by Ning Cai
“Would you girls like to skydive? My boy @sonnyboy808 works with an operator up in North Shore and can help you arrange.” The promise of an epic adventure and the fulfillment of a dream – all in under 142 characters!
Sonny called me on the phone. “How soon can you girls get up to North Shore?”
“About an hour?” I said, my heart thumping. Ning propped herself expectantly on her knees beside me, like an eager puppy.
“OK, I’ll book you girls for a 10am jump,” Sonny announced. “Aloha!”
Twitter rocks!
But back to the airfield... my instructor Shaun must have sensed me looking at him because he turned and flashed me a boyish grin. “Relax!” he winked, patting me on the arm.
Okaaay...
I was in Hawaii, and I really wanted to... you know, go with the flow and adopt the cool “hang loose” attitude that the dudes and chicks here have. So I leaned back on the grass and we talked drums and music, and why he decided to move out here to the islands, and how long he’d been skydiving, and what his various tattoos meant.
“Hey ya!” I heard a familiar cheery voice behind me.
The BFF was all suited up and was bounding over with a silly grin on her face. Her instructor Elio was trotting behind her, along with two videographers, apparently one for each of us. They were going to skydive with us and capture us on film!
The cameramen circled around us filming while the rest of the skydivers made their way across the field. The tremendous force of the wind whipped our faces as the plane landed just metres from us. I could barely breathe because the gust of hot wind was suffocating.
We climbed into the old propeller plane with as brave a smile as we could muster, and sat silently still as the noisy aircraft spluttered its way up to 10,000 feet.
You know how it is when you’re waiting at the wings to go on stage? That wait is often more agonising than the actual speech or performance. That was how we felt. Ning and I were all geared up, and we were climbing slowly to the stipulated altitude, higher and higher. I was the one nearest the door so I knew I would be the first one to be pushed off the plane. My heart was pounding so hard I could feel and hear the throbbing in my temples.
Ning was on the long bench across the aisle from me. There were two long benches on either side of the narrow aircraft, and we were sitting with our legs astride. Shaun was humming nonchalantly behind me, while Elio was looking all serious as he checked Ning’s straps and harnesses. I wasn’t too sure how high up in the air we were, but I was soon to find out.
One of the videographers suddenly appeared from behind and started filming us, panning his camera wide to capture our nervous faces. Instinctively, we all waved and cheered despite ourselves... the finest piece of acting, if I may say so myself! As we cheered, the other videographer moved swiftly to the door just in front of me and pushed it open.
Oh. My. God.
There was a sudden gush of wind and the roar of the plane’s engine assaulted my eardrums. Is this it? Is it time?
The brave man perched precariously at the edge of the plane, leaning against the doorframe as he filmed the view outside. I peered out and realised for the first time that we were really high up, above the clouds.
Below us... way, way below us... was an expanse of ocean as far as the eye could see, in a million shades of aquamarine. To my right were the rugged volcanic mountains that had become so synonymous with Hawaii for me. From this high up, the whole landscape looked curved, as if we were in space looking down on Earth. It was surreal.
“Look, whales!” Shaun yelled above the din, pointing to a white frothy patch on the ocean surface far below.
After going on a whale-watching expedition at the historical coastal town of Lahaina in Maui earlier in the month, Ning and I had become quite good at spotting whales. And yes, I could see them even from this distance. A pod of five or six of them, spouting water from their blowholes in turns.
“Look, Ning, look!” I tugged at the BFF’s sleeves and she leaned over, giving me the thumbs up. I could see her grinning through her ridiculous goggles, which distorted her face.
At the sight of the whales, I felt my heart swell with so much joy and exhilaration that my fear melted. I was in the beautiful islands of Hawaii, skydiving into the most spectacular landscape of ocean, sandy beaches and majestic mountains below. In that moment, my “butterflies in the tummy” transformed into sheer adrenaline-driven excitement of seeing Hawaii from the sky.
