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Vashi2Panvel.Com: Navi Mumbai: June 8: The portly District Collector (a Ram Gopal Varma clone) rolls up his pants and points to a Harry Potter scar just below his knee, “That happened last week, and this too [a purplish-blue welt that promised to get more colourful], but it isn’t really painful,” he says with a touch of testosterone. “You should’ve seen the gash I got on my first try at paragliding.” The index finger of his right hand moves alarmingly away from his thumb and settles for a two-inch space, “that wide!”

“You know,” he says considering me carefully, “you look like a travel writer. You should go paragliding.”

The manager at the hotel in Munnar suggested that watching paragliding was the best way to spend the day, since everything and everybody was closed for a bandh. That was just what one intended to do – watch. I did not want people persuading me to join in.
On the hillside are seven people who can’t wait to take off. The DC’s got his friend who’s got his wife and kids. There is also a fat man in a red T-shirt with his wife in high heels. They are on their honeymoon and the wife wants to make the most of Munnar before she gets to Chennai to meet his relatives.

Essentially paragliding seems easy enough. Get yourself to the edge of a cliff and get strapped into a harness. The harness is attached to a parachute-like contraption (in the shape of a huge mattress) with innumerable cords that hold it all in place. Once everything that can be strapped, tightened and pulled -- is, you take a deep breath and run off the cliff-face. The running serves the same purpose as a plane taxiing on the runway for takeoff. There are cords, much like a Venetian Blind on both sides of the user. You pull to change direction or land.

In small places like Munnar, discovered as much by the British as the Scots, democracy and the British love for queues doesn’t work. Red T-shirt reached the slopes much before the DC entourage, but gets to go much after. The DC gets into the harness and stands braced to run, the sails flattened on the ground behind him, held up in places by the chaps from the paragliding institute. “The wind has to be just right, not too much or too little,” he points out, just as I was beginning to wonder if he’d lost his nerve/bravado/wits. And suddenly, he was off, airborne, a tiny speck in the air. The wind rose with a burst of vigour, the sails bellowed and man and contraption soared over the tea plantations -- briefly. Within minutes, the sail lost height and the DC hit the ground with the parachute flopping around him in a tired heap. There is no movement beneath. I wear my spectacles, still nothing. The chaps from the paragliding institute walk down and the DC emerges from under the heap, waves triumphantly and climbs up the hill to where the rest of us were standing. “Great huh, great huh!” he nudges a response.

“How did it feel?” I ask. “Great! Great!” The very prolific man then asks his friend also a DC to strap in. “Papa, I want to go first,” says the little cherub, his son. Fortunately for T-shirt who is still waiting patiently, children are not allowed to paraglide, and his father gets strapped on. It’s his first time and he has to fly tandem, which means the instructor is strapped on behind him and they fly together, with the instructor at the controls.

This DC is an unusual Dilliwallah, who says Delhi not Dali and doesn’t give you a low-down on his car, bungalow and bank account in the first five minutes. His first attempt is unsuccessful, his second – successful. Ditto his third and fourth . Total time spent: 1 hour 30 minutes (approximately). Number of film reels shot: eight. The wife was sitting next to me and she said that they’d had the camera fitted with a zoom lens for the event.

I have been squatting on the green hills for two hours now. It’s hot, but mercifully not sunny, and I figure that if I’ve spent so much time watching others do their thing that,
a: they can now watch me doing mine,
b: I’ve learnt enough to have a go at it, and
c: if they can do it, I can do it better.

But now the wife/photographer wants a go too. She changes her heels for her daughter’s sports shoes, gets strapped on and fails at her first attempt. On her second attempt though, she does a graceful arc and glides over the valley and lands, splash into a patch of marsh. Even at that distance, I can see she’s caked with mud and not too happy about it. Fortunately, that also she means she won’t try to better her husband’s four attempts and sure enough DC and the entourage leave. “Hey, sorry, we will not be able to stay and watch you. But we have to go now. We’ve been here for three hours now!” (Tell me about it.) He wishes me a good glide and I watch them go. A little dispiritedly, I admit. I need an ovation after my performance. It’s like a musician performing without an audience. The honeymooners have also gone – their palms are probably hurting from all that applauding and they don’t feel they could manage another big round for me.

In the sky, rain clouds loom. I look up at them lovingly; I hate the sun. The natives look up at them, appraisingly. Apparently you cannot paraglide in the rain. After a three-hour wait, I don’t think I can take that. I want to get strapped in and fly immediately, but there is a tiny problem – the contraption is not there. “Wash, dirty,” they tell me. The wife obviously didn’t just dirty herself, she muddied the sails too and it was being dabbed at in the little stream at the bottom. The sky, in the meantime was getting ominously darker, matching my mood hue for hue. “No rain. Mazza illya,” says Mohan the instructor prophetically.

Finally, I’m strapped in tandem with Mohan and we are ready to roll. The others spread the sail out with as much attention as the bridesmaids attending to the late Princess Di’s train. “Run fast, when I tell you to,” recites Mohan. “That’s all you have to do,” he says, just in case I thought I was the one at the controls.

The wait seems forever. I’m not scared, just a little on the edge. I don’t want to look like a novice. I want the instructors to say nalla and applaud loudly as well. Praise from a pro sounds so much better. “Run!” yells Mohan in my ear. “Run, run fast,” he urges.

I ran. I swear I ran. But I scarcely moved. “Run, run, RUN!!!” yell the other instructors. I put one foot ahead of the other, making all the motions that comprise running, but my feet hardly moved. It was the most difficult bit of running I’ve ever done. The sails bellow behind you and when you are running against wind resistance, it feels like an invisible force is holding you back. No wonder the DC from Delhi and his wife, failed at the first attempt. But then that’s them. And then there’s me. I ran like I was possessed and whee, suddenly I was in the sky. I did it on my first try.

What did it feel like? Light. Liberating. And oh so wonderful. Not high enough to meet an eagle, but high enough for certain death. The fact that if something had to go wrong with the equipment, it would mean death or a debilitating injury. But thankfully, all’s well. We soar and dip, turn and circle chasing the rise and fall of the green hills of Munnar. This is freedom.

“In the air, in the air! Up your feet,” barks my partner. I did. But my feet didn’t listen. The ground suddenly does a 360-degree curve and rises up to meet us. “In the air,” shouts Mohan rudely. I tell him it is, it is. We crash-land into the marsh. “I tell you! I tell you to put feet up. Eeesh!!”
When you take off, you do the running; when you land your partner touches the ground first. So unless you keep your feet raised, straight ahead of you, you can have a very rough landing.
The marsh is soft and well, marsh-like. I try to stand, but fall back in an ungainly heap, the sail and harness, a dead weight. “Wait, you wait,” he growls as he heaves himself from the ooze. He unharnasses me and I stand up shakily. Waist-down I look like the Incredible Hulk, fresh from the bog. “Go there and wash,” Mohan says and points to a little stream, which also washed the chute before me. Two kids in their school uniform run up to me and ask me if I need some water from the tank nearby. I shake my head, but they insist. “Leeches. Water.” says Mohan happily.

It’s been many moons since the day, many washes and trips to the drycleaners. The mud stains are amazingly stubborn. It’s a Wrangler I’ll never be able to wear in polite company. On the other hand, I was applauded for a great first flight and congratulated on landing so well. It rained only after I completed my flight and it was a day well spent. Better yet, there’s nothing like a little envy (from people back home) to make nice experience seem a fabulous one. Try it some time.

India News Feature Service