First Descent ...

... happens to be a movie that documents the rise of snowboarding in general and the first descent of a peak (peak 7601 in remote Alaska) using snowboard by a group of 5 elite snowboarders. During the descent, the group encountered an avalanche and literally rode down the slope on the crest of the avalanche! This movie is my inspiration for snowboarding.
In terms of ability, I belong to the other end of the spectrum when compared to the 5 - what has been termed as level 0 in 'Kung-fu Panda' (interestingly that movie also had 5 Kung-fu masters!). The location was a very popular ski resort in South Korea (instead of the remote mountain in Alaska) and the slope had a gentle gradient (and not the 70 degree avalanche prone monster of the movie).
Now on the surface, the purpose of our visit to this place was for exchange of academic and research ideas. But there was just one presentation by a student as a rehearsal for a conference in April and my 'vacation' thus continued. So far, for me, all the workshops and seminars in Korea have been - driven around by someone else, sleeping through the presentations, cultural education in a traditional Korean restaurant ( and eat with unwavering attention) and posting the pictures on Orkut and Facebook. This one was no exception - the journey to the resort took about 3.5 hours. I was in the Professor's car and spent the time reading and sleeping. I slept through most of the presentation and when the workshop was over and we went to the restaurant, I happily stuffed myself.

First view of the ski-resort.
The resort is called High1 resort situated in Kangwan province on the east coast of the Korean peninsula. The ski slopes are part of the Kangwan Land park. The workshop was conducted in the conference center of the building on the right.

Yu's presentation - rehearsing for ICASSP 2009 in Taiwan.
This picture was taken right at the start of the presentation, so I was still awake. I fell asleep very soon after that. There were 2 more presentations (which were in Korean) which continued till 5:30pm. By the end of the talks, I was totally pissed - I hardly understood anything and on top of that, I was terribly hungry.
View of the hotel at night.
After dinner, we went to a rental shop to get ski, snowboards and other gear. Things were settled within an hour and we went to the Kangwanland Casino.
The casino charges an entry fee of 5000 won (about 3.5$) but I being the only foreigner around, got a free entry, thanks to the floor manager. Now most of the tables were dedicated to Blackjack and Roulette - neither of which I know. There were a large number of slot machines but they are not fun. So I searched for Hold'em Poker (the only game that I can play) but there were none. Meanhile, June Sig (one of my labmates) had won about 150$ in Roulette.
Next day, I woke up at 0800hrs and after a light breakfast dressed up in snowboarding gear. My first impression was - f#$@ ... I can't even move properly in this, how the hell am I gonna ride the board. But there was no time think. We left the hotel for the slopes and very soon, the moment of truth arrived. It was a bright and crisp day, under a cloudless blue sky and a temperature of -19 at 10 in the morning. But when you are running on adrenaline, who gives a damn about the cold.
We took the ski-lift to the top. As soon it left the station, we were greeted by gale force winds. It was fu$%#$ cold and I could barely speak. We tried taking shelter behind the boards but the wind almost ripped it away from our hands.
Finally, we reached the top and got down. Others helped me to get into position and my first lesson started.
Volume 1
Chapter 1 - How to stand with the board on.
After listing to a lecture on the contol of the CG (Center of Gravity) of the body for sometime and the structural mechanics of a snowboard, I was ready to convert the heavy-duty theoritical knowledge into practice. Keeping my weight on the heels and gradually raising my CG, I tried to stand. The board started to skid down gradually ... I readjusted my CG .... and blam!!!! Pain in the a$$ acquired a new meaning ... damn it! Never mind ... try it again ... and again ..... aaand again! But the result was the same ... the only difference was that PITA (Pain In The A$$) became more intense with each fall. I realised that it was time to change strategy.
Chapter 2 - Standing on your toes.
For snowboarding, there are 2 set of protectors - one for the hip and the other for the knee. I decided that it was time for the knee guards to do some work and tried to learn riding on toe side. And it worked. Very soon, I was able to stand up and balance myself. After sometime, I was able to slowly slide down and stop. But the steps were still very uncertain and my leg was getting tired. So as soon as I stopped, I fell down on my knees. The rock hard surface showed no mercy, inspite of the knee protectors.
Chapter 3 - Back to the heel side.
After a brief rest, I was back on my heels. Still no result. I continued the downward journey, sliding a few centimeters on the board followed by rolling on the snow for a few meters. The progress was painfully slow and the strength of the protectors were brutally tested at every step. It took me close to 2 hrs to cover the 1.8km and by the end of it, I was really depressed and very tired.
Time for lunch. While everybody laughed and joked, I had just looked down at my plate. I really felt like quitting and going back to the hotel. In comes Shin Jae. Shin Jae had helped me settle down in Korea in the initial days. From getting a phone connection, to the gym membership to every other detail, he had always helped me with a smile. Now he steps in to drag me out into the cold slopes. After a brief rest, we were off.
Volume 2
Chapter 1 - Perseverance pays.
Shin Jae painstakingly taught me how to balance myself on the board without sliding down. He didn't lecture me on structural mechanics of boards and the movement of CG. He held the board as I stood up and till I could balance myself properly. And bingo ... after a few attempts, I could do it on my own!
Chapter 2 - The falling leaf.
The next step was to ride the board on one edge and slide down the slope. Traversing from one side of the slope to the other like a falling leaf. He also taught me how to increase and decrease speed and how to stop without falling down. The efforts bore fruit and we covered the 1.8km in 1 hour.
I was tired and we took another break and sipped hot chocolate. My knee and wrist were paining very badly now but somehow, I dragged myself out into the cold.

