I had never surfed before, I'd never even held a surf board. But I was good at skateboarding and great at snowboarding and figured that that predisposed me to being a good surfer, if not great. I wasn't prepared to be the train wreck I was while trying desprately to get ont that board! Damn is surfing hard!
Well I wasn't long in Costa Rica before I went and bought a board, I should have gained some knowledge on board styles before hand but I was naive, I ended up with a crotch rocket of a board, short, narrow and hard as hell to ride, I don't think that helped my plight at all but my friends sure thought it funny! Well I soon became addicted to trying to surf, I'd paddle out through these huge breakers, it'd take me ten minutes of intense physical excertion and countless moments of pure terror to finaly make it past the breakers. So there I'd sit, floating in the water with some friends talking laughing and enjoying the gorgeous view of the tropical water meeting the lush hilly jungle of Costa Rica. It was beautiful! After awhile I'd start to have my ego kick in, I'd catch it whispering things like "What, are you scared? Look, there are girls and little kids paddeling in, what are you waiting for? Wuss!" And so I'd pick one of the smaller sized waves, which by the way was still "overhead", that's surfer lingo for fuckin huge! and I'd paddle with all my strength, drop down the face of the wave and do a whole body twitch which is in some way supposed to result in me standing up on the board, well thats were things went wrong, the board would just disappear as the wave contorted itself and excepted me as a new part of it, entering me into a world of chaos and water. This is about the point were I'd curl into the fetal position and go, in my mind, to a happy place. I generally survived these episodes and even came away with a desire to try again. That was until I made the mistake of paddling into a wave with all my friends watching, they must have been proud of me I thought as I paddled becasue I could hear them yelling, so I paddled harder. When I again looked over my shoulder to see where the wave was I realized why they must have been yelling at me, this wave was a monster!! (read: double overhead!) Somehow in the short time I'd been paddling this wave must have swelled up to thrice it's previous size. Well what was I do to except try and ride it. Down the face I go, full body twitch thing and I'm actually up on the board! I did it! I'm surfing, or maybe not, I was up for a full 1/2 second before this wave collapsed on me. I can't even describe what went on for the next minute or so, it was like a rollor coaster ride mated with a ferris wheel that has just taken speed and snorted a line of coke, but it was seriously even more fucked up than that! I finally, after what seemed an eternity, feel things calming down and then air, oh glorious air, I grasp for breathe, open my eyes and uncurl myself. I'm now kneeling, head pounding, now I'm standing, shit I'm on the beach. So I stand up to assess the damage; Ok I've got all my limbs, they seem to work, I can breathe and see, so far so good. First damage found, minor nose bleed and cut lip, hmm I look down and find that my shorts are around my ankles, ok so I bend over to pull them up and this triggers an unfortunate urge to puke, luckly I get my shorts up before recycling my lunch.