Bored of malls? Take to the skies for remedy

PUNCAK, West Java (JP): There I was close to the ramp. A couple of hundred meters below were cars winding their way along Puncak Pass. I was about to leap off the ramp, but there was only one problem. I am afraid of heights.

"How did I end up here?" I asked as I cringed at the prospect of making a fool of myself in front of about 50 people gathered nearby.

What drove me here, however, was nothing dramatic. In fact, it was the very mundane which spurred me on. You probably know the feeling when the prospect of another weekend in Jakarta looms and you can't think of anything else to do besides going to the shopping malls again.

My desperation to get out of the mall circuit was so intense that when I came across an advertisement for paragliding in a magazine, I thought this was exciting and different and immediately called up the number to make an appointment.

Then sanity returned. Did I not always harbor a fear of high, open places? All I have to do is look down from a few floors up and my legs turn to jelly. And now I committed myself to a sport which promised to take me several hundred meters in the air with nothing between the ground and me.

But the alternative was Plaza Senayan, Mal Taman Anggrek ... Enough! It was a fate as bad as having to listen repeatedly to Whitney Houston's I will Always Love You. I decided to fly away from it all.

With a reluctant I-would-rather-be-golfing husband in tow, I arrived at a bunch of warungs (food stalls) by the side of the main road at 9 a.m. the next Saturday.

Already milling in one of the warungs were some young executive types eager for the wind to change so they could take flight. Here we met Tommy, the ebullient organizer for our flight. She was with flight instructor Gendon, one of the pioneers of paragliding in Indonesia.

We sat about talking with them and the other pilots while waiting for the wind to change. "You can't take off until the wind is blowing into the direction of the ramp," said Gendon.

Shortly after noon, I came another step closer to meeting my fear of heights.

At the launch site, I watched how the pilots took off. At first, they appeared to just run to the edge of the hill and kick off into air. To my horror, several pilots disappeared over the edge when their gliders failed to catch the wind properly.

When I summoned enough courage to get closer to the edge, I saw that connected to the edge was a steel ramp that ended only about half a meter from the side of the hill which sloped on a forgiving gradient. This meant that pilots had less chances of seriously injuring themselves if they ran off the ramp before their gliders were ready.

A few people were doing the tandem flight before me and watching them only increased my anxiety. With each aborted launch, my heart dropped several inches more. One couple tried as many as seven unsuccessful launches.

When my turn finally came, I took the harness from Gendon with trembling hands. "Don't worry," said Tommy, sensing my fear. "If you fall, you'll be cushioned by the pilot."

As I put my safety helmet on, a group of pilots sarcastically muttered statements like "paragliding is a dangerous sport". My husband's contribution was "just make sure you don't scream". I managed to smile coolly at all that and decided that the only workable strategy was to forbid myself from thinking about being scared.

The moment of truth had arrived. I was now standing only about a meter from the edge of the hill, fully strapped into the harness, ready to do the unthinkable any second.

"When I tell you to run, keep running as fast as you can," said Gendon. "Don't stop unless I say so."

Earlier, I'd overheard some guys telling a story about this woman who kept sitting down on her harness each time they got close to the edge, aborting numerous launches. The story sparked howls of laughter. I drew strength from that story, not wanting to be next week's joke.

"Go, go, go!" came the shout from Gendon. I shut out all thoughts of fear and ran like crazy. But the glider failed to catch the wind properly. We stopped running somewhere on the ramp, which nearly killed me with fright, as I was now standing in full view of the ground below.

Our second attempt yielded pretty much the same results. By then, my body had mercifully turned numb. I carried out the third attempt mechanically, devoid of feelings and expectations.

Before I knew it, I was up. My first thoughts were, "Wow! I am actually flying! This is what it feels like to fly!"

As we floated noiselessly off the ramp, we caught a thermal and were lifted higher. At that point, Gendon swiveled the glider 180 degrees to face the crowd. "Wave to them, otherwise they'll think you're scared." I managed a lame wave and gritted my teeth to pass for a smile.

Was I scared? I was certainly on the brink of fear and it threatened to overwhelm me the entire flight. But each time I felt it creeping up on me, I stubbornly refused to think about it and focused on the beauty of flying.

There were times during that short flight when we seemed to be suspended motionless in the air as the huge expanse of sky and tea plantations spread out before us. The only sound was that of the wind whooshing by against my ears. It was as exquisite as a moment of stolen tranquility.

I decided then and there that I wanted to fly on my own, acrophobia or not. (Sadie Mah)