Did I tell you that skydiving tops Ning’s bucket list? She told me that not long after we first met. In fact, we did some research about a trip to Thailand or Australia over a long weekend. But we decided we didn’t quite trust the equipment in Thailand, and a weekend in Australia just to skydive didn’t make financial sense. This skydiving experience in Hawaii was a dream come true for both of us, and it was finally happening!
“You ready?” Shaun’s voice snapped me back to reality.
We had climbed to 10,000 feet. I could see wisps of white clouds drifting lazily below us. How neat to be able to jump through a fluffy cloud, I thought.
“YEAAHHH!” I yelled back at the top of my lungs, really meaning it this time.
“Go, BFF!!” Ning laughed, punching her hand into the air with a hoot. “Have fun!!!”
I inched my way to the edge of the open door and pulled myself up on my feet. I was grabbing the railing so tightly that my knuckles were white. Half of my feet were now jutting out over the edge of the plane, and a shiver coursed through me as I looked down. Did I mention that I have a fear of heights...?
“Cross your arms over your chest and lean your head back,” Shaun shouted authoritatively. “After we jump, bend your legs and tuck them between my legs!”
“Got it!”
“Alright, here we go!” he yelled, and with a push we tumbled out of the plane.
OH. MY. GOD. We were free fallin’!
Nothing prepared me for the immense force of the wind when you jump off a plane. It’s like a brick wall slamming into you. I couldn’t breathe. Or maybe it’s the sudden change of pressure at 10,000 feet?
My heart felt like it would pop right out of my mouth. And boy, did I scream! I understood later why my instructor told me to scream...
Ning, the superhero girl, told me after we landed that she thought she was going to die because she could not breathe at all. I was a bit puzzled because I didn’t feel that way, at least not to that extent. And it’s because I was screaming my lungs out, the way I always do on free-fall rides at theme parks.
“Didn’t Elio tell you to scream?” I asked her as we drove to get some Matsumoto shaved ice and shrimp scampi from the food truck later.
“No, he didn’t... was I supposed to?” Ning turned to me, raising an eyebrow.
The other thing no one prepared me for was this: You know how your ears get blocked when you take the elevator and it goes up or down too fast? Or when the plane is landing and you have to keep swallowing or yawning to pop your ears? Well, this was a hundred times worse.
My ears were completely blocked within seconds of free falling. My eardrums started to ring and hurt, but no amount of swallowing or yawning could pop them because the pressure was changing so quickly with the vertical drop.
Before I could begin to adjust to all these intense changes I was experiencing, the cameraman – who had tumbled out of the plane after me – caught up with us and started filming me in mid-air. We’d started out being quite far apart in the sky, but this guy expertly manoeuvred his way over till we were within arm’s length of each other. It was so awesome to suddenly have a three-person pod, thousands of feet up in the air!
I wish it could have lasted longer but before I knew it, Shaun pulled the parachute chord and up we shot, like an Angry Bird on a slingshot or the backward pull of a bungee chord. My head was pressed back against Shaun’s chest and all I saw was the blue sky above shielded by a flapping parachute.
“Woohoo!” I screamed, adrenaline thumping t
hrough my veins. I could get addicted to this!
When our parachute was fully opened – thank God there were no holes in it – we began to drift. I felt like a little fairy with hummingbird wings just hovering effortlessly in the air.
The brick wall of wind had subsided and in its place was a gentle breeze and the sun’s warmth on my face. I dropped my legs and spread my hands out on either side of me like a bird. I could make an air angel now!
Snugly harnessed, I looked down and saw my own two feet dangling high up in the air, with nothing under them but the white crests of breaking waves far, far below. I swung them back and forth like a little kid. This was fun!
“You want a bit more adrenaline?” I heard Shaun’s voice in my ear.
I had no clue what this madman had in mind, but I nodded. I can never turn down an invitation for more adventure and more adrenaline. Never!
