I slowly opened my eyes and relaxed my tummy muscles. The pilot had put his hand on my right shoulder. "Relax, my boy", he said "Look at your left, look down! What do you see?" I came back to my senses and turned left. Although I could not stop thinking. My whole body had just experienced a free fall from a height of 500ft........
The Piper Chronicles
Day 2 started the same. Basically it started a lot before our group could even wake up. We were scheduled to have an experimental flight at 6:15 in the morning and at 6:05 i was sitting in the toilet waiting for day 1 to disappear. Another group who were scheduled after us were already ready and had reached the hangar. As we rushed in a jeep to the hangar at 6:45, we luckily discovered the the pilot himself was late and was sitting in the same jeep as ours (Weird! we didnt even recognize him:)) So the first journey started! All 5 of us, Varun, Aadil, Satyam, Achyoot and myself, we took our positions inside the Piper Saratoga aircraft and waited for one of the most memorable moments for the rest of our lives.....or so we thought!!
So a lot happened. Satyam read out to the pilot from the pilot's handbook; my camera floated a feet above my hand (during the free fall) and when Achyoot requested the pilot to hand him over the controls the pilot looked at him as if saying, "Dude, I wont give that to my wife!". Although it was not that funny, Aadil coudnt stop laughing. He went on and on like Indro on a bad joke day.
Achyoot concluded this pilot might not be the "sutta" kind of guy (although he found out later he was wrong) and forgot about it as soon as he came back on the ground and saw the ravishing Vandy waving and smiling at him like a female prime minister of a third world country ( Our country needs to experiment with one of those too). Achyoot smiled as he preened his hair. Little did the poor chap know the RIMC was standing right behind him and smiling and waving as well.
The little people from Ratanpur
The second excercise for the day was three rounds of taking off, turning and landing a glider, a plane with no engines.
I am notorious for being a "fattu" (or a guy who is scared of taking any sort of risk, physical mental or experimental). So people had basically assumed what would happen once I go inside the glider and it takes off. I can picture them picturing me screaming, cursing, throwing my limbs around and ultimately opening the latch and jumping out of the glider from 300 ft. Now, that is so contradictory-its weird, and thats why it didnt happen.
This is what happened. I checked my seatbelts waved at my friends and the glider took off. It was kind of nice, rising heights and thinning air when suddenly everything in my stomach just started wobbling, trying to comeout and enjoy the view from that height. It was a free fall just after the cable which pulls the glider detaches. I clinched my fists and shut my eyes. When I opened them......"Look down, what do you see" The pilot was talking to me as if I was a five year old trapped in a tree panda`s body. "Look at that small village . How small it looks. Look at the little people of Ratanpur doing their daily chores. Look how that little woman is unloading water infront of that toy car. Oh wait! Thats not a toy car, thats a giant tractor.... " "I get it", I screamed. "I can see how little these people are looking and I can also see why....It would be really better for both of us if we concentrated on the landing rather than that woman`s tractor."
I kept looking down at the village for the rest of the landing. Everyone was busy with what they were doing except, there was a little 5 year old looking up agape as the glider was turning to land. It was probably nothing new for him, but he looked up with a curiosity that I can never match about a flying object. I looked closely....He looked a little bit like me.
I always had this phobia of heights. Much like everyone else I also fear falling down but in my case I always think its more likely to happen. I am usually reminded of the little people of Ratanpur whenever I feel lonely (not in a weird way:P), and that has been a lot lately. Sometimes I wonder, am I slowly rising above while all the people around me are shrinking in dimension doing their daily chores, bored and thus uninterested in what is going on above them or am I a little fellow from the village looking up at everyone who is floating past. The latter agrees more to my logic.
The Piper Chronicles
Day 2 started the same. Basically it started a lot before our group could even wake up. We were scheduled to have an experimental flight at 6:15 in the morning and at 6:05 i was sitting in the toilet waiting for day 1 to disappear. Another group who were scheduled after us were already ready and had reached the hangar. As we rushed in a jeep to the hangar at 6:45, we luckily discovered the the pilot himself was late and was sitting in the same jeep as ours (Weird! we didnt even recognize him:)) So the first journey started! All 5 of us, Varun, Aadil, Satyam, Achyoot and myself, we took our positions inside the Piper Saratoga aircraft and waited for one of the most memorable moments for the rest of our lives.....or so we thought!!
So a lot happened. Satyam read out to the pilot from the pilot's handbook; my camera floated a feet above my hand (during the free fall) and when Achyoot requested the pilot to hand him over the controls the pilot looked at him as if saying, "Dude, I wont give that to my wife!". Although it was not that funny, Aadil coudnt stop laughing. He went on and on like Indro on a bad joke day.
Achyoot concluded this pilot might not be the "sutta" kind of guy (although he found out later he was wrong) and forgot about it as soon as he came back on the ground and saw the ravishing Vandy waving and smiling at him like a female prime minister of a third world country ( Our country needs to experiment with one of those too). Achyoot smiled as he preened his hair. Little did the poor chap know the RIMC was standing right behind him and smiling and waving as well.
The little people from Ratanpur
The second excercise for the day was three rounds of taking off, turning and landing a glider, a plane with no engines.
I am notorious for being a "fattu" (or a guy who is scared of taking any sort of risk, physical mental or experimental). So people had basically assumed what would happen once I go inside the glider and it takes off. I can picture them picturing me screaming, cursing, throwing my limbs around and ultimately opening the latch and jumping out of the glider from 300 ft. Now, that is so contradictory-its weird, and thats why it didnt happen.
This is what happened. I checked my seatbelts waved at my friends and the glider took off. It was kind of nice, rising heights and thinning air when suddenly everything in my stomach just started wobbling, trying to comeout and enjoy the view from that height. It was a free fall just after the cable which pulls the glider detaches. I clinched my fists and shut my eyes. When I opened them......"Look down, what do you see" The pilot was talking to me as if I was a five year old trapped in a tree panda`s body. "Look at that small village . How small it looks. Look at the little people of Ratanpur doing their daily chores. Look how that little woman is unloading water infront of that toy car. Oh wait! Thats not a toy car, thats a giant tractor.... " "I get it", I screamed. "I can see how little these people are looking and I can also see why....It would be really better for both of us if we concentrated on the landing rather than that woman`s tractor."
I kept looking down at the village for the rest of the landing. Everyone was busy with what they were doing except, there was a little 5 year old looking up agape as the glider was turning to land. It was probably nothing new for him, but he looked up with a curiosity that I can never match about a flying object. I looked closely....He looked a little bit like me.
I always had this phobia of heights. Much like everyone else I also fear falling down but in my case I always think its more likely to happen. I am usually reminded of the little people of Ratanpur whenever I feel lonely (not in a weird way:P), and that has been a lot lately. Sometimes I wonder, am I slowly rising above while all the people around me are shrinking in dimension doing their daily chores, bored and thus uninterested in what is going on above them or am I a little fellow from the village looking up at everyone who is floating past. The latter agrees more to my logic.
