Skiing in June

Jessica and I went to Shanghai today, and joined her friend Angie. Angie grew up in Shanghai, and Jessica knows her from the last time she went to China. Angie took us across Shanghai to an indoor ski hill. I had quite a good time watching the Chinese try to figure out how to ski. It clearly isn't something they get to do often. North China supposedly has some good skiing resorts, but certainly not at this time of year. I just like to be able to say I got to ski in late June, when the temperature was 35 degrees Celsius outside.

The "snow" was actually ice shavings, similar to the excess crap they shave off the ice with the zamboni in hockey rinks back in Canada and abandon in a giant snowbank outside. It smelled like a hockey rink as well, despite the lack of sweaty players. I was reminded many times of my time playing hockey while being here. I missed Canada a lot while we skiied, as I hadn't skiied or skated in a few years. I had a ton of flashbacks.

As I hadn't skiied in years, it took a while to get used to moving around. The bottom of the hill was also filled with thick, loose ice shavings, so it was near impossible to move. At first, I thought it was just because they didn't know what they were doing, but then I saw how the Chinese ski. The majority of them have no concept of how to slow down, or turn, since for many of them, this is their first time doing any sort of winter sport. The extra crap at the bottom was to slow them to a stop since most of them just bombed the entire hill, not being able to control their direction or speed, just trying to stay standing up.

It was comical to watch, and there were a ton of collisions, but the part that struck me as surprising is that Jessica's friend, Angie, was remarkably good, and a quick study. I only saw her fall once (on her last run, at that), and by the end, she had figured out a rudimentary turning system, and knew how to control her speed. She wasn't bad, especially if that was her first time skiing.

Afterwards, Angie lead us to a nice Japanese restaurant, with terrific sushi. Despite sushi being a Japanese delicacy, Jessica and I tend to eat it a lot, since it's so cheap here (relatively speaking), and the fish is so fresh. It wasn't all you can eat, but the three of us actually filled ourselves up reasonably for about the cost of one all you can eat price (about 120 yuan). Back in Wuxi, we would've gotten fish that wasn't as good for a considerably higher amount (although I would've stuffed my face a lot more). Once back in Canada, I'm definitely getting a sushi set, as making sushi is not hard, and eating it is extremely healthy (and sooooo tasty). Wasabi!