Shaun grinned and tugged at one side of the parachute chord and we started to spiral. The spirals got faster and tighter, and we were spinning downward so sharply that my entire body was tilted at a 45-degree angle to the earth. It was like a steep spiral drop on a suspended roller coaster!
I could feel the contents in my stomach churning and bile rising to my throat as my breakfast threatened to do an anti-gravity stunt up my esophagus. It was motion sickness at its worst. And my stuffed ears were giving me a throbbing headache.
Who would have guessed that a simple jump from a plane could cause all these physiological changes in a human body? Surely humans were not designed to fly!
My throat was dry from all that screaming as we sailed down, down, down in spiraling loops towards the airfield below. From up there, you don’t realise how fast you’re actually falling until the ground rushes up at you at an alarming speed.
I realised at that moment that I didn’t know how to land. Do I stretch my legs straight out? What if I break my ankles or knees at the impact? Do I tuck them in? Bend my knees? What if I scraped my kneecaps off as they dragged against the ground?
Before I could figure this out, we landed splat on our butts on the grassy airfield, with the huge parachute flopping unceremoniously over our heads. It was the most unglamorous landing ever, and the cameraman was there to capture it all.
I was laughing so hard as we crawled out from under the parachute, the way I always do – hysterically – when I’m nervous. My adrenaline was still on overdrive.
“Again!!!” I whooped, and Shaun gave me a high five.
“Great job, Pam!” he yelled, slapping me on the back like I was one of the guys. I beamed.
Looking up, I saw the other skydivers falling from the sky. They were all lined up, spread out in one large spiraling loop above our heads. Where was the BFF? She was supposed to jump right after me. But one by one they landed and none of them was Ning.
I shielded my eyes from the sun and searched the sky for my best friend.
When everyone was done folding their parachutes and heading back to the base camp, there was just one skydiving duo up in the sky, still drifting leisurely like they had all the time in the world.
After what seemed like an eternity, Elio finally decided to return Ning to earth. It was so good to see her land – and gracefully so – on the airfield. I scampered up to her and we screamed and hugged each other, laughing till tears blurred our vision.
“It was awesome!!!” Ning screamed in exhilaration. “We did it! We did it!”
Yes, we survived our first skydive – and on 4 April too!
So 4 April did become an auspicious day for Ning and I, the day we ticked the second biggest item off our bucket lists – second only to travelling the world. And we’ll never forget this date!
Us after our first skydive!
Our certificate with the “auspicious” date!
04
trouble in paradise
Hawaii · March 2011
PAM
Librans by nature, Ning and I are both harmony-loving, sweep-stuff-under-the-carpet type of girls on normal days. But in our nine months of travelling together, believe me, there were instances in which we fought like alley cats.
If you’ve tried spending 24 hours × 9 months with another human being, you’ll know that the insane closeness alone can trigger a fight. Add PMS into the equation and we’re talking multiplication and permutations! I guess what we didn’t consider was the fact that when two girls spend a lot of time together, their menstrual cycles often converge.
Our PMS fights are epic.
And the mother of all fights, the one that started it all... was in Honolulu.
It was our last day in Hawaii, at the tail end of March 2011, and the day before we packed our backpacks and flew across the Pacific Ocean to Los Angeles. It was also the day that we had a lunch appointment with our Singaporean friend Angeline and her family, who now live in Honolulu and who were cooking a meal specially for us that afternoon...
NING
It was 10am when I was finishing up the laundry in Lori Okami’s backyard. Lori is the cousin of my dear friend Alan Okami (aka @koalohauke), whom I met on Twitter and who runs KoAloha, a family business that manufactures high-end ukuleles. The BFF and I were staying in the lower level of Lori’s house, which is separate from where she lived with her son.
As a freelance personal trainer and ex-body builder, Lori often had clients train with her and as such, had her garage converted into an amazing fitness haven for gym bunnies. We were putting up in a spare room with a shower just outside her home gym.
