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Journalism of Courage
I HAD to pinch myself to be reassured I was really on the Antartic Circle that December 31, 1999. It had all been like a dream 8212; landing at Patriot Hills on the South Pole in bright sunlight at 11.30 pm, seeing only an endless mass of pristine white ice, and then deciding to take off almost immediately for the Millennium Jump.
Although I had more than 500 skydives to my name, the only emotion I knew when I jumped out of the airplane from a height of 20,000 feet at -30 degree Celsius was fear. But then, it is that fear that makes adventure sports what they are: thrilling. That is what sends the adrenaline coursing through the veins. That fear of the unknown is an essential part of the sport, like salt in food.
I was with an international skydiving expedition I had joined after reading about them on the Net. For months, I corresponded with the organisers of the trip, providing details of my skydiving experience, fitness levels, motivations. It was something I wanted to do from the core of my heart; luckily for me, I found sponsors for my dream in the Indian Army and a couple of their enterprises.
Finally, when we arrived at the South Pole, I found myself in a motley group of 32. There was an African girl who had won a contest that offered the expedition as a first prize, there was a Hollywood stuntman, for whom Antartica was the only continent he hadn8217;t paraglided over. There was a priest from a Russian priest who had been inspired by his son to take up parachuting. And there was a 73-year-old Californian, who was in it for the sheer spirit of adventure.
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And then there was me. I firmly believe that while many live on the edge, I want to step over it. I am motivated by the thought of achieving something few others have. The jump was to last just 40 seconds in the air, but the effort, the planning, the hardship, the risk are all worth it in my book. That is probably why I didn8217;t have a problem acclimatising to the severe weather conditions, the sub-zero temperatures or the five kgs of clothes we had to wear. We had practised jumps in Puenta Arenas in Chile prior heading out for Antartica, and I believed they would stand us in good stead.
We had for our neighbours scientists from the UK and the US, who had camped nine km away from our campsite. The only mode of transportation were snowbuggies, which we had brought with us. Interestingly, they didn8217;t have any tyres, they travelled only on tyre tubes.
But for me, what took more getting used to than anything else was the reality of six months of daylight. The sun was so bright during the four days we were there that we had to wear goggles not just when we were out in the snow, but also in our tents and while we slept in the magnificently warm sleeping-bags.
Cooking was another task, so I settled for the biscuits and dry fruits I had brought with me. One corner of our campsite doubled up as a makeshift kitchen. Here, a fire burned round-the-clock to heat the ice that made up our drinking water supplies. Since I don8217;t drink either tea or coffee, I survived on a concoction of condensed milk and water and sips of soup.
These conditions, and the absence of any other activity, made it easy to bond. We were from 18 different countries, bound together by an experience few others could share, so communication was never a problem. But the highlight was Nadeem, a student from South Africa, whom I caught humming a few Bollywood tunes. What8217;s more, she was even familiar with a few of the stars8217; names. A Malaysian group, which was part of the expedition, surprised me with their knowledge of Hindi film songs as well. That made for an immediate bonhomie.
But all this fades into the background when I think of the actual jump, the curious rush of excitement and contentment. After 40 seconds in the air over the South Pole, when I finally landed at Patriot Hills and planted the national flag on the ice, there was this heady feeling of the responsibility of being the only Indian on the southernmost tip of the earth.
The skydive surely lifted me higher than I could have ever imagined.
