Wenn die Kalte Kommt

As the weather starts to turn warm, I am thinking back on the long and cold German winter in which I experienced. Through the short foggy days and long frigid nights, nothing in my memory feels as cold as being caked in snow after perilously sliding half a mile head-first down a black-level ski slope. 

I had never skied before in my life three days before the event occurred. After the grueling twelve hour bus ride through the night from Warburg, Germany to Südtirol in northern Italy with the majority of my eleventh grade class, I, for the first time in my life, suited up to try my skills on the alpine slopes. Bundling up in the thick puffy ski jacket and ski pants borrowed from my host father, I looked out the window of the youth hostel we were staying in. The sun was just beginning to peak above the white peaks of the Alps. I had never seen so much snow before in my life. Piled on the side of the road, the snow reached higher than cars (even though the cars were tiny Italian fiats). Keeping in mind what happens when we get flurries, if Georiga got this much snow, the state would fall into a state of anarchy. 

Trudging outside like a puffy Michelin man, my school group gathered at the bus stop. The air was full of excitement, as we chatted about our feelings about our rustic hostel and plans for the day. The narrow road followed a crystal clear stream through the valley, with towering mountains on both sides. I had never seen a landscape like this. The mountains were at least quadruple the size of the tallest Appalachians, which I was used to. Evergreen trees caked in snow and ice dotted the bottom of the looming rocky giants. About a mile or so up, the tree line disappears and is replaced by sharp and jagged rock faces tucked under thick blankets of snow. 

My first day of skiing was filled with struggling to walk with skis and stumbling around. I really was pretty bad at first, and figured I would be in the beginners group the whole week. Our class was divided into six groups based on skill level.  By noon on the second day, however, something clicked, and by the end of the afternoon I was thundering down the beginners course. This meant for the third day I was moved up to the second highest group.I was happy to be in this group. The other group mates were nice enough, but it was our coach who made our group what it was. He was quiet yet funny, and skiing alongside him, I felt encouraged to try harder and harder slopes. It's not that I was nervous or timid though. In fact, I probably could have been a tad bit more. It was because of my gung-ho attitude that led to me thundering head first down a fifty degree slope. 

On my fifth day, my group decided to try the steepest slope in the park. Ski slopes are rated (at least in Europe) as green (practice) , blue (beginner), red (medium), and black (expert and over forty five degrees of incline). The slope was ranked black and although it was not our first try on black slope, it was the most difficult. Staring over the edge, it almost looked as if I was looking a mile straight down. Despite of this, I began the descent. I learned that the best way to handle steep slopes is to zigzag your way down. This means turning left to right and taking a path not directly down the hill, but rather alongside it for the most part. It was on one of these turns from right to left that my ski got caught under the other. On an easier slope I’d like to think I would have been able to recover, but here it was everything I could do not to face plant. Now missing one of my skis, I began to slide down the slope. I was heading head first and began to realize that I was picking up speed. The faster I went the more snow covered my face and blocked my sight. I tried to slow my roll by digging my hands into the snow, but I continued to accelerate. Snow found its way into all openings of my clothes and completely engulfed me. Unable to see, I realized that I had no clue what was ahead of me. There was a point that I thought to myself this probably isn’t going to end without some part of me being broken. In that moment I had no clue how far I had gone or how fast I was going, but my main concern was what was ahead of me. After what felt like forever, I finally began to slow and the cloud of snow blocking my vision started to dissipate. Finally, about half a mile from where I started, my slide came to a stop. I laid there in the snow for a moment, feeling the snow inside my shirt sting against my chest. My cheeks were covered in ice and my black hair turned white by the freezing powder. I had never been so cold, but I wasn’t hurt. I couldn’t help but laugh which seemed to relieve my coach who arrived after racing down the mountain after me.

I spent the rest of the day wet and cold, but my spirit for skiing remained intact. I hope to someday be able to go again in the beautiful (and cold) Alps.