Since it was our last day in rainbow-blessed Hawaii, we decided to seize the opportunity to wash all our clothes.
I was chucking in the last of our damp clean clothes into Lori’s dryer when Pam joined me in the backyard after her morning coffee. She padded over in her flip-flops, wearing her coffee-stained Jake Shimabukuro concert t-shirt and koala-patterned panties.
“Shouldn’t you be wearing shorts?” I raised an eyebrow. “Really Pam, Lori has neighbours.”
“Nah, it’s fine,” Pam stretched like a lazy cat in the warm Hawaiian sun. I shrugged and threw in the last of our clothes.
PAM
That wasn’t how it happened. Yes, the washing machine was in the backyard, and the BFF had gone out with the laundry basket. But I was inside the house washing the breakfast dishes when I heard Ning yell, “Hey, come help me!”
I scampered out the back door and found her loading the dirty clothes into the wash, throwing them in one by one. I ran over, leaving the door open. It would just take a minute, right?
“I’m gonna wash the clothes I have on too,” Ning said, pulling off her t-shirt and shorts in front of the washing machine till she was standing in her bikini and Puma shoes. “You wanna wash yours?”
“Sure,” I replied. I needed to wash my underwear and grubby shorts, so I unhooked my bra and skillfully slipped it out from under my t-shirt a la Jennifer Beals in Flashdance, then stepped out of my shorts, leaving me in my grey Jake Shimabukuro t-shirt and panties.
The BFF scanned me up and down with a raised eyebrow. “Are you sure you wanna walk around like this?”
I looked down at myself and pondered for a moment. “It’s OK, I’ll just stay indoors,” I reasoned. Ning shrugged and continued throwing the last pieces of clothing into the washing machine.
As I turned to head back into the house, I saw a flicker of movement out of the corner of my eye. It was slithering between the blades of grass about two feet from us, towards our open door. I froze in horror when I saw its scaly legs and long flicking tail.
“Oh my God! It’s a lizard!” I shrieked. “It’s going into the house!”
“Close the door!” Ning instructed firmly as I flailed around.
I leaned over and slammed the back door, but a bit too hard so it ricochetted against the doorframe and flew wide open. I shuddered and slammed it again. This time, the back door clicked shut. The startled lizard scuttled away as I fled in the opposite direction and hopped on a foot-high stool for safety.
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The BFF followed the mayhem nonchalantly. After all, she isn’t afraid of lizards. But toss a bug her way and you’ll see a side of ‘Magic Babe’ that’s completely uncharacteristic of her sexy, fearless, fire-eating, sai-wielding, kickass onstage persona. (But you didn’t hear that from me.)
Once I felt safe enough to climb down from my stool, I inched over to the door to open it for Ning, who had picked up the laundry basket and was heading back into the house. That’s when I realised – to my horror – that the door was locked. I rattled the doorknob, but it refused to open.
“Oh fuck, do you have the keys?” I shot Ning a look of panic.
“No, why would I have the keys?” She raised an eyebrow. “Please don’t tell me...”
NING
“Did you...” I turned around to look at Pam, feeling the blood drain from my face. “Did you just lock us out?”
Pam tried to twist the knob. It jiggled loudly but it was evident that the door wasn’t about to budge.
“Fuck!!!” A rush of anger and despair coursed through me, right before I unleashed a horrified scream – not unlike that of a suicidal teenager who’d just found out that his parents cancelled his World of Warcraft subscription.
I grit my teeth. “Pam! I was just done with our laundry! Five seconds! JUST FIVE SECONDS and we’d be inside our house!”
Pam gave me her best innocent koala face. Big, wide eyes. Meek open mouth. Her perfected cuddly helpless expression. I ignored it and screamed like a deranged Lady MacBeth who’d just been clued in that her expensive Japanese skin-whitening cream wasn’t gonna get the red blood stains off her hands.