The American College of Switzerland Zoo. James E. Henderson
into the rock face. Then, when I started to reach out with my right hand to push away from the rock, I loosened my grip on the rappelling rope and slid a few feet before the belay caught me up. Once I was on the rock face and standing horizontally it was great fun walking and bouncing down the cliff face! Although the bouncing part was when it got warm…
Nancy had followed Bernd to the class. She was a tall blonde, five-foot ten, definitely well put together but a skyscraper, as far as I was concerned. She was only a little shorter that Bernd. Nancy had her hair tied up in two ponytails and wore a long- sleeve flowered blouse and very tight three-quarter length, rolled up jeans that gave her a Daisy Mae look. Like the rest of us, she was scared shitless before rappelling the first time. But watching her face turn red with excitement and fear as she went over the edge, and then looking down on her long legs and lovely body as she stood horizontally beneath us with her two blond ponytails flipping to each side her as she shook her head and laughed with delight made many of the male observers, including me, quite warm in another way. Rappelling was cool, once my initial fear was conquered; the weightless drop down the cliff made a fatiguing climb up worth the effort.
After the first week, we graduated to vertical climbs and overhangs. That was not fun! Some of the moves involved reaching up behind my head to a handhold that I couldn’t see. Such moves were inevitable failures, and I dropped several feet through space until the belay rope pinched my waist and swung me into the rock face. Hands, shoulders, knees, and hips took a beating, but we kept trying. Also jamming and twisting our fingers into a crack to form some sort of living piton began to take a toll on the skin on our fingers and knuckles, but Bernd taught us some unique taping patterns to provide some protection. However, I am not sure which hurt more, tearing a scab off in a crack or pulling it off with the tape after the lesson was finished. Ouch, damn, it hurts just thinking about it!
One day Spyder put on a demonstration. It was unreal watching him creep up the cliff face and under the overhang. He even hung by his left hand for an instant, feet dangling, while he swung his right hand up to a higher handhold hidden from him on the upper face. He then jammed his feet back against a seemingly smooth surface under the face for traction for his next move. Now, this was amazing, but, for me, it wasn’t his most unreal feat. One day, Gil was stuck on the overhang unsure of the location of his next handhold when, after calling instructions up, Spyder scrambled up the face without a belay. He intended to show Gil where the next handhold was; but about eight feet up, he missed his next handhold and fell. Below him were a series of boulders and scree that had broken from the cliff over the years. He came down feet first with his hands pointed down and his head well forward measuring his landing spot. He only lacked a tail from looking like a falling cat. Like his feet had eyes, they picked the flat areas of two of the larger boulders for the initial landing spot, and he pranced backwards over the boulders and out of the scree without putting a hand down. It was totally amazing! His nickname was well earned.
At dinner on Sunday of the following weekend, Gil came to our table with another story about Spyder. A group had left early in the morning for what Spyder called a hike and a picnic on the Chamossaire across from our mountain. Several couples went, including Gil and Sam, and Spyder and Carole with her cowl of black hair. They were an item now. In fact, Carole had just cut the bangs of her cowl to a point in the middle, which enhanced the intensity of her beautiful dark eyes. When Spyder and Carole walked together dressed in black, they could easily be mistaken for comic book superheroes.
Anyway, the couples had borrowed a car to drive to the far side of the valley, where they began their hike. They followed a stream until they reached a waterfall. There they picnicked. After a while, Spyder encouraged them to climb a fairly steep rock face beside the falls. The girls decided to watch from below while the guys showed off. Spyder led, then Gil, and the others were to follow. Gil was about fifteen feet up with Spyder another ten feet above him when a rock came falling past his right shoulder. “Hey, warn me!” Gil yelled, but as he looked up he saw Spyder’s boots fly over his head. From his perch he looked down and saw Spyder falling the next fifteen feet in eerie silence to the slope of the hill. Spyder landed on his back, bounced over a bush, and came to rest on his side in a small level area. Carole ran over, screaming his name, while Gil scrambled down the cliff. When he got there, the others were standing in a ring around Spyder. Only Sam was standing to one side, crying. Gil pushed inside the group and saw Spyder unconscious with some blood coming from his mouth and more from under one cuff of his black turtleneck. Gil panicked! No one was doing anything! He grabbed the wrist that wasn’t bleeding to feel for a pulse, but Spyder started to groan and move. Carole then swooped down, grabbed Spyder, and cradled him into her breasts. This brought a small, crooked smile from Spyder, who then pretended to nuzzle in. Seeing that, Gil went to comfort Sam.
