WHY NOT?

April 1996 Istanbul Turkey.

I'm French, and I live in Istanbul for 2 years because of my job. 2 weeks later we will have 5 days off for the " Bayram ", the religious celebration 40 days after the end of the Ramadan.

An advertisement in a Turkish magazine specialized in the outdoor leisures draws our attention:

Training course of paragliding, 4 days, 100$, accommodation included...

Let' s try!!!

And we found ourself in Pamukale famous place of tourism in the mid-west of Turkey. The hotel... So what!

The" school " is in fact the sports club of the university of Izmir, and the classroom is the terrace of the bar. As for the 3 " monitors ", they seem come out from a cartoon about Bob Marley That's promising because none speaks English! 100 $...

The group of pupils arrives gradually and meets at the bar. We are 8 : a Turkish soldier , 4 Turkish students , a Palestinian student, Ozlem (my friend) and me.

At about 3 hours, let' s go for the stony field which is used as training slope. And there we discovered the PARACHUTES, no the parapentes. Ok, but when you see for the first time Briz' Air or 1988 model of Apco, confusion is possible.

KOS (to pronounce kosh) Kos kos kos... It means RUN, and it is what we did all day long.

In the evening, theoretical lesson : how does it fly, until 1 AM'. In Turkish of course, but Ozlem translated.