My trip to Hakuba - Day 2

The door was knocked on thrice as I lazily rose from my slumber. It was seven thirty in the morning and I had managed to sleep the previous night after a good deal of tossing and turning about. My friends woke up as well; and upon opening it, found one of our teachers standing outside. He wished us good morning and told us to quickly get ready as breakfast was in an hour's time. Thanking the teacher, we went back into the room and set about performing our usual morning routine. Around eight thirty, we headed down to the hotel lobby, where I greeted the rest of my classmates.  

After tucking into a sumptuous breakfast, we were given a briefing of the day's events by our teachers. I was jubilant when my teachers announced that we were going to ski today!! After all, this was going to be my first experience trying the sport. Following breakfast, we headed back to our rooms where I proudly donned my ski jacket, pant, helmet, gloves and goggles. We then went down to the storage room where I gathered my poles and skis and took a whole ten minutes to put on my ski boots. The boots were very heavy and reached all the way up to my shins. The skis were heavy as well and it took a long time for me to adjust with all the equipment. 

I headed towards the hotel's lobby and met up with my classmates who were in the same ski class as me. All of us were split into classes for either skiing or snowboarding based on our skill level. As this was my first time trying skiing, I was put into the first timers batch. While I was impatiently waiting to start, I watched as a sea of ski and snowboarding instructors walked towards us. At that moment, I saw my ski instructor for the first time. Upon meeting us, he greeted us in a very friendly manner and told us that he was from Germany. Hitching our skiis and poles on our shoulders, we headed for the ski slopes, waiting for the fun to begin. 

As soon as I set foot on the Hakuba slopes, my jaw dropped in astonishment. Hundreds of people whizzed passed me on their skis and snowboards. Right above me, the chairlift rattled as it slowly travelled through the air amidst the falling snow. We trotted over to a small slope and we began fitting our skiis onto our feet!! Eagerly anticipating the moment when we begin skiing, I was delighted when my instructor anounced that we were ready to go. 

We started by using one ski and just gliding on the ice. We moved on to both skis and then used poles as well. Personally, I felt skiing was a lot easier than many other sports. We mainly use our skis to glide and change directions in the snow. The poles are used to control our speed and can be used as a stopper if we are going too fast.

Over the next couple of hours, we learnt how to stop and practiced some basic turns. Although I fell down a lot of times and once even rolled downhill, I got back onto my skis each time, reminding myself that falling down is a part and parcel of any sport and should not be a hindrance towards success. 

Following the two hour session, over which my skill in skiing had considerably improved, we headed to the ski company's restaurant which was right beside the slope. I gobbled up a  pizza and after half an hour's rest, we trotted back to the slope again, where my ski instructor announced that we were ready to hop onto the chair lift!!

A chair lift is similar in structure to a gondola except unlike a gondola, it is not covered fully. It takes you to the topmost point of a slope and from there we ski back down. My first chair lift was a nice experience as although the vehicle was rattling and shaking, I could see the frost bitten mountains amidst the falling snow, which was an image to treasure. On reaching the crest of the slope, I put all the techniques I had learnt into use and was able to ski better than all my group mates.

After a supercalifragilisticexpialidocius day of skiing, we headed back to the hotel, where after putting our boots and ski equipment away, we headed for dinner, following which seven of my classmates and I began preparing for the Open Mic Night competition!!

The Open Mic Night is an english poetry/essay competition where students all over the year group write an essay. Each person will read their essay to their classmates, who will then vote for the essay they liked the most. Out of the whole year group (which is ninety students!!), I was one of the eight people who got selected for the finals of this competition!!

In preparation for the finals, my English teacher and I fine-tuned my poem and I learnt some good tricks on how to deliver my poem effectively. As I walked up to the stage to present my poem in front of my classmates, schoolmates and teachers, I shook myself free from all negative doubts and after a silent prayer, I began my address. As I delivered my poem, I felt myself growing in confidence and the moment I finished, the audience gave me a rousing applause. I returned back to my seat and listened to the other finalists read out their work. Most of it was amazing, although I wasn't focusing on winning the contest, but merely took pride in myself for having done a good job. 

After all the finalists were done, the audience quickly wrote down who's poem/essay was the best. The votes were tallied and when the top three were announced, the audience started screaming and clapping when my name was announced in third place. Although I was elated that I came third out of 90 students, the fact that made me even more proud and happy was when I learnt that most of the teachers casted their vote for me. Some of the teachers even asked me to digitally share my poem with them!! You can be sure that when I hit the bed later that night after a hot shower, I felt like I was the most contented man in the whole wide world😀

P.S: Here is my Open Mic Night poem. If you are interested, then kindly have a read through it. Thank you. 

Books

Books are many things. They are the rusty key, capable of solving unfathomable mysteries. 

    

They provide us with sesquipedalian words and phrases and proverbs so deep and rich with meaning, it would take centuries to figure them out.

Books can be the secret overthrower of governments, an intellectual and spiritual weapon aimed directly at our hearts. For veteran readers however, books are a transporter. A simple paper machine, capable of whisking you away to lush forests, futuristic utopian worlds and even into the quest to reach the centre of the Earth.

They can be life coaches, personality builders, role models, full of gleeful memories and precious hopes.

Books are the rare entities which encompass all feelings. Sometimes makes you bite your nails in a tense moment, sometimes makes you laugh, but mostly, lets you think about where you are at this moment, today.

 If you would ask me, what do I like the most about books, I wouldn’t say anything. I would take a deep breath full of the time worn, musty and invaluable pages of the book and exclaim, ‘This is the best smell in the world.’