Last weekend I went to the mountains with the church for a retreat. For the first time in my life, I was only moderately excited about visiting the snow. I've always loved the snow (as something to play in, and something that puts life on pause when it comes to Portland), but after months of feeling constantly cold, the idea of being in a colder place with snow, wasn't as appealing as it's been in the past. However, I had nothing else to do over the weekend and figured, if nothing more, it'd be a good time to hang out with people I usually just see briefly. So I packed layers and joined the group for a short trip to the mountains.
Every so often I decide that I ought to do something that stretches me. Last year I learned to Scuba dive which is something that pretty much terrified me. I think one of the worst ways to die would be by drowning, so the idea of being a number of feet underwater, breathing through a tube, just didn't sound fun to me. Turns out, it is quite enjoyable though. Anyway, living in Japan for the year I've ended up doing lots of things that are stretching, but one thing that I've always kind of avoided is skiing. A couple years ago I went cross-country skiing, but I've never really wanted to go down hill skiing or snowboarding. Speeding down a hill, out of control, I find quite horrifying. It probably doesn't help that I had a previous encounter with a tree while on snowmobile. Anyway, before the retreat I was talking with my friend Nao and she told me that she wanted to try skiing, so I decided I should make an attempt at conquering my fear, and agreed to do it with her.
We arrived at the mountain for the retreat on Friday evening. Lots of beautiful white and a nice warm lodge place. It even has an onsen (Japanese hot spring bath)...delightful. We played games, ate a tasty meal, and had some time of Bible study. I went to bed early and woke up ready to head to the slopes. Once I got in the car my excitement turned to extreme nervousness and I began asking myself why on earth I was going to go do this. Well by that time it was simply too late to change my mind so I "ganbare"ed (worked hard-persevered) and just went with it. Rented my skis and got told by the rental guy that I had on too many layers and would get hot. It was really pretty funny. I'd done something wrong with my boots so he came to show me something and then went to put my snow pants on the outside of my boot, but realized then that underneath that water proof shell was three additional layers :) I was determined to stay warm. Anyway, got my gear and then accompanied Nao, and Angel and Jonathan (our senseis) to the bunny slope. Jonathan showed me how to put my skis on, told me about turning and stopping and then led me onto the tiny little hill. White knuckled I held onto those poles and gritted my teeth. You know what? I didn't die. We worked our way up to slightly steeper hills, went on the lift, and picked up some speed, and I didn't die!!! I actually didn't fall much, and once I realized I could somewhat control my speed and direction I had a lot of fun! I got a lot of funny looks from people when I first started, probably because the look on my face must have been pretty interesting as I was muttering cuss words to myself hoping I could slow down the rate of speed was I gaining. Eventually though, I was able to relax a bit. I still don't know what I'd do on longer, bigger slopes, but in general, I think I can say I got over my fear.
I also realized in the midst of this all that my Japanese is improving! It's still terrible, but I was sort of talking with my friend Angel who speaks Japanese and Spanish, and I realized that we were talking in about an equal amount of Japanese and Spanish. Now when I say talking, what I really mean is Angle was talking and doing all sorts of crazy charades teaching me Japanese and Spanish, and I would respond with wakarimasu (I understand) or wakaranai (I don't understand) but communication occurred, and I understood more Japanese then I used to. It's quite fun attempting this kind of communication.
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