KYLE: That’s normal, man. Push down on your heel, that’ll stop it.
KARL: Yeah, but what’s it saying to me? Why is it getting involved?
KYLE: Your left leg is going ’cos the adrenaline is pumping and coursing through your veins right now.
KARL: Right. I’m getting the rush of adrenaline without stepping off, so why go further?
PHIL: When you leave that edge that’s when you get it, that’s when the endorphins kick in, that’s when you get the reward. So, what you’ve got to do is take a couple of deep breaths again. You can do this, work with me. We’re going to go to the edge, look up, you’ve had a look down, you know what it’s like down there. I want you to look up, I want you to find that mountain out there, the sunshine, focus on it. We give you the countdown, it’s gonna be three, two, one, short countdown. Go for it. Once you leave that edge, boom! that’s it, job done. You’re gonna be absolutely giggling, I promise you. Karl, stop thinking about it!
KARL: But I’ve got to think about it.
PHIL: Don’t think too much!
PHIL: Just let go, stop listening to that thing in your head.
KARL: No, because that’s what you should listen to in life.
PHIL: No, you shouldn’t, not always. You’ll never get anywhere if you listen to that all the time.
The mood started to change. The other bungee jumpers were getting impatient and shouting, as they were getting tired of waiting. I suppose they’d hyped themselves up to do it and now I was getting in the way and giving their inner voice more time to make them reconsider, which isn’t good when you’ve probably paid around £130 to do this. I asked them to shut up, as I couldn’t think straight with all the noise.
PHIL: Don’t think about it too much! You’re gonna go for it!
KARL: No.
PHIL: Yes, you are.
KARL: No.
PHIL: You have got it, mate.
KARL: No.
PHIL: It’s all yours. Look up, focus.
KARL: No.
PHIL: Just let it happen.
KARL: No.
PHIL: We’re gonna count you down.
KARL: No, stop pushing me.
PHIL: I want you to say yes! I’m holding on to the back of you . . .
KARL: No, no, I wanted me to say yes, I’m not saying yes, it’s everyone else saying yes.
PHIL: OK, well, say yes.
KARL: No!
SPECTATOR: Strap on a pair of balls and get out there!
KYLE: You’re being Welsh about it, aren’t you? Go on, get out there, mate!
SAM: Can I get you a tissue for that vagina?
KARL: Say what you want, it doesn’t bother me.
KYLE: Toughen up.
In the end I decided to listen to the voice in my head and not do it. Sam and Kyle did though. They didn’t hang around as long as me and think about what they were about to do. They got hooked up and jumped without looking down and didn’t give time for their inner voice to get a word in. They came back up woooohing loudly, but nothing made me want to do it. In a way I was proud of the fact I said no. To this day, there is not one bit of me that wished I had done the bungee. I wonder how many people end up doing it under pressure from spectators standing by yelling at them the way they did with me. How many of them are brave enough to say no? How many of these people would do it for themselves if no one was watching? I’ve always been quite good at not doing things I didn’t want to do. When I was younger I had loads of mates who did daft things like sniff glue and gas but I always said no. I had a friend whose ambition it was to work in a cobblers just for the free smell of glue. The only time I took drugs was by accident at a pub quiz. There were loads of chocolate brownies on the tables. I wandered about from table to table eating them. When I left I hailed a taxi, but when he asked where I wanted to go I couldn’t remember. It turned out I’d been eating hash cakes. I had to sit on the pavement for ages before my address came back to me. But I can still remember the bloody reg plate of that maroon Ford Orion though.
Sam and Kyle said they knew I was never going to do the jump and had set up another activity. They took me to a golf course, but not for golf . . . No, that would be too boring for a person in this part of the world. They wanted me to experience zorbing. I’d never heard of it. They had a huge rubber ball sat in the rough, close to the fourteenth hole. They asked me to climb in. Kyle then started pouring in water from a big drum. I wasn’t expecting this, so I quickly zipped up the hole. They started to roll it. I was being thrown all over the place. It was like being in one of them balls you put in the washing machine that has softener in it. The water swished about drenching me. This must be what it feels like being a baby in the womb. It was hot in there, and the smell of warm rubber on top of being chucked around made me feel really sick. It’s not even as if it looks cool. Some people might do bungee jumping and sky diving ’cos they think it gives off a macho look, but zorbing doesn’t even give you that. It’s the sort of thing you wouldn’t brag about. I felt like a hamster in a wheel.
I was worried I was going to be sick, which could be dangerous while trapped in a moving ball, as I could end up choking. So, I yelled all the swear words I knew at the top of my voice. They eventually stopped it rolling. Kyle said I shouldn’t have closed the entrance as the more water that’s in the ball, the smoother the ride. That’s some information I may as well forget about, as I’m never going zorbing again. No one should go zorbing. I think the ball should be used for shifting furniture that’s too heavy to carry. Shove in a big telly and then roll it down the road.
Before they left, Kyle gave me a blow-up kiwi (the national bird) as a memento. I watched a programme on these birds ages ago and remembered that they mate for life. Some have been known to be together for 30 years, but I don’t know why they make such a big deal about it. I put it down to them all looking the same. I’m pretty sure if all men and all woman looked the same there wouldn’t be as many divorces. While I’m on kiwi facts, even though it has wings it’s a flightless bird and prefers to keep its feet on the ground like me. And it sleeps during the day, which was something I wished I could do as the jet lag was killing me by this point.
I called Ricky and told him I didn’t do the bungee and I wasn’t happy about being put in the situation. He made some chicken noises: £1.50 a minute and he’s doing chicken noises. But he said I had a chance to redeem myself because he’d arranged for me to go to another island where bungee was actually invented. He said the island was known as the happiest place in the world and to stop moaning.
We were up early the next day to catch a small private plane that would take us to another airport to catch another plane that would take us to the island of Pentecost in Vanuatu. A woman was scraping frost off the windscreen as we loaded up our kit into the small six-seater. It’s the first time I’ve ever had to ask the pilot if he could move his seat forward so I had room for my legs. We flew really low, so low that the woman co-pilot seemed to be using a normal road map. I’m surprised we didn’t stop at traffic lights we were flying that low.
I sat next to so many pilots in small planes during this trip that I reckon I’ve picked up the basics. I’m not a fan of flying so maybe it would be a