This past President's Day weekend (and Valentine's Day!) I went to Park City, Utah for a ski trip with my long-time law school friends (they say that once you've been friends with someone for 7 years you'll be friends with them for life). Salt Lake City surprisingly only has population of 190,000 people, kind of a oasis in the drab Mountain region of the United States, with not much on any side of it.
I must profess that I am not a good skier. I've never been very good at activites that involve balance, and skiing and skating and rollerblading all fit into that category. I also have a sort of mental block of not wanting to fall, preventing me from taking unnecessary risks which is good in a normal situation but difficult to get past in skiing. The whole idea is to go as fast as possible down a hill without crashing, then stop on a dime as fast as possible or turning through a bend. I may be a lot of things, but speed is not my game. Every time I go skiing, I do quite a bit of slip and falls (suberiochiru). Personally, I rather disagree with the premise of skiing (sorry skating friends!) The sports I like involve balls, like a football or dodgeball or some sort of marker to hone in the action on. Skiing, among other activities, doesn't involve a ball, there's no point system reinforcing one to continue pursuing the activity. The best possible outcome of the activity is that you get down the hill without incident and move on. Further, skiing is a rich person's game: much like golf (but without a golf), skiing takes massive amounts of equipment, with the right dry-fitting clothing, snowpants, headgear, ski mask so that the wind and snow don't blow up painfully into one's face), and finally, skis and poles (and now a helmet in play which I never saw before!) A lot of moving parts which are tough to get up a mountain, much less get together in case of a suberiochi (slip and fall). Plus it harbors sentiments related to deseration: if you suberochiru, you let down the group that you ski with, and possibly get deserted due to your slowness. It's easy to get hurt! I mean it's a mountain, with trees, and ice, and going down it at high speeds. Ripe for injury, thus developing the paradigm of "got hurt in a ski accident." I haven't gotten any major injuries yet from skiing (or anything), but they tell me life after 30 is different! For this and many other reasons, I believe I will no longer indulge in the sport of skiing any more. (Hanging up the poles, that's it!!!!)
Other observations on my trip:
- The Morman presence in Salt Lake City is pretty strong. We went to the Mormon Temple in center Salt Lake City and was fascinated by the culture there.
- I visited the Olympic Park used during the 2002 Winter Olympics. The bobsled/ luge course is INSANE!
- gas is cheaper in Utah and Texas. Seriously, like half the prices of California.
- Magic Mike/ Magic Mike XXL the sequel are not very good movies.
- We live in a society where a Supreme Court justice passes away unexpectedly, but the media and many presidential contenders respond by speculating about who the next justice is right away and how it will effect the Supreme Court. Sigh.
-Deer Valley and other "high class" ski resorts in Utah don't allow snowboarding (just skiing). Guess I'm retiring from snowboarding as well, not just skiing.
Spring has come in Los Angeles! 75 degrees all day with no clouds and a beautiful sunset that my GF and I enjoyed in Palos Verdes as a late-Valentine's Day date. Excellent day to walk around and be outside. That's why there's more people living in Culver City than Salt Lake City!
Fantasize on,
Robert Yan
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