Daily Prompt: Jump

In response to the Daily Post’s Daily Prompt: Jump

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It’s Day 6 of our New Zealand trip and we’re in Lake Taupo (toe-paw) which is approximately one and a half hours drive from Rotorua. Well, closer to two hours since the maximum speed limit in New Zealand seems to be 100 km/hr and every time I went up to 110 km/hr, Emily (our GPS) started to ping wildly.

The sign entering the Lake Taupo area proudly proclaimed it to be the ‘Rainbow Trout Capital of the Universe’. Reading the travel brochures, I also learnt that Lake Taupo is actually the crater of an ancient volcano. Though that was an interesting tit-bit, the primary reason for my being in Taupo was because it’s the home of Taupo Bungy.

One of the Top 10 insanest things I’ve ever done

Little Sis told me, “If you’re going to New Zealand, you have to go bungy jumping, or else what’s the point? It’s where bungy was born!!” How do I argue with that? And so that’s how I found myself standing on a weighing scale getting my weight checked before I voluntarily threw myself off a wooden platform 47 metres above the gushing river below.

“Ok, your weight is 48 kg. You’re good to go,” said the guy behind the counter, his eyes hidden behind matrix-esque sunnies.

“48? Oh, I thought I was 46 kg, must be the mussels,” I said more to myself than to matrix-sunnies guy.

He slipped the receipt into a tag with a lanyard and told me to hang it around my neck, took my left hand and wrote in bold with a flat-tipped marker (not permanent, I later sighed in relief), “48”. Ugh, my weight, for all the world to see. The world being everyone at the bungy centre.

“Erm, so what do I do now?” I asked when actually, what I really wanted was for someone to take my hand and lead me to where I was supposed to go to next. After all, I was on the verge (pun intended) of doing something that my life insurance agent should never be told about as I was pretty sure that if she did, my monthly premium would go up exponentially.

“Head over to the cantilevered bridge over there and queue up and wait for your turn,” he explained slowly in case this Asian person could not understand English. “Have a good jump!” he added as an afterthought.

GULP.

And so, I walked over and waited my turn. In front of me was a Japanese lady. She looked as zen as can be, standing there admiring the view so I thought why not ask her, “Is this your 1st time?”

“No, it’s my 14th.”

“Wow, so, what advice do you have for me? It’s my first time.”

“Just relax, at first you’ll be nervous. I’m always nervous before I jump. But after you jump, no problem!” She assured me.

“Okay…thanks. No problem.” My nerves went into overdrive.

I saw the bungy guys call her when it was her turn and as she sat down on the bench, they strapped the cable around her feet, giving her instructions which I was attempting my best to listen to even though I knew they’ll be giving me the same instructions later. I suppose if I heard it twice, the information would be burned into my brain. When she stood on the ledge, I was extremely nervous (on her behalf) and cringed a little when the bungy master counted down and then I heard her scream as she jumped. Yikes.

I laid my hand on my heart and sure enough, it was beating quadruple-time, as if I’d run full speed for 15 mins around the park in front of my house. Then, it was my turn.

I sat down and as the bungy master strapped the cable on, she asked, “How are you today?” No point in trying to be suave so I replied, “Super-nervous!” And after that she gave me a litany of instructions that’s a blur to me now and next I knew…

…I was at the edge of the platform looking down at the Waikato River.

Yikes! I’m going to go all that way??? It felt like I was going to hyper-ventilate. My ears were beginning to buzz and through the buzzing spimd, I heard the bungy master remind me to put my hands out and after she counted to three, I should lean forward and let gravity do the rest. At that moment, I thought gravity was evil.

I heard her start the countdown – one, two, three… and like an automaton (I’m pretty sure it was just my body responding automatically as my brain had temporarily shut down to protect me from this crazy thing I was nano-seconds away from), my body obediently had its hands out and I leant forward and even at the nano-nano-second before my feet left the platform to meet the air, the motto I read at the Taupo Bungy hut flashed through my mind – Why live on the edge, when you can jump off it? Stupid motto, was what I thought as well.

With that thought, my entire body already in the air, I opened my mouth and screamed and flew…and hoped that the bungy guys got the cable measurement correct.