I have officially decided that I suck at surfing. No if, ands, or buts about it; i just flat out fucking suck. I was trying to convince myself that there were various other reasons for my lack of time actually riding waves compared to the amount of time I have spent tossed around by them such as; I´m not used to this short board, i can´t duck dive with the epoxy, I´m not confident on left-handers, I keep getting dropped in on, It´s too windy, it´s too crowded, it´s too big....but I think today I have finally just accepted the fact that I just flat out suck, and I will accept this fact with grace
Ok, i know I am being a little hard on myself. I know I don´t really suck THAT bad. And to be fair, I am in the water constantly here with pros and advanced surfers from all over the world, obviously just sitting on the outside watching trying not to get in the way of people and trying to shoulder steal as much as possible. But MAN, this sport is frustrating.
At Manu bay is a car park where all of the campervans park to watch the surfers at the point. There´s a pretty big audience there, especially on bigger days, lotsa photographers and bikini clad girls hoping to catch the eye of their famous local boys. Well, yesterday, I was itching to get in the water after 6 days straight of torrential rain, so I decided to try my luck and paddle out at Manu to see how I go. Whoops.
To get into the water, you have to walk over about 100 yards of big, slippery rocks, holding your board with your leash attached to your leg. So while you´re trying to navigate between not slipping on the rocks and breaking your board or your back, you also have to make sure you time it correctly so you don´t walk on the rocks when A set comes through, or else the water will rush at you angrily and knock you on your ass for the world to see. Well, i stood on shore for about a half hour, watching other guys carefully on how they were entering the water. Seemed simple enough; walk out carfeully, get stable, put board in the water, and when its deep enough, jump onto your board and paddle like hell to get out of the impact zone. So, with confidence I really should not have mustered, I walked out onto the rocks and pretended like I knew what i was doing. I think I even gave the camera that was following me (probably thinking I was some kind of good athlete) a little pose. Well. I managed to walk out to where i was about aknle deep in the water and stabilized myself on a bigger rock. But out of nowhere, a rogue wave decides to break about 2 feet in front of me, and all I could do was watch this massive mass of white water come barrelling at my face, helpless because my foot was now wedged between two rocks. It knocked me straight on my ass, then due to my board, pinned me up against the rocks, my feet in the sky and my body thrashing around like a beached whale. And to make it worse, it was the first wave of a set, so for all of Manu bay to see, I was pounded again and again against the rocks, board flying and making sounds compbrable to bones breaking, eliciting pained ¨ooohs¨ and "oooouch"es from my spectators. When the beating was finally over, I gracefully scrambled, falling about 4 more times on the way, up to the grass, every curse word in the book flying out of my mouth. And I looked up, and every single person at Manu was watching me, probably relieved that they didn´t have to come in and rescue me, and then the carpark erupted in applause. And I, with blood dripping down my arms and legs from the beating I just incurred, bowed deepy and smiled again for the camera, who now clearly realized I was no pro surfer. And then, I walked home a 30 minute trek uphill, which was enough time for me to wallow in my defeat and decide that I am now giving up surfing.
Kidding, I´m not. But perhaps I´ll think otherwise next time I decide to go out at Manu when it´s "Pumping, bro!". But damn...those left handers ARE hard.
No comments:
Post a Comment