Turkish tea! It was probably the nearest I have ever been to being hijacked! I did though find out some very very interesting information during this second visit. They wanted to know how many Jawa were in Britain. I indicated that I do not know, but there were about 400 hundred members in our club (Est 1954). I was then given a piece of paper, that had the population of Jawas in the Alanya region. I was flabbergasted. The number was 20,000!!!! I don’t question this guys estimate, as he make a living out of repairing these machines, so I guess he must be right! Why so many you may ask?

Well. It seems that when an old Jawa is broken, they just fix it. When it breaks again, they just fix it again. Bikes are rarely scrapped here. Even after a serious road accident, one can just go down to your local Jawa spares shop, and buy a new 559 frame, and rebuild it! That is why there are no breakers yards, or even scrap yards for cars here! Turks just don’t do things that way. I enquired about the price of an old Jawa. I was told, that now the older (559s) could cost second hand anything up to £300, as these older machines, are now regarded as an antique, and can cost more than a modern Jawa! So that explains the high population of Jawas. Not only that. Alanya was not always a tourist area. Ten years ago, the (town) population was only 25,000. Now there 125,000 people in Alanya. Despite modernisation and development of the area, many of the locals still stuck to owning their trusty Jawas. Plumbers, waiters, cleaners, maintenance men, all sorts of people can bee seen riding around Jawas in Alanya, whereas up North, it tended to be the poorer farming type who rode Jawas.

I noticed as I have done in the past, the presence of the Indian ‘Yezdi’ Jawa, and the Chinese ‘Xing-Fu’ Jawa in many parts of Turkey. The Yezdi, is fitted with a Californian type petrol tank. These tanks, and the tank badges are very sought after in club circles in the UK. I tried to find out if there was an agent for these Indian Jawas. Do you know what I found out? There are NO agents for these machines! What happens is that some enterprising Turk buys a boat load of these machines and then sells them in his shop. It could be a shop that sells hi-fi or kitchen equipment, in fact any sort of shop. That is how they do things here! “What about warrantee, service and spares back up?” I hear you ask. There is NONE! What they do is, if they need a part then a regular Jawa item has to be fitted. If it does not fit, it is made to fit. So it was just as well, that the Indian and Chinese factories stuck to the original bore and stroke when producing these Jawa variants or else such bikes would be totally un-saleable!

It has never ceased to amaze me, as to how many countries in the world have Jawas. Each country though, with different cultures and climates, have different problems. Here in the UK, rain and salt on the road, are the biggest enemy to any motorcycle, not just Jawas. So here in the UK we get problems with rust, and gunge in the petrol tank if a bike has been left standing. Even the main bearings can rust without you knowing! In Turkey though, they seem to have different set of problems. I was told that Jawas are not ideally suited to the high temperatures (which explains why they sold so many to the USSR!) here are few problems, that the average Turk has to deal with from time to time. Due to the extreme temperature variation, it is common for Turkish Jawas to suffer from a petrol leak where the petrol tap is screwed into the petrol tank. The steel tank expands, allowing the alloy thread to work itself loose. It gets tightened. Eventually, the allow thread allows petrol to leak out. So what happens is that Mr. Jawaturk goes to his friendly Jawa shop and buys a new tap! It works out cheaper to buy a new tap, than to lose petrol on the floor! I have NEVER had this problem in the UK.

Also due the high temperatures, Dynamos and ignition points don’t seem to last very long either. The point faces apparently just melt! The Turkish word for ignition points is ‘Platin’. So if you fancy buying a few sets while you are there, they are only £1 each! Despite these problems, Jawas are incredibly popular in Alanya. I don’t know why, but it is just great that it is like that. I can confidently say, that you will see more Jawas in Alanya, than anywhere in Czechoslovakia, even in the 60’s! So if you are in two minds as whether to visit Prague or Alanya, go to Alanya, as you will see very few Jawa on the streets in everyday use in Prague. And as regarding pre 74 Jawa spares. I don’t think there is anywhere in the world that comes any where near what you can obtain in Turkey, especially Alanya.

