My dad often says to me ‘Getting old stinks, don’t do it” and I think I’m starting to catch on to what he means. Birthdays force you to think about things you don’t want to think about, they force you to come to some realizations. And I use realizations, because unlike new years resolutions that are goals, realizations are an after the fact you can’t change them. What I came to a realization about this time around was pretty big for me – I learned what the difference between being young and being old really is.
I’m in China on a shoot right now, and on the cover of one of the big national newspapers is a huge image of a young woman crushing a ping pong ball. The national ping pong (yes I know some people call it table tennis but here they say ping pong so for now I do too) championships were being held in Guangzhou and I guess it was hot news. My initial reaction was condescending boredom, but after my quick flight to Guilin, and walking by crowds watching the games on TV, and a bus ride to Yangshuo, where we drove by kids playing ping pong on anything they could find, I came to the realization that maybe I was the one who hadn’t figured out how cool ping pong was. So I did my research and have decided, much to the amusement of the kids who watch us climb everyday and think we are ‘super rad’, that ping pong is cooler than rock climbing. Here’s why:
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yfefW-uZh_Y
4) Its an Olympic sport. Like it or not this is the largest yardstick that all sports are measured by, and climbing isn’t and won’t be for any time in the near future be on this map. Hell I bet we see pin pong in the x-games over a pit of fire before climbing gets its second chance here.
3) Professional Ping Pong players make more money. I don’t really know how much money they make [even after hours of google] but I know how much pro climbers make so it has to be more.
2) The weather doesn’t affect conditions and they don’t have to starve themselves to be really good.
1) Ping Pong is the worlds largest participation sport (Says the Olympics website, with 40 million competitive players alone worldwide!). Think about it, just about everyone has tried ping pong in their lifetimes – nuff said.
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cy1uHLjMESY
Ok so what does all of this have to with the difference between young and old?
Simple, old isn’t a number and neither is young — both are reflective on your way of living. To me, to be young means that you are naïve about things at times whether you admit it or not. It’s the young ones that are constantly looking for ways to learn about the world, about themselves. It’s the young ones that evolve themselves and evolve their surroundings.
‘Old’ people are those that are set in their ways. They see things that may be different but they don’t attempt to learn or understand them. They know that they may be wrong at times but they are ok with it. Its almost like an enlightenment… ‘I’m happy knowing what I know so why would I want to change that…’
So for now I’m 27 years young… and I plan on staying this way for a while.
tk
Best blog entry ever. peace.
4 reasons why rock climbing is every bit as cool as ping pong: (Note that i didn’t say that climbing is better than ping pong as i think that it is a very subjective thing. One person may live for ping pong whilst another person lives for climbing.)
1. Climbing, depending on which form you adhere to, can lay claim to being more than just a sport. Sport is essentially a form of competition, where as climbing is an activity where people work together to acheive a common goal. Competition versus cooperation: The ‘West’ has developed an economic system based on a lopsided view of human nature. Enterprise capitalism works on the principle that human nature is entirely selfish and what we should all do is compete with each other all the time. Unfortunately this way of doing things has lead the world to economic crisis.
The reality is that kindness, generosity and a desire to work together are also a part of human nature. Hopefully out of the ruins of enterprise capitalism we can build a more balanced system which takes the positive traits of human nature into account.
My point being lets enjoy the cooperation element of climbing and respect the activity for this aspect of it. Climbing doesn’t need to be about competing with others. It is a special personal and shared experience anyway. So stuff the olympics!
2. Wherever there is money there is corruption. We don’t need to let the pursuit of money dominate our life choices, so it is kinda cool that climbing isn’t all about the money
3. The vagaries of the weather are an unfortunate aspect of climbing but on the flip side of that,one of the joys of climbing is that it puts us back in touch with nature and gets us outdoors! Food is one of the great pleasures in life, so instead of being ‘really good’ at climbing and starving yourself why not strike a balance between the two?
4. I don’t care how many people have tried ping pong, but i do know that climbing is not to everyones taste. However for me personally the extremes and intensity of emotion and the sheer joy felt by climbing has never been matched by smacking a plastic ball backwards and forwards on a table.