Gil and the guys had to carry Spyder back down the hill, and they took him to the doctor in Leysin. Gil had just come from the doctor’s office to tell us what had happened. All he knew was that Spyder had no broken bones. He had some bruised ribs, lots of scrapes and bruises, and he had bitten the tip of his tongue. An over twenty-five-foot fall onto his back with only bruises; a spider he truly is!
One fall sport was taught by the school’s staff. The president asked if there was interest in Judo, and several of us responded. The first day of class, a coed group showed up. We had been given heavy off-white outfits, called Judo-gis and matching belts to tie around them. Gil helped Wilds and me put the outfits on in our rooms. The shoulders and upper half of the jacket were made of coarse, heavy-woven material, and the collar and front opening were bordered with a thick band of material that rivaled the sturdy belt that was to be tied around the waist. Gil explained that the material has to be heavy so it won’t be torn during the grappling. Wilds said that he didn’t care much for the use of the term “grappling.” Gil also showed us how to tie the belt so we didn’t look like fools. You have to run the belt twice around your body and tie it with a fancy kind of square knot.
The first day of class, the Gut, in his gi complete with a black belt, asked if anyone had taken Judo before, and like a fool, I mentioned that my dad had taught me some Judo as self-defense when I was twelve. In reality, my father had taught me only a couple of throws and how to fall. After the fact, I realized that several of the second-year students, like Gil, had taken this course last year but were smart enough to keep quiet. Therefore, I became his first demonstration dummy.
At first, he was kind to me as he demonstrated the starting position with his right hand grabbing the heavy belt-like material on the opening my Judo-gi near my chest, and his other hand holding the elbow of my right arm which, in turn, was grabbing his gi. We pushed and shoved each other for a while demonstrating the need to stay loose and move with the other’s force and not to resist it, although his 250 pounds of force definitely had more effect than my 137 pounds. Next step was landing after a throw. The president, all 250 pounds of him, did a swift shoulder-roll through the air landing and rolling quietly across his back, ending with a resounding thump of his arm on the mat. Given my gymnastics, I had no problem with that and started showing Wilds and a couple of others how to perfect a shoulder roll.
Then, the Gut called me up for the next demonstration. “Do you know how to do a hip throw?” he asked.
“Sure” I said, grinning and looking crosswise at Wilds.
“Show us!”
As I reached for Wilds’ gi, the Gut said, “No, with me!”
My jaw dropped as my eyes scanned his rotund physique and I wondered, even as short as I was, if I could get below his center of gravity. I closed my mouth, took a deep breath, moved forward, and grabbed his gi and elbow. I pushed him back and then pulled him toward me. As he rocked back upright, I stepped around behind him, as dad had taught me, and attempted to roll him over my hip. He fell back, but he didn’t roll over my hip. Instead he landed on my tripping leg and tried to crush my hip and leg into the floor beneath the mat. Although I was in some pain, once he rolled off me, I got up, bounced around to shake it off, and he offered to demonstrate. He caught my gi and, without much fanfare, I saw the wall and several light fixtures before crashing into the mat. My arm did manage a resounding slap on the mat, but I suspect that was more the result of centrifugal force than of any conscious effort on my part. I returned quickly to my feet; a pain in my head had replaced the ache in my hip, but I didn’t