Thursday, April 01, 2010

Kite flying at Marina Barrage



Last Saturday, my Dear and I made our way to Marina Barrage for our maiden kite flying activity at the scenic place. We were quite surprised that the free shuttle bus headed towards the destination was packed full of commuters, with a majority of them being youths. Many of them were carrying a host of snacks and drinks, seemingly ready for a fun day at the barrage. After a 5-minute ride, we reached our destination and proceeded straight to the rooftop for our kite-flying session!

The view from the rooftop was breathtaking and the winds were as reputedly strong! Luckily I wore a cap else my hair would have been blown topsy-turvy by the winds!
On the field were scattered gatherings of families, friends and lovers, who were there on the fields in their picnic maps. Similarly, I spreaded out the picnic mat which I had brought and after putting our bags on the map, my Dear and I were ready for action!

It has been tens of years since I last flew a kite! At the beginning, it was hard, as we tried to hit the rhythm of putting up our kite. After a few attempts facilitated by the strong wind, we managed to get our kite going up in the sky!

As our kite flew higher and higher, we released more and more of the kite string so that it would ascend high up in the skies, joining the slew of its other counterparts who were already there! Soon the 30 metres of string were fully unleashed and we saw our little kite high up in the sky. Looking at the kite, it was as though both of us were also flying!

Alas, not all was well! Due to the dozens of kites competing for airspace, our kite string was cut by that of a ‘stronger competitor’! We watched helplessly at our poor kite descending down rapidly and vanishing amongst the trees some hundred metres away from us! Later, we realized that such string cutting is quite prevalent in Marina Barrage due to the dozens of kite in the skies: there were many broken kites in the vegetation and tree branches outside Marina Barrage.

Nevertheless, my Dear and I bought a stronger kite at the first storey of Marina Barrage and chose a less-crowded spot to fly our kite. We managed to control our kite better this time round and took caution to rein in our kite a little bit more the moment its speed slackened and started descending a little as we did not want to pull the kite string for our kite if it were to drop few tens of metres below the roof into the thick woodlands! That occurred once but I managed to mount over the rooftop and retrieved our kite fast!

If you are feeling bored, you can try to fly a kite, something which you may do before in your childhood days! You will find pleasure in simple joys and learn some valuable lessons of life from such a stint!

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