Life’s Cheap
May 8th, 2008 by Isak Ladegård
Skydiving is cheap in Argentina, and when I see our plane I realize why. The entire back wall of the tiny 2-man plane is duct-taped at place. Too late and too proud to run away, we hit the clouds and the big blue sky. The pilot cruises around and while he keeps silent Aljandro, the skydive master and company runner, asks if I’m ready.
“I’m ready.”
Then he turns to the fourth and last man in our plane. He’s a small and chubby Argentinean, my co-jumper, the guy who’s supposed to push me out of the plane with himself attached. (Basically he kills me – before he saves me again by unfolding the parachute)
“Are you ready?”, main man Alejandro asks my co-jumper.
“Si, si,” he responds. And from this point my Spanish skills fail in understanding the following phrases. But Alejandro’s serious eyes and explaining and gesticulating hands scares me. My co-jumpers madly nervous face scares me even more. It’s my first jump, ever, and I’m scared because here it’s obvious that my co-jumper, the man who’s supposed to save my life, he’s a rookie as well.
“OK my friend!” Says Alejandro, to me, and it’s time.
My life’s in his hands.
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