When I flied..
Autumn 2001,
Gaithersburg,
Maryland,
US of A .
One fine sunday morning, we were all set to start our venture to King's Dominion, a theme park in Virginia. We were four in the plan - 3 guys and the only courageous me.! :-D
Before I could leave my apartment the phone rang. It was Purnima. I'd invited her to join us, but she was reluctant. *Roller coasters* were not her cup of tea. To my surprise, what I heard on phone was "Can I join you guys too? I will just watch you guys enjoying".
"Are you sure you want to dole out that hefty an amount only to watch us enjoying?"
"Well, yes.! better than to be bored to death here alone".
"Well, come over then" and now we were five. 3 guys, one courageous me and one not-so-courageous Purnima (@Purnima, please don't mind this and keep reading :) ). KD has a HUGE parking, and one can hear the screams of *fun-riders* in the remotest corner of parking lot - loud and clear.! Purnima took a step back, "I don't want to go". "arre chalo na, what will you do inside the car the whole day?". And we literally, physically, dragged her through the park entry. So! The fun was on.!! The first ride we came across was something similar to columbus in Appu Ghar, the only difference being that the ship used to take complete circle, and as if that was not enough, it used to halt for a few seconds when you r hanging upside down.! "Arre purnima ye to sabse chotti ride hai, at least try this one." "What will you tell others? You went to KD and did nothing". And once again, she was literally physically dragged and before she could realize it, was put on the ride. That hanging upside down did some trick to her - dimaag mein chemical lochaa, screws falling out or neurons short circuit, whatever - but after that Purnima was the first one in the queue on all the subsequent rides..! Wait, the best is yet to come.!
We came by the "skyflyer", some variation of bungee jumping. We all were watching it, our jaws dropped - in awe, in fear, in anxiety, I can't really recall now, but leaving us (or at least me) completely numb. I knew I didn't want to do it. The guys registered for it, though I am sure not really whole-heartedly ;). And then we kept standing there, seeing people swinging like the pendulum of a HUGE clock, our hearts pounding faster than the ones who were swinging.. Suddenly, Purnima turned to me and said "Priyanka, lets do it.!" Did I hear it right? Was I dreaming? Was it hallucination coming out of mental numbness? "You never know if we will get this chance ever again, lets do it", she contninued. In my mind I could hear "Are you out of your mind? What has gone into you? Did the omellettes you had for breakfast had steroids?" All I could hear myself saying was "Are you sure?". "Yes, lets do it". There she was, the not-so-courageous girl, throwing my 'courage' into my face. ab to naak ka sawaal ho gayaa ye.! ;-) After some trivial to-be or not-to-be kinda conversation, we were standing at the registration desk. [Inner Voice: why am i doing this?] The wait time after registration was long, a couple of hours if I remember correctly, and had I kept standing there, I would have gone weak in my knees. "Yahaan se chalte hain". We loitered around the park, and I am sure, all of us were pre-occupied with the thoughts of skyflyer and all of us wanting it to get over soon.!
The much-awaited, much-dreaded as well, moment arrived. We stood on the podium, ready to be belted and notched into the system. I was stil numb.. [why why why?] Suddenly I heard a question "Who amongst you will pull the string to free yourself?" This is torturous. My courage had gone out of stock till I reached the podium, now another shot is required. To be hanging at the height of 120ft in the air and then pull the string to fall freely under gravitational pull. Before it could sink in, Purnima had already volunteered to pull the string.! The columbus ride was haunted too I am sure, and I was being belted with a part-ghost next to me.! :D So there we were, being pulled to the arc at the height of 120ft. Oh Jeez, "aur kitni upar le jaayenge.!" [o maa! why?]. So what all I was feeling? stomach churning, head spinning, and eyes eager to be wide shut.! And when we reached the top, and the stomach had just started to settle somewhat, we heard the command, "3. 2.. 1... FLY". Wait, in all this rush, we had forgotten where was the string?! Again, Purnima hurriedly found it and pulled it.! Damn, 9.8m/sec sq is just too much of gravitational acceleration. did I ever realized it in physics lab in school?? did I even think about throwing that stone under gravitational pull? :P With wind gushing into our face, hands flowing in air with no support to reach out to, approaching the ground fast, real fast - we had no reason to believe that we won't smash into that blue podium base.. And worst part was, inspite of trying hard, I couldn't scream too.!! the wind pressure was choking the voice.! and then, what was being built up for hours now was over in less than 15 seconds, but as Prashant very precisely put that into words 'moksh praapt ho gaya' :D
The camera couldn't capture on rolls what the eyes captured in gray cells, and those entire 2-2.5 minutes of ordeal is a writing-on-the-stone which probably will get carried across eras :) Thanks to the 'snag' caused by the first ride :D
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o_t0pAGhK7Y
Gaithersburg,
Maryland,
US of A .
