1 month of surf (1st March 2013)

The disadvantage of realising I’d been in Peru for a month, was realising what I hadn’t achieved. I didn’t think I would have changed the world, become trilingual or a pro surfer, but I thought I might have progressed a little faster. After about a week I bought my very own surfboard, Carlitos (later renamed Maya Carlitos as I realised she is definitely a she). I have been out in the waves pretty much everyday since, mainly thanks to Foreste. For that amount of surfing I definitely feel like I should be a lot better than I am. I have to remind myself that it took me a few years to feel like I was good at snowboarding. But still, I’m only here for 2 more months and right now, I can barely stand up on the thing.

I also never realised how clumsy I am. I guess I had an idea as I regularly walk into door frames and knock things over. The day I bought my surfboard I banged it on the way out of the shop. I bang it pretty much everyday and wherever I prop it up it’s likely to fall down (I’ve learnt the hard why to lie it on the floor whenever possible). When I went back to the shop to get 2 small holes repaired on my board, Poppy the repairer insisted on taking it out of the shop for me. I also seem to have managed a (small) injury per day I surf. It started with a cut hand from some rocks I fell on, then a cut foot, then a few sea urchins in the foot, then bruised ribs, a rock thrown up by a wave in the shin, a kids surfboard in the other shin, another thrown up rock on a toe, an ankle sliced open by a fin, grazed and bruised knees by falling in shallow water and yesterday I got a fin to the head. All totally fine though, and even though my surfing skills aren’t quite as I want them to be, I always have fun paddling around on my board, and often end up in fits of giggles with Foreste, shouting to each other “I don’t understand!!!”  when we can’t paddle past the break or get any waves. And if I don’t get good, I’ll stick to snowboarding.