Ever since I was a child, I’ve dreamt of flying. Not in the sense of someone determined to be an astronaut or a pilot but in the childlike sense of imagining how amazing it would be to be able to spread my arms and take to the skies. I vaguely considered sky-diving when I was at Varsity but somehow I never got around to it. Yesterday, I realised a dream.

It was also the first time in my life that I’ve done anything adventure/extreme-sports-ish, so I think quite a bit of the stiffness and exhaustion, now, is related to nerves and tension rather than the actual paragliding itself.

A lot of people plan this sort of adventure for weeks in advance. In this case, it was rather spontaneous. A couple of friends were supposed to be going to the Philippines for Chusoek (a major national holiday – harvest festival – when all Koreans return to their ancestral homes, which is accompanied by a long weekend). Unfortunately, a typhoon hit the Philippines, leaving over 200 people dead and causing major flooding. They cancelled their trip and decided to replace it with activities right here that would be fun and exciting. One of these – for which I joined them – was the paragliding. So instead of weeks to prepare, this all happened in the last 5 days.

We met at Dongdaegu station at 08:30 on Thursday morning. I struggled to get to sleep the night before with last-minute waves of concern that I may have spontaneously agreed to something completely crazy. My mother’s reaction when I told her (completely justifiably) was, “Who are you and what have you done with my daughter?” I was also excited – especially after chatting to one of the people I was going with who had also never done this before. I still woke up in plenty of time, had a shower and some breakfast and headed off. I could have taken the bus but I hadn’t done much planning (to figure out which bus to take) and I wasn’t even sure how often the buses would be running on the Chusoek weekend, so I settled on the more expensive option of a cab.

I arrived early and wandered around the station looking at things and waiting for my fellow travellers. It’s the first time I’ve been to the train station in Daegu and the first time I’ve taken a train (apart from the subway) in Korea. In fact, it’s the first time I’ve left Daegu since I arrived, which made it all doubly exciting. Dongdaegu the station is modern and well-equipped and feels a little like an airport – which probably makes sense given that regular, high-quality train travel is the most effective to get around in Korea because the country is too small to make regular flights viable. We bought three tickets from the automatic ticketing machine (which it turns out functions in English as well as Korean) and, after grabbing something to wake us up, headed to the platform to await our train. None of us was entirely sure whether we were in the right place and on the right platform. To be honest, I’ve very glad I was there with the other two, who have travelled before; I’m sure I would have missed the train otherwise. When it did arrive (on time at 09:06), we rushed to get on (we were almost in the right place) and found our comfortable, padded, spacious seats. We were on the slow train (Mugunghwa) – the slowest and least luxurious of the three main Korean train-types. It was still pretty luxurious and we settled in to watch the scenery and doze for the short 1hour 40 minute ride to Changwon.

Because it’s the first time I’ve left Daegu, I was glued to the window, in spite of my tiredness. We passed towns and small settlements (which would be huge compared to what I know as small towns) and agricultural lands stretching across the valleys to the foot of the mountains in every direction. Sometimes we’d pass a temple complex on a mountainside, with ornately-decorated buildings in traditional style. I wondered how they could be peaceful with the railway line running so close. There were many tunnels, short and long, passing right through the hearts of the mountains. Our ears all got blocked every time we entered a major tunnels as if the pressure had changed as it does when you’re flying or driving and you suddenly change altitude. Most of all though, I was struck by the way that the countryside, at least of the area we were passing through, could be easily characterised by the three picturesque dominant features – mountains, rivers and bridges.

Looking at this world from the window of a train was a joy. I took some pictures but I’d like to go back and stop in the small towns and spend time walking around and exploring the rivers and mountains and bridges. On the front wall of the our railway carriage were some pictures which appeared mostly to be adverts for the KTX (the super-high-speed Korean trains). One of them, for some reason, seemed to show the KTX following the Trans-Siberian Railroad. Sitting on a train, looking at the amazing view and thinking about the Trans-Siberian Railroad was a wonderful reminder of the Trans-Siberian adventure I have planned for sometime in the future.