One fine sunday morning, we were all set to start our venture to King's Dominion, a theme park in Virginia. We were four in the plan - 3 guys and the only courageous me.! :-D
Before I could leave my apartment the phone rang. It was Purnima. I'd invited her to join us, but she was reluctant. *Roller coasters* were not her cup of tea. To my surprise, what I heard on phone was "Can I join you guys too? I will just watch you guys enjoying".
"Are you sure you want to dole out that hefty an amount only to watch us enjoying?"
"Well, yes.! better than to be bored to death here alone".
"Well, come over then" and now we were five. 3 guys, one courageous me and one not-so-courageous Purnima (@Purnima, please don't mind this and keep reading :) ). KD has a HUGE parking, and one can hear the screams of *fun-riders* in the remotest corner of parking lot - loud and clear.! Purnima took a step back, "I don't want to go". "arre chalo na, what will you do inside the car the whole day?". And we literally, physically, dragged her through the park entry. So! The fun was on.!! The first ride we came across was something similar to columbus in Appu Ghar, the only difference being that the ship used to take complete circle, and as if that was not enough, it used to halt for a few seconds when you r hanging upside down.! "Arre purnima ye to sabse chotti ride hai, at least try this one." "What will you tell others? You went to KD and did nothing". And once again, she was literally physically dragged and before she could realize it, was put on the ride. That hanging upside down did some trick to her - dimaag mein chemical lochaa, screws falling out or neurons short circuit, whatever - but after that Purnima was the first one in the queue on all the subsequent rides..! Wait, the best is yet to come.!
We came by the "skyflyer", some variation of bungee jumping. We all were watching it, our jaws dropped - in awe, in fear, in anxiety, I can't really recall now, but leaving us (or at least me) completely numb. I knew I didn't want to do it. The guys registered for it, though I am sure not really whole-heartedly ;). And then we kept standing there, seeing people swinging like the pendulum of a HUGE clock, our hearts pounding faster than the ones who were swinging.. Suddenly, Purnima turned to me and said "Priyanka, lets do it.!" Did I hear it right? Was I dreaming? Was it hallucination coming out of mental numbness? "You never know if we will get this chance ever again, lets do it", she contninued. In my mind I could hear "Are you out of your mind? What has gone into you? Did the omellettes you had for breakfast had steroids?" All I could hear myself saying was "Are you sure?". "Yes, lets do it". There she was, the not-so-courageous girl, throwing my 'courage' into my face. ab to naak ka sawaal ho gayaa ye.! ;-) After some trivial to-be or not-to-be kinda conversation, we were standing at the registration desk. [Inner Voice: why am i doing this?] The wait time after registration was long, a couple of hours if I remember correctly, and had I kept standing there, I would have gone weak in my knees. "Yahaan se chalte hain". We loitered around the park, and I am sure, all of us were pre-occupied with the thoughts of skyflyer and all of us wanting it to get over soon.!
The much-awaited, much-dreaded as well, moment arrived. We stood on the podium, ready to be belted and notched into the system. I was stil numb..
The camera couldn't capture on rolls what the eyes captured in gray cells, and those entire 2-2.5 minutes of ordeal is a writing-on-the-stone which probably will get carried across eras :) Thanks to the 'snag' caused by the first ride :D
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o_t0pAGhK7Y
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