9,000 feet and falling

So there I am, 9,000 feet above Cape Town, wondering, as I suppose many in my position do, why the hell I'm doing this.

I mean, really. When was it ever my idea of entertainment to jump out of a tiny plane and plummet towards earth? Turns out, it started just last week, when fellow volunteer J said "want to go skydiving?" and like a fool, I said "yes".

So before I know it I'm strapped into the world's most unflattering harness, and onto the front of a guy whose name I don't remember (this is my tandem instructor), and we're edging out of the plane door and into the gaping void below...goggles on...harness tight...are you coming out, miss?

I wish I could say I was graceful under pressure, but through no fault of my own, really, as soon as we dropped -- and it was an out and out drop -- my mouth opened and a scream came out. This happened until I was turned onto my stomach, and could no longer intake enough air with which to continue screaming. From here there was nothing to do but open out my arms into the wind, breathe through my nose and try to smile for the video camera guy who was now zooming towards us, apparently with a desire to get a good look at my nostril hairs. One of them yells "We've got a screamer!", which is less than helpful. But once I got all that into line, it was fantastic -- there really was nothing around us but air, nothing above but sky, and nothing below but, well, everything.

After about 15 seconds of free-falling (though it felt like about 10 times that), the chute opened and whooshed us back into the sky and upright, and now it was a lovely floating drift over Cape Town -- Table Mountain to the South, to the East the beautiful sun-lit mountains, and over to the West, the deep blue sea. It was so quiet, so peaceful, and lovely to be floating swiftly through the air, fingertips stretched out into the sky. Closer we drifted to the landing area, where I could make out my friends below, waving. One last roller-coaster whoosh downwards and we were touching down (some of us less gracefully than others) onto the sand, blood pumping and endorphins racing, the general feeling being that I wanted to do that again.

PS - the video footage of this is less than flattering. Ever wanted to see your hair flying, terrified, back from your forehead, your cheeks billowing like two puffy pink sails? No, me neither.