Today’s adventure, however, was drawing ever nearer. When we reached roughly the time we were supposed to arrive, we gathered our belongings and waited for a station to appear. It soon did and we hopped off and headed across the pedestrian covered bridge to Changwon station and a day good day to fly. We were a bit early so we found a seat to wait the short while until our instructor  arrived. The guy we were going paragliding with is an experienced instructor who, along with many paragliding-specific achievements, has apparently climbed Mount Everest twice. He is also the instructor that other friends of ours went with a few weeks back, so we knew a little of what to expect and had the reassurance of knowing that they’d made it back in one piece. We left the station and he took us to his ‘office’ (a long room full of paragliding equipment and awards) and offered us coffee and tea – which we gratefully accepted. We wondered if we were there to get to know him a little and perhaps watch a safety video (there was a VCR and TV) but it turned out we were waiting for the other instructor, who may or may not have been his brother. I should perhaps mention at this point that what we were doing wasn’t ‘real’ (solo) paragliding. That takes a whole series of lessons, a licence and far more money. What we were there for was a tandem jump with an instructor – who would do all the work while we simply enjoyed the experience.

As soon as we finished our coffee, we (by which I mean they) loaded up the mini-bus and we headed out of town. The site we were heading to for the jump was about 30 minutes out of the town in a rural-ish area. We drove to the bottom in the mini-bus, at which point the instructor got out,  planted a wind-sock in the ground and suggested we leave our bags behind. We were a little reluctant to do so (and not sure we understood), so we took them along and all climbed into the cab of a truck to go up the mountain on one of the most winding, hair-pin-bending, half-tar, half-dirt roads I’ve seen in a while. At some point I really thought the driver was going to go off the edge, but by now the anticipation was really building and we were pretty much exclusively focussed on the fact that we were about to jump off a mountain. Not focussed in the sense of sitting quietly and preparing for the event, partly because we didn’t know what to expect. We chatted all the way up and laughed quite a lot but it was all about the experience that we were about to encounter together. Exploring alone has it’s advantages but you forget the joy of anticipation and excitement mediated and amplified through sharing and conversation. I’m glad I had people to share this rather spectacular experience with.

By the time we reached the top, everyone was pretty psyched to jump/run off a mountain. The instructor informed us that only two people could jump at a time (I assume because they only had two tandem canopies), so I waited while Stephanie and Christina got ready to jump first. Actually, the way it turned out to work is that you run as fast as you can straight down a very steep slope towards the trees below you and at some point before you reach them, if all goes according to plan, you take off. The preparation involves standing there feeling a little useless while the instructor straps on knee-pads and elbow-pads and helmet and then puts on the harness and straps you in firmly – or at least supposedly firmly, one of our number had a particular flight that could have ended a little less pleasantly because the instructor didn’t tighten the straps enough. Once your harness is attached and you’re all padded up, you move into position and the instructor attaches himself to you and the canopy to both harnesses.

Then it’s time to run. Christina went first and, at the signal from the instructor, which almost seemed to take her by surprise, rushed down the mountain and looked like she was going to hit a trees or fall down the hill, when, all of a sudden, she and the instructor miraculously took off and floated through the air. We watched them until they drifted out of sight around the mountain. No time to contemplate as the team hustled Stephanie into position and the other instructor hooked her up. For each take-off, a group of several other men, none of whom were introduced but who all seemed to be paragliders or at least to know an awful lot about it, helped to get everything ready, untangling lines, checking straps and then lifting the canopy into the air as the jumping pair started to run.  Stephanie and her instructor started running down the hill but the canopy must not have inflated evenly (we surmised) because the team stopped them and they went back for a second try. On the second run, they got it right and headed off into the air. I felt a thrill as I watched them fly away.

And then I had nothing to do but wait for them all to return so that I could take my turn at flying. In the meantime, I wandered around taking some pictures and watched a few solo paragliders take to the air, with far less fuss and difficulty than our group had experienced, and head off into the distance. It was amazing to watch them lift off and fly away. Watching the experienced paragliders, I could see how carefully they steered their canopies and used the air currents to choose a direction and to go up and down and it made me just how much control they have and that their flying is not at all random. I also walked around a bit and stood looking down the hill you have to run down in order to take off. In retrospect, this might have been a mistake.

