Saturday, December 13, 2014

A thrilling movie ride to drive out fear

I am not an adventurous person and so prefer to be comfortably placed in my safe cocoon. I don’t venture into any dare-devilry act or accept tough physical challenges. If I had to take any risk it would be very calculative. On the other hand is my best half who is an adrenaline junkie. He loves adventure and tough challenges. My two teens have also inherited his genes. So, many a times I am the black sheep in the family at the various adventure outings and thrill rides.

One such adventurous outing we had recently was at Universal studios Singapore. I was not too excited about the visit because I knew adventurous and thrill rides were the highlight of this park. More on my mind was also the fact that my pushy family would encourage me to try the rides while I as always would try to find excuses. This drama unfolding in my mind was one of the reasons I was not too excited.

The moment we entered Universal Studios, my children and the husband eyed SCI-FI city which had a gigantic roller coaster and the most famous Transformer ride. The Transformer is a thrilling ride based on the movie by the same name. Here you are virtually involved in saving the earth from autobots but  the cutting edge technology makes it feel so real. We had heard about this ride from our friend whom we met the previous day at the hotel. He had warned it was a very frightening ride due to its speed and its special effects and it was nightmarish for him.




My family decided to try this and so we marched towards the queue. I was as usual skeptical about my fear of heights, dark and so decided to keep away. But many young kids and old people marching towards the queue and the constant chants of my family to join the fun, spurred me to take the ride. With fear in my mind, and the words of our friend ringing in my ears I stood in the queue which was in a tunnel where the movies setting with many missiles and autobots where recreated. The setting and the commentary of the movie made my heart race, I was feeling confused and panicky unable to share it with my family who were excited about the ride.

The autobat on which we had to experience the thrill ride was in front of us, we sat in along with two other families completing the 12 member squad in rows of 3. Our harnesses were fixed and there was a ‘voice over’ telling that the fate of humanity hangs and villains are invading to steal some spark( can’t recall now) and that we have been volunteered to protect the spark from stealing and save the planet.

It was totally dark and we were sporting our 3D glasses. I could see nothing for a moment and I was sweating. Suddenly, we were flung into the air and we encounter some monsters which spit fire, we spin,we zip up,  we hang in the air  and suddenly plunge with great speed and another moment crash into a skyscraper. The crash amplifies the sense of speed. It was very scary and at every moment, I was hanging on to my dear life and for a moment I thought I was the battling it all alone in the dark. After a while, the excitement caught on and I was completely absorbed , felt proactive , lost fear and enjoyed the thrill like a seasoned player. I seem to have conquered the fear of the dark or the heights.

I felt everything was so real and perhaps the visual mayhem through the 3D glasses apart from the water, steam and heat effects make it feel hyper-realistic and this is no virtual as I mentioned before.

When the ride ended, I felt I  enjoyed the ride and  had surpassed myself and felt a sense of achievement. Looking back, I want to do that ride again. It was thrilling and not dizzying or scary. I next joined my family in all their adventurous escapades and thrill rides in the park and did not stand out and hold bags.


This was a place where i realized "life begins when fear ends".






2 comments:

  1. Great post! Hi, do you have an email address I can contact you on? Thanks and have a great day!

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  2. I can understand your fear and apprehensions before the ride. But glad that you overcame all those doubts and had fun and enjoyed saving the earth from autobots :))

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