We left Princeton by 8 am and reached Jack Frost Black Boulder skiing resort in Poconos, PA by 11 am. We were supposed to be joined by some of Jeethu's friends there. The line to buy the tickets was getting longer, so we decided to stand in the line and let the people pass us once we reach near the counter. The line was in the outdoors and started snowing. Initially I didn't feel much cold since I was all covered up in my jacket, gloves and all. But the temperature was hovering around -10 deg C and slowly I felt the bite of cold. When we started I didn't expect this kind of cold. I was losing sensation in my extremities. I began thinking this is no fun. When I looked around there were people, most of them white, chatting and laughing as if all is fine. They had all the cool gadgets like face-mask, snow-boot etc that will completely isolate them from the cold. I was there wondering what a boy born and raised in tropical climate, who haven't seen snow till a few years back doing standing in the line to get tickets for skiing.
It turned out that Jeethu's friends have gone to a nearby resort and we decided to go ahead and buy the tickets for ourselves. Since Jeethu had done skiing before, we decided to do snow boarding this time. We went inside the building to get our gear.It took a while to thaw myself and I became little apprehensive of how I am going to last outdoors for longer time. We got out gear (boots and snow board) went to the place where they gave instructions for the beginners.
The slope for the beginners is not actually a slope. It had a very slight gradient and only 25- 30 feet in length. It looked very innocuous. The instructor was good and experienced, he explained how to balance on the board and demostrated a few times sliding down the slope in his board. It didn't look that hard and I decided to give it a try. I went through the instructions in my mind, "weight on the front foot, back straight, shoulders and hand in-line with the board, no turning the hips" and I let go. I did exactly what I was supposed to do; I arched my back, couldn't put the weight on the front foot and turned involuntarily to see where I am going, with disastrous effect. I slid half the way on my board and the rest on my stomach. Wow! May be this is not that easy!!
I went back and tried a few more times; same mistakes, same results. Then with some further tips from the instructor, I began sliding smoothly once in a while. I can see myself getting better and I was all excited in conquering the first lesson in snow-boarding. The biting cold didn't seem to bother me and I wanted more .The instructor told us that after few more tries, he will teach us how to turn on our board.
I decided to do one last time before I start to turn in the board. I started to slide down, everything seems ok till I realized that my board is going down at an angle. I tried to correct it by shifting my weight slightly in the other side and that did it. I had an awkward fall and I felt a sharp pain in my knee. It was twisted sideways when I was falling down the slope. I was in the snow, face down telling to myself, "Oh! crap!, I broke some thing". I limped my way to the side and started ascertaining the extent of damage by folding and extending my knee. The pain was not very intense so may be I didn't break any bones. I called it quits and limped back to the building.
Only inside the building I realized how bad the cold was. I couldn't feel my toes or for that matter any of the other digits. It’s still one more hour before the end of the lessons and I was brooding over my fall and inability to continue the lessons. I was tempted to go back if my knee feels ok. I took a few steps, it didn't pain, but I still got a sharp prick, when I turned or got up. I decided against any more snow-boarding.
So much for a fun day of skiing. Ah! Well, you gain some; you lose some.
