Lever position/direction

[RizzoTheRat]

I've recently bought a second hand Dutch made Koga for commuting, and wondering if it's odd or if British bikes do things the other way round to everyone else.

For starters the front brake is on the left and the back on the right, the other way round from my Specialized Hardrock, but I think that seems to be pretty normal in the Netherlands where front brake on the left and pedal back brake on the rear is also common.

However it's the gears that I keep getting wrong, it appears they're both set up to shift up on the thumb and down on the finger, whereas on my specialised the thumb shifter always takes you to the bigger cog, and the finger lets the spring pull you back to the smaller, so both thumbs lets you go up a gear at the front and down at the back, which I find a lot easier than thumb one side and finger the other that I have to do on the Koga.

Both on Shimano shifters, Deore LX on the Koga but not sure what on the Specialized. Is it the Koga that's odd or the Specialized?

[RizzoTheRat]

It works fine, but every time I change gear I have to think about it

[RizzoTheRat]

I'm not sure it's worth swapping the brake cables or just getting used to it. Any other push bike I'm likely to ride in the near future will be the euro way round, and hopefully the rest of the controls are different enough on my motorbike that I won't accidentally go for the clutch when I want to stop