The Eye of Patrick

Before I start my story today, I should give some background info. My town, Shimokawa is famous for producing a high number of Olympic caliber ski jumpers. As a result my town gets extra funding to have a fairly sophisticated program with very talented coaches. This also means that they are always training, come winter or summer.

During my short stay in Shimokawa I have become fairly good friends with a number of the teachers and coaches that run the ski jumping program.

While at a yakiniku party with some of the ski jumping coaches, one of the coaches mentioned that he was going to Sapporo for a ski jumping competition and that if I liked I could join him and watch my students compete.  I said yes, but thought in my head that it was just another hallow invitation. The reason I thought this was because in some of my past dealings with Japanese people, I learnt the fact that you are invited to something is not an actual invitation to do something, but a sign that they hold you in positive regard and maybe down the road you will do something together. So when I was invited to attend the ski jump competition I did not put too much creditable in it for this reason and also the fact that numerous beers had be consumed by all.

So it was to my surprise that during the following week that the coach approached me and asked me if I was still interested in going. Normally I would say no because I am fairly shy person and don’t like going out of my comfort zone. But I thought to myself, that I should try and experience new things. So I said yes and then he informed me that we would be living at 5 am that Sunday and that if I was still interested in going. I thought to myself that I would probably not get an opportunity to do this again and that I would probably have a boring Sunday if I didn’t go. So I said yes with a smirk on my face.

The week leading up to the ski jumping competition in Sapporo would pass fairly uneventfully. So that by Sunday I was very excited to being heading to Sapporo. The lucky or unlucky thing about me is that when I am forced to wake up for something that is not part of my daily schedule,  I worry too much about waking up on time and end up not sleeping well and also waking up 30 minutes to an hour before my alarm will go off. This has been good to me, in the sense that I am normally never late for something, but sometimes results in me being fairly tired.

The bus ride to Sapporo was pretty uneventful, as it was a 2 hour bus ride in the early morning. At first I and the students had an uneasy relationship as we both knew we could not communicate with each other and we were both tired. So the trip there was filled with me listening to my ipod and sleeping.

But then at 8 am or so we arrived in Sapporo and headed towards the ski jump place. For many of you this may seem like an impossible concept; jumping in the summer, I for one thought that the whole bus ride there. But when we got there I had learnt that they just use artificial grass and that because the jumpers wear so much protection it is not a problem to jump in the summer.

I learnt an interesting tidbit about ski jumping. That there is a white line near the end and if the jumper is able to make it pass that line and then crashes it is ok and they will get full points. But if they crash before that point they lose 10 meters or so. I thought that was interesting and that kind of explains why when I have watched it on TV that there was so much importance places on getting past that line and why what look like great jumps end up not scoring that well.

At first we unloaded the bus and took all their gear to the top of the hill and then they did some warming up and stretching. This is important as to jump is a fairly physically exhausting experience. The pictures to the right show some of the training that was going on; most of the warm up was simulating an actual ski jump experience. It may look easy in the pictures or on TV. But the truth is that it is fairly challenging to hold the same pose for the whole duration of the jump. The take off and landing is especially difficult as it requires precise attention to detail as jumping to early or to late will result in a lower distance jump, while landing too late will result in a crash.

The group that I went with was made up of kids from my elementary school and their grades ranged from 2 to 6. Their young age meant that many of them had never jumped before and as a result there were a lot crashes as they learnt to jump properly. This is why they start off at the smaller jump hill and work there way up to the Olympic level hills by high school or university. One of the coaches’ kids from my town was jumping for only his second week only. In his previous jumps he had always fallen. So it was a real joy for our team that this time on his final jump he was able to land. I think that will help to build confidence in him and let him do more difficult jumpers later on. I hope he turns out to be a great jumper.

The other coach from my town was once ranked 5^th in Japan in the 70s for Nordic combined. His wife was also a fairly high level sports competitor and together they had two kids that were jumping in this competition. So it was not a surprise then later when the results were released that both of his children finished 1^st in the age category that they participated in. (I should take a photo of their trophy case at home, it would put any one I know back home to shame, his whole family is amazing jumpers,, grandfather, father, coach and children)

After seeing them jump, I thought it was funny to see my students jump fearless from the edge of a cliff and not worry about falling and hurting themselves. But when they are faced the question “how are you” they will freeze up and not be able to talk.

After the results were announced we headed back to our bus and returned home for some yakniku and good conversation. I am really started to love my town and all the wonderful people that go into making it the best little town in Japan.

Maybe next post will be about the wonderful restaurant in my town and why they are the kindest people I know.

If you have any interesting stories or comments to share, please leave and I will reply.

Thank you,

Patrick