I didn’t have all that long to wait before the jumpers returned. They said their flight had been good but we didn’t have much time to chat before the instructor bundled me off to strap on masses of gear. I handed my camera to the other two and did as I was told as I was strapped into harnesses and padding and canopies. My mind by this stage was in a whirl – I was about to jump off a mountain. I was given simple instructions but I’m not sure how much I really took in: “When I say run you run really fast”, “we’re just waiting for the wind to be right”, “when I say ‘sit’ you push down hard on this strap”, “are you ready? No wait!”. My mind was racing and I was trying to breathe deeply. And then we were running down the hill in an unsuccessful attempt to take flight. I think I may actually have mis-stepped as I tried to run-but-not-fall down the very steep mountain slope. We tried again but I still wasn’t running fast enough. I think my brain was reluctant to let me rush down a hillside in what seemed like an inevitable rush into some bushes or possibly down a mountain. On the third try we rushed down and then suddenly someone was pulling me from the front and we were hurtling to the left and into some trees and then suddenly we were above them and my whole body seemed to be a mess of nerves and sensations as I realised I was flying.

The instructor said “sit” and I pushed on the straps and found myself sitting in the air high up above the tall pine forests as we rushed and floated around the mountain. I was taking deep slow breaths and there was a solid knot in my stomach. It’s hard to describe the sensation – I was aware of everything and nothing and it was so much sensation, almost sensory overload. The physical memory is so strong that just describing it I feel like I’m reliving every second. I could see into the distance to what felt like forever, right into the next valley and the next, to the mountains so blue in the distance. At the same time, I fought the thought, looking down, of what would happen if we fell into that forest. At one point we turned a little sharply and I had a momentary passing thought of mortality. We soared around for what felt like ages and just a moment. I was aware of changing scenery below me. We turned back towards the mountain and I could see how far away we were from the take-off point. At some point the instructor held out a camera and took a picture of us in the air. Below me were rows and rows of fruit trees. I felt dizzy as we turned around a few times and vaguely wondered about motion sickness. We turned again and flew out over farmlands. The sensations are like a multi-dimensional sensory recording – like the whole-body sensation version of a movie, the images like frozen stills. The strongest is the picture of a moment when our shadow passed over an old Korean man in a hat tending his vegetable garden far below. We got closer to the ground and I became aware of the power-lines and flowers.

We seemed to be up there for quite a long time. It must have been about 10-15 minutes but it’s hard to sense time when your brain is simultaneously dealing with all senses being magnificently alive,  the views of forever, meta-thoughts about flying, thinking about mortality and trying to avoid thinking about the possibility of dying (which is hard to do at the same time), noticing every moment passing and just relaxing into the experience. After what seemed like forever and not nearly long enough, the instructor simply “we land, you run” and I found we were heading to the open spot where we would finally be landing. It’s strange to think you’re travelling so far and so fast but the wind is quiet enough to talk up there. I had no fear as the ground got closer but I found myself focussing less on the scenery and practising running in the air – perhaps to remind my legs what  that meant. We came down and I think ran one or two steps and then came to a stop sliding and sitting. Somehow in the landing I grazed my knuckles, possibly as we slid and finally stopped. I must have stood up – I don’t remember it – and the instructor untangled the strings of the canopy which had landed in front of us and took a photo of me holding them. He unstrapped me and set about folding it all up and moving us away with efficiency.

I didn’t know whether to scream or to sing or to cry or to sit down and contemplate. Christina and Stephanie were still at the top and there were no other English speakers, so while we waited for other people to land and everyone to organise themselves and pack up their equipment, and while other people arrived and things happened, I stood around and, mostly, looked out at a nearby dam and tried to re-engage my brain and figure out the feelings. I think perhaps the experience left us all a little in shock. I know that the time I spent at the landing area I wasn’t really all there and I didn’t really manage to think anything. At some point I picked up a piece of straw and broke into into equal-sized pieces.

And then I was climbing back into the truck for the trip back up the mountain, surrounded by what seemed like a lot of Koreans chatting loudly and masses of equipment. By this stage bits of my brain were again working sufficiently for me to be a concerned that the truck was overloaded. I was in the cab. It was a double cab. I was very aware of the hair-pin bends and the rather precarious road. I spent most of that nerve-wracking ride back up the mountain wishing for a Nissan Hardbody or a Colt Double-cab or any proper bakkie to replace the somewhat flimsy Korean double-cab-truck substitute. I have no doubt that I wouldn’t have been the least concerned about taking that road in a proper double-cab, even with all the luggage and the people, but Korean vehicles always seem to me a little like tin-cans-on-wheels and this truck was no exception.