Volume 3
Chapter 1 - Solo.
I asked Shin Jae to go ahead and let me do a solo ride down. I was a lot more confident now. I practiced the falling leaf over short distances. I was beginning to enjoy it inspite of the pain. As I gained more balance, I decided to increase the speed of the descent.
Chapter 2 - Slow down dude!
Half a way down the slope, I was brimming with confidence and decided to go full throttle. I did a slow gradual falling leaf over the more gradual slope and as I appraoched the steeper section, fired on all cylinders (actually got the board parallel to the surface) and zoomed down .... bang! The shock wave ran up from my palm, through the wrist into my arms. Then it was my right shoulder and then the back. The problem with falling down when on full throttle is that its very difficult to stop without hurting yourself. I lay in the snow for sometime and resumed the falling leaf. This time it took me 40 minutes to cover the slope.
I decided to call it a day after that and resume the next day. We went back to the hotel and had a shower. Though it greatly refreshed me up, the pain was getting worse every moment - and it was not just the back or the knee. I found it really difficult to sit on a hard surface or on the floor (as it is the norm in most Korean rooms).

From L>R, Mrs Sung Seop Park (thanks for the wonderful dinner), Shin Jae and Sung Soo.

I woke up next morning with swolen knees and no sensation on my a$$. On top of it there was a snow storm outside. But my pride was at stake ... so inspite of being barely able to walk, I decided to go ahead. We reached the slopes at around 1030hrs. The conditons were very bad - the storm continued unabated. Visibility was poor and the slope was in a very bad condition.

Volume 4
Chapter 1 - Worst case scenario.
The surface was like soft sand and it was difficult to manuever the board on it. The poor visibilty was worsened by the vapor condensing on my goggles turing into ice. By this time, I was quite confident with the falling leaf and could control me speed. However, the soft surface made it far from a smooth ride.
Chapter 2 - Don't try to learn snowboarding from YouTube!
With the falling leaf conquered, I decided to take the next step. Changing the riding edge in the move. I learnt from YouTube that the key was to quickly shift the body weight from forward to backward and vice versa when changing the riding edge. I was thinking about momentum conservation and CG shift and calculating how quickly I should shift my weight! After coming up with a reasonable solution, I went ahead with the hypothesis testing part. I was riding on my heel when I encountered the first steep section. I eased the pressure on my heels, flattened the board and went 'supersonic' :)
Einstein said that time slows down the faster you go. The following events seemed to justify it. As the board became parallel to the ground, the friction reduced drastically and the speed increased. The soft surface was very irregular and I could feel it as I rode over it. It was somehow similar to an aeroplane on a runway. When the plane is about to take off, we can feel the vibration due the surface irregularities on the runway. As soon as the place leaves the ground, that vibration ceases instanteneously. As my board picked up speed, adrenaline took over and I shifted my weight from back to front. But suddenly the vibrations beneath my feet ceased. For a split second I was quite surprised. Am I riding on clean ice? And then reality returned ... upside down. I landed on my head - partly embedded in the soft snow and shortly afterwards, a sledgehammer blow on my back. For sometime, I lay on the slope trying to figure out what exactly happened.
A ski patrol asked me if I was OK. Yeah sure ... just trying to locate the sun through the clouds!
For rest of the distance, I didn't try anything new and returned to base with all my bones intact. Thankfully, no body was around with a camera during those embarrasing moments.
The First Descent was not as impressive as I had hoped it to be but it was only my first time. Hopefully I'll return next season to ride the whole circuit of almost 5km of continuous slope.

L>R June Sig, Me and Yu Liu .... Yu makes no attempt to hide the effect of the wind.
L>R Yu Gwang, Chol Mae, Chang Woo, June Sig, KiHo, Me and Yu Liu.

>> End of Season 1.0 <<