Learning to Ski

The day started with an overly enthusiastic spirit that made leavingthe apartment at 8 AM absolutely painless. We even woke up earlyenough to cook breakfast. Looking back it was probably more of thegroup effort and the planned breakfast that got me out of bed thatmorning. After all, I was still the last person actually out of thebed that morning. Through the aid of friends, I was loaned a raincoatand pants to put over my own winter coat and jeans. I needed to bewaterproof to play in snow, and having never skied before, I had nogear of my own. Looking like a puffy marshmallow, we left to meet theothers where the taxis were waiting.

We took a beautiful taxi ride through the mountains to a ski lodge. Itwas a short ride but the mountains were covered in massive Christmastrees covered in snow. So the entire experience was like a postcard.

The wait for rental equipment wasn’t too bad for a place that had onlyone person working. I do have to say learning to put on the boots andskis was a slightly frustrating process. I was too worried aboutbreaking the equipment. Luckily there was one other volunteer who hadalso never been skiing before. Two of our friends stayed behind withus to show us how to use the chair lifts, and we thought they teach ushow to ski.

The entire process of the chair lift is absolutely terrifying if youhave never used such a contraption before. First, you have to raiseforward on these seemingly giant slabs of whatever it is that skis aremade from. You have to make sure you are standing in the right spot tosit down when the chair comes. Then you pull some crazy bar down, andmight I add, this bar is incredibly awkwardly placed if you didn’tknow the chair lift isn’t really one giant bench seat. Those lifts donot stay very close to the ground. Oh no, you are high, oh so veryhigh above the earth. It makes this screeching sound as it passesthrough the posts holding the wires making you think that it isbreaking, and as you are so far above the earth, you will of course besmashed into a million pieces. Never fear though, it doesn’t break.Once you’re at the top, you have to get off. It always looks soeffortless in the movies. But there is so much to remember. Skis up,poles up, but don’t forget to stand up… and don’t forget to stopbefore you start going down the mountain.

That’s right. See, while on the chair lift, my seasoned chair liftfriend coached me on getting OFF the chair lift but forgot to mentionwhat to do once I was off. Thus, I slid about 10 feet from the chairlift before managing to stop myself, and by stop I mean every soslowly inch down the mountain in this sideways backwards stance. Theyhollered after me that I needed to make my skis like a pizza slice tostop. I screamed back that only made me go faster. Then I ate snow. Ifell awkwardly enough that my skis actually popped off.

I only fell a few times in that day, all in the beginning. The secondtime I fell is when I skied into 3 feet of powder. When you don’t knowhow to take your skis off, or stand up while wearing them, thissituation takes no less than 30 minutes to remedy. It is like swimmingin snow. There is no bottom to push yourself up against.
People kept screaming at me not to hit the young children learning howto ski. I had no ability to steer myself and was already screamingfrom fear

After reaching the bottom of the mountain for the first time, anotherfriend was waiting there. She taught me how to stop and how to turnside to side. She showed me how to put my weight on the skis. It allbegan to make sense. Skiing is like ice skating but going down amountain.

With each trip up to the top of the bunny hill, the chair lift and theentire act of skiing became less terrifying. By lunch I was eveningsaying that skiing was fun! I told my parents I am never again livingsome place where I cannot go skiing. I am still trying to find a wayto go again. As odd as it sounds, the mountains in Kyrgyzstan are notentirely easy to reach. I am sure there is some easy way to do thisbut I have not figured it out yet.
Anyways, if you have never gone skiing, give it a try. Best adrenalinerush ever. Well white water rafting is still better, but skiing ISTOTALLY AWESOME FUN!!!!!