Every body asks me “How did you get that lot through the customs?”. So I will conclude by telling you about my ‘box of bits’. I found a large cardboard box for my silencers and seat this time, as there was no way that such items would squeeze into the suitcase. I wrapped the contents up in towels and things. Put masses of Cellotape around it, to make sure that it would not burst open. Using a large felt pen, I decorated the box with my flight number and home address. I also wrote on the side, the contents of the box in Turkish. Jawa-Eksoz (Exhausts) Jawa-Oturak (seat). So that the items inside could be easily identified by the x-ray machine at the airport.

Here I must remind you, that you can bring home from Turkey any legal item or substance, gifts or personal purchases, to the value of £140 (into the UK). Jawa parts are not considered as contraband in ANY country. It would be prudent though, to have written receipt for the good you bring back, as some customs officers might not believe you how cheap your purchases were! If you do ever get stopped, bearing in mind I have done this five times, and have never had any problems, all you have to do, is state that these items are a ‘personal import’ to which you have a right to import, to the maximum value set by the country you are returning to. So few words about how I got on at the airport will not come amiss, as everybody asks me, every time “How did you get those parts through the metal detector/x-ray machine?”

In the past, I have put one silencer in each suitcase, but this proved to be impractical. One year I got an old holdall, and cut the ends out, so that I could carry my silencers like a bag. This time though, I tried a different approach, by packing them in a box. Once packed. Sadie asked “How do you think you are going to get all that lot to the airport, as we have enough luggage of our own to carry?” I explain that I would drag my suitcase along on it’s own wheels. My hand luggage would be hanging around my neck, and I would put my box on my shoulder. I would only have to do this between getting off the coach, and checking in at the desk in the airport. In practice, once you are inside the airport queuing up for the checking in desk, you end up moving all your luggage a few inches from time to time, as the queue creeps forward.

One of the pains of modern flight, especially since the Locherby disaster, you have to carry ALL electrical equipment in you hand luggage. This is a real pain if you have a Camcorder, as you have to have your batteries, charger, and al the leads in your hand luggage. So my hand luggage was a bit on the heavy side also, especially as I also had things like brake shoes stuffed in it!

Anyhow. When I got to the x-ray machine, the security guard had already read what I had written on the box. He said “Oh! Jawa? OK!”. This final touch, meant that he could match up what he saw on the view screen, with what was written on the box. Next was the long queue to the checking in desk. As we inched our way closer, I was watching everybody in front getting their luggage weighed. Trying to work out what the average weight was. If we were overweight, I was more than willing to pay the excess baggage charge, but as my youngest daughter Natalie, had only one suitcase, and has a full weight allowance, it is very unlikely that we would be over weight. When it was our turn to check in, the girl asked “How many items of luggage?” I said “Three suitcases and one box”. She looked ad the strange box, and asked “What is in dis?” I told her, and she called a security guard over, stuck a bar code on the box, and asked him to carry it down to the aircraft. She didn’t even bother to weigh it! So off my box went, being hand delivered to the cargo hold, and receiving VIP treatment! I think that she did not want my box to go on the conveyor belt system with the suitcases, to save risking getting it damaged. Also. She did NOT weight our hand luggage! It never ceases to amaze me, how different airlines, have different policies regarding the weighing and checking in of luggage! This meant my second stache of parts, also went on board ‘un-weighed’. So now all we had to do, was go up to the lounge, and wait around for our flight.

So. As far as getting all my treasure home, all went well, as it has done on all four previous occasions. The twist in this story though, brought a little frustration and annoyance with myself, for when I got home, I found a postcard from Alanya on the mat. My in-laws, thought that I must have sent it to myself for a laugh. But when I read it, I was amazed to see, that my friend Timo sent it from Alanya! If I had only known, we could have met up somewhere, and had a good chat about Jawa paradise. Never mind. You can’t win them all!  THE END

© Mario Mager