minal | 
11 17th, 2007| 
Yes. I feel everyone in their lifetime should go rafting at least once. It is a once in a lifetime experience. And if you are a non-swimmer, pack your bags right away and head to the best rafting destination you can find.
Well, we took a trip to Dev Prayag and the major feature of it was rafting. It’s called white water rafting and it is basically all about testing your guts. I cannot swim and neither can Abhi, my husband (he has a certificate that he can save lives, but I would be happy if he saved his own!) and nor could all the other people we went with. So in short we were a bunch of novice, non-swimmers who had decided that life needs some excitement. And rafting provided exactly what we were looking for.
Before we started for rafting, I had a million questions. Questions after which I am sure our instructor must have felt like asking me to go to hell. But he was better acquainted with people like me. They had arranged for a raft, life-jackets, helmets and the instructor was himself qualified (unlike my husband, he was properly qualified) and they even had a kayak (a small boat like structure which can house only one person) piloting us in case one of us fell off and needed to be rescued. But my questions were far from the general
What if two people fell off the raft? Whom would the kayak-fellow save?
What if i fell off and was swayed away by the current to some far off place?
How deep is the water here? What are my chances of hitting rocks in a rapid?
What if the raft is punctured?
What if a crocodile were to catch hold of me?
After all these and many more impossible questions Abhi pulled me into the raft and we started for the most untested terrains. But the most fearsome fact that I had not questioned about was the temperature of the water. The water of Alaknanada is nothing but melted ice. It was simply CHILLING. And with the first splash of water on my body I could empathize with the victims of Titanic. Somehow I could just portray myself being afloat and frozen on Alaknanda. Ghosh!! It’s freaky!
Then came the rapids. Rapids are those parts of the river where the water gushes with extreme speed and a lot of waves and at times whirlpools are formed. Rapids could be because of rocks in the path of the river or changes in the terrain of the riverbed, they could be due to anything but rapids are freaky.
However the best part of rafting is rapids. As you approach a rapid, slowly its sound grows on you and you start panicking as the sound levels increase. And once the rapid is visible you feel like leaving the raft and sitting on the river-bank and wishing others best of luck. But because it’s too late and you are already into the rapid, you start paddling harder. The instructor says the better you paddle the lesser are the chances of your raft being overthrown (he feels its a positive statement that there are lesser chances of being overthrown but to a person like me it means only ONE thing- that there ARE chances of being overthrown!) And to shove away that ominous thought I paddle harder. So hard that I don’t find the time to panic. But as soon as the raft is swayed by the huge wave of water it almost flies in the air, and I find myself paddling in the air. But the very next moment I am down and again there is a bigger wave awaiting our raft. A huge amount of water is splashed across our bodies and we scream our lungs out because it is scary and freezing in the real sense. But team work wins and we go past the rapid without having to meet crocs, or to call for the kayak-fellow.
And then we look back at the rapid and feel PROUD. Wah, wah, we say to ourselves. Because we realize that it’s not just the rapid that we have crossed, it is is also the fear of it. It is the testimony of trust that we placed on each other as a team (rafting is team-work. If your team members don’t paddle, you are bound to go down). It is a reinforcement of our faith in science and God at the same time. Without life-jackets and helmets and such rafts, we too would have been threatened by the monstrous river and would not dare step in the river, let alone raft. And God is something you just can’t help thank. After all it is the brilliant force of the Almighty that makes Alaknanda what it is, and us too!
So, get hold of your fears and go rafting. You deserve it. And in case you have something similar to share please go ahead. Would love to read from you.
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