Pizza or french fries? / Pizza nebo hranolky?

We went recently skiing with the kids for the first time and it was a great experience. What a different situation from when I was little and learned how to ski!

First of all, thank God for skiing schools! Both kids were flying down the hill (well, ok, plowing) at the end of the day with happy smiles on their faces. If I remember well, it took me a couple of years just to stand up on skis and not fall every 5 seconds. Why did it take me so long?

– children nowadays are being taught without using poles. I wasn’t. From the very beginnings my dad made us always to push one pole in the snow and then make a turn. Those poles and skis were attached by an umbilical cord!

– instructors use this short rope to connect the tips of the skis so they don’t spread out of control. That way only the back of the skis opens up, which the instructors call the ‘pizza’ position (parallel skis are called the ‘french fries’ position).

–  teachers are so fun! My daughters’ teacher was dressed up as Batman and as a good Batman, he was coming to the rescue whenever one of the students lost control of the speed or got stuck somewhere.

– Oh, and what did they use for a lift? A cute little rubber belt that pulled the kids up just by them standing there. They did not use those evil ‘pomas’ (a plate attached to a metal bar that you put under your butt) like I did, which required a great concentration and an advanced skiing level. And if you did not have that, you just kept falling: either at the beginning of the lift – in front of everyone, or somewhere in the middle, which was usually in the deep part of some foggy woods. What did you do next? If you were a little grommet, you started wailing uncontrollably and waited for your parents (hopefully) to find you. If you were older, you just had to take your skis and set out for a long, streneous journey accross the snowed in woods in hopes to find some civilization again.

Or another choice for us as kids to get on the top of the hill was to simply take those skis off and walk it up in our ski shoes. What a great exercise that was! The drawback was that we ended up skiing down the hill like twice in one day.

Anyhow, when our girls were done with the baby lift (i.e. rubber belt) they moved over to the regular chair lift. No poma stressing necessary!

And their attitude at the end of our 2-day trip? “We want to move here and ski every day!”

CZ: Nedavno jsme se rozhodli jet s detmi poprve na hory a vyzkouset s nimy lyzovani. A vite, ze to dopadlo dobre? Zadne potoky slz, zadne ‘ja chci jit domu!’. Prvni den jsme holkam zaplatili lyzarskou skolu, kde ke konci dne uz svistely (no, svisto-pluzili) dolu z kopecka, a druhy den jsem si je vzala pod kontrolu ja s manzelem.

Jejich zkusenost byla absolutne opacna s tim, co jsem zazila ja jako dite:

– nas rodice od zacatku nutili pouzivat hulky: “Zapichnout a zatocit! Zapichnout a zatocit!…”. Ty dve veci byly k sobe proste pripevnene pupecni snurou.

– my jsme se musely naucit pouzivat jiz od zacatku ty odporne pomy. Coz znamenalo, ze jsi tak prvni 3 roky z te otalirovane tyce jen padala: bud na zacatku vleku – pred ocima fronty plne lyzaru a rozzlobeneho vlekare, anebo nekde veprostred vleku, coz se stalo vetsinou v hlubokem, zamlzenem lese plnem zaveji. Jestli jste byl/a jeste male dite, tak jste zacalo ve strachu desne bulet a cekat, ze vas rodice brzy zachrani. Jestli jste byl/a jiz starsi dite, tak jste si proste sundal preskace, dal lyze na ramena a vydal se na pout skrz les, doufajice, ze se brzy stretnente opet s nejakou civilizaci.

Anebo tu byla dalsi moznost a to vyslapat kopec pesky, coz jsme take casto delaly. Sice jsme za cely den sjely sjezdovku tak dvakrat, ale bylo to vyborne cviceni!

– instruktori nebyli zas tak plne legracek :). Byli to nasi rodice, ktere obetovali svuj cas a penize na to, aby nas naucili lyzovat. A jak vime, kdyz vas neco uci rodic, tak je to zcela jine, nez kdyz je to nejaky novy, zabavny instruktor prevleceny za Batmana.