Not two days back from skipping halfway around the world to West Sumatra’s Mentawais and I’m already packing for another adventure, but that’s another story. I’m exhausted by 2:00 p.m. every day and life somehow has still let me float on by without a care in the world because I had a near-death experience (NDE) in the Ments—for a brief moment, I died and went to surfer heaven.
Maybe it’s because I’m unbothered by most things at the moment. After all, surfer heaven is indeed a magical place that makes you forget about life’s trivialities. Or maybe I’m just so very exhausted from a three-day journey there and back again, with every day in between presenting a new adventure wrapped up in random rainbows, squalls, big waves and tropical fish.
But it’s not all sparkles, turquoise water and sunshine. It is work to find and exist in the heat and humidity. Mosquitoes have a special craving for foreigners and squalls will waterboard you faster than you thought possible if you happen to be surfing. A stroll on the beach? Expect to lose five pounds in the process, which has a great side-effect for bikini photos. But it’s easy to do when you’re so distracted by the beauty, just carry bug spray. You have to really want those sparkles, rainbows and perfect waves… badly.
My San Francisco friend, Tiffany, invited me to join her and her friend, Raquel, on this tropical adventure. Though hesitant at first, an unexpected life twist at the beginning of March shoved me out the door and onto the tarmac of SFO with a whole gang of supportive friends cheering me on, stretching from the very terminals of all airports to the moment my toes hit the sand and through the interwebs of social media.
Sixteen hours and multiple TV shows and movies later, the three of us arrive in Singapore to crash land in our hotel, only to be woken up the next day for another flight to Jakarta and then to Padang. As we landed in Padang, I peeked out the airplane’s window to spy small islands surrounded by turquoise water and WAVES.
PERFECT WAVES.
Never mind serious sleep deprivation, I bounced up and down in my seat like a nine-year-old hopped up on a sugar rush circa 1996 (there may have been Janet Jackson playing in the background) and tears instantly welled up. Just send me there now, give me a parachute and toss me out. This is what I’ve desperately needed after an insane year and a half, I thought.
With one more night in Padang and a 4:00 a.m. wake-up call courtesy of the local mosques, we found the rest of our girl group and hopped aboard a fast ferry to Pulau Siberut. The sun baked our covered bodies and we climbed aboard a smaller boat and dipped and dodged our way to a tiny island where the Big Wave Babes crew, professional big wave surfer Polly Ralda leading the charge and professional surfer and coach, Vicente Diaz, a.k.a. “Pingui,” and professional photographer Maria Fernanda awaited. Still wearing sneakers, I tripped onto the sand and felt immediately like a goon—sweatpants, sneakers and a t-shirt. Wardrobe was a-miss the entire time. How could I seriously bring dark colored clothing and leave my sarong and light colored, loose-fitted clothing behind? At least I packed 10,000 bikinis, I thought.
No sooner had the 12 of us shared brief surf intros, we all piled back into the small boat, dress code aprops, with our boards, surf suits and hats and pounds of sunscreen to find some waves. Frothing would be the understatement of the century as we spied perfect rights and lefts combing the horizon...each sighting was met with girl-freakouts and froth—“OooOoo OMG, did you see that?? Perfect right. When are we going there??”
We anchored at Ombuk Tidur, a.k.a. The Sleeping Wave…only, it was doing anything but sleeping.
If I had to guess, this wave was about as restless as the two toddlers screaming throughout the entire 16-hour Singapore flight, though we didn’t get the full view of the beautiful blue tantrum until we paddled from the boat to the lineup. We were all just excited to be there—the water a balmy 86 degrees, aquarium-level clarity, my mind couldn’t decide what it wanted immediately—to catch one of these blue beauties or grab a mask, dive deep and shake fins with an angel fish. Then a set came and my mind was made up—it was hard to determine the actual size of the wave, it also helped that there weren’t 50 of your best friends hooting and yelping like dogs. Thankfully, just six of us, all beautiful and brave women, as giddy as kids on Christmas morning catching waves, laughing and just stoked to be there. Smiles from ear to ear.
Then a set, maybe THE set rolls in. It was like that moment in “Independence Day” where the alien cult is so marveled by the beauty of the ship, that they stare into its massive laser and smile right before they get vaporized.
“Let’s paddle, Jackieee!” yells KK, the wise-cracking Hawaii girl.
Barely making it over the first one, I’m still marveled, still smiling.
“One more, we got this, Jackie!!” she yells again.
Eyes go big, and I realize, oh yeah—I should be scared right about now, right? Double overhead waves groom the beautiful blue playing field into a foamy sea of white. So much salt, so much foam, so many duck dives. But I don’t mind—no ice cream headaches or crowds! Just slow, clear, salty duck dives that challenge my ponytail holder.
All adrenaline, all stoke for day one.
The fun didn’t stop—we surfed until sunset that day. The Mentawais welcomed us back to home base with an actual crowd at Tikus, a playful left in front of Sunset Surf Villas. A brief shower sprinkled overhead and the sky split between dark grey clouds and pure golden sunlight on the horizon. I’ve never wanted to be a photographer more than I did in that moment. I look over at Victoria, one of the Hawaii girls and five-time ISA adaptive surfing champ, both of us smiling and laughing nonstop in complete disbelief. No other words could describe our expressions as we both said over and over through cracked-out giggles: “I’m just stoked out of my mind right now!”
Shortly after, a double rainbow frames Victoria’s smiling face and the rest of the grinning troupe and we both shout in happy disbelief:
“Welcome to the Mentawais!!”
Core memory created.
The next day, I woke up and realized I was not back at home in Orange County, startled awake to an alarm, fighting traffic, sitting at a desk and staring at a screen. Was it all a dream? Am I actually alive right now? Or did my body wash up on some random beach after being shoved into a reef and is this really surfer heaven? No, no, I’m still alive, in the flesh. After waking up, I really did pinch my arm to double-check I was living in reality as day two began. I’m still here, I thought, on this tiny island, playing in the Indian Ocean with some amazing surfer girls, waiting for more lessons from Big Wave Babes and the Ments. Maybe they come in the form of NDEs, but what a pleasant NDE, it was.