We got to the top and I hurried off to find the others but it was somehow not possible to have a real conversation about the experience. I suppose it was all too new. They did say I seemed to have been gone for ages, which was confirmed when the instructor came up and said that I’d been in the air far longer than either of them. There was just enough time left for two people to go again and he suggested, because I’d had a much longer flight, that the other two should have a second go. I could definitely have gone again but I think the longer first flight was part of the reason my experience was so amazing, so I’m not at all unhappy that they got to go again. I wouldn’t have exchanged that for anything.

This time Stephanie took off first time and headed off for her second flying opportunity. Christina had a slightly more bumpy start; while they were running down the hill all around her people were shouting “go, go, go”, but given that they had previously been shouting “no, no, no” when they thought it was a bad attempt, everything was a little confusing. We heard when we all reached the bottom (me in one of the vehicles) that her whole flight was a little terrifying and the landing resulted in the instructor falling on her. But Stephanie’s second flight was better than her first so I suppose perhaps things balanced.

After that, we waited around for what seemed like ages, while the instructors and all the many other paragliding people chatted and packed up and made plans and waited for other people. By this stage all three of us were tired, thirsty and hungry and not really in the mood for waiting. I was glad that I’m so very used to African time and waiting around for people; I think it bothered me less than the other two. We were also aware of the time, though. My jumping-off-the-mountain companions were supposed to get back for a dinner so we needed to get an early enough train and it was by now 15:30, with the town was a good half-hour away.

When we eventually did leave the mountain of paragliding, that still had to wait, but the stop was a good thing that made us all feel better. About 5 minutes away from the place where we’d been, we stopped at a Chinese Restaurant for a late lunch. Of course the language barrier became a problem in ordering and the three of us ended up getting fried rice with vegetables in a garbled attempt at understanding. This started with spicy soup and then a large stack of rice topped with egg and mushrooms. It was fairly yummy, although partly because it was ‘seasoned with hunger’. We were sorry, however, after he let us taste some, that we hadn’t ordered the sweet-and-sour chicken one of the other guys had – it was really amazingly delicious.

After lunch we headed back to town, stopping briefly at the office to pay our money and returned to Changwon station. By the time we got tickets, we had just 20 minutes to wait. We were also, by happy coincidence, on the medium speed train (Saemaul), leaving at 17:06, so we would arrive back in Daegu by 18:30. The train was rather full but we found our seats and watched Korea pass by as we sped on to Dongdaegu station, where we caught cabs and headed home.

The two friends I’d gone with went out last night but I was too exhausted, both physically and emotionally, even to consider doing anything. I’m eternally grateful to them, though, for the amazing opportunity. I don’t think I would ever have considered, never mind actually done, something like this on my own. In fact, I don’t think I’d ever have thought that it might be something which was a) possible and b) not prohibitively expensive. Many of the other vague ideas I’ve had about flying have been dismissed because the cost was exorbitant. This was very reasonable at 70 000 won. In fact, the whole trip was relatively inexpensive: 70 000 won for paragliding, 15 000 won for train tickets (6000 won there, 9000 won back) and 5 000 won for lunch. A total of 90 000 won, which converts to less than R 600. There are some things that weren’t perfect. I would have preferred a little more information about safety procedures before we took off, and perhaps to have had a better idea of exactly what to expect. It might also have been easier if the instructors had had a little more English. And the second instructor was definitely not nearly as competent or friendly as the first and flying with him not as good an experience. Other than that, however, the experience was good, none of us was injured in any way, the equipment was obviously well-maintained and, apart from the trip up the mountain in the tin-can truck, I didn’t feel in any way unsafe. Changwon is just an hour or two from Daegu so it’s also relatively close. So, all in all, the cost was minimal, the inconvenience limited and the disadvantages manageable. And the experience of flying, realising a dream, soaring through the air so incredibly alive? Well, quite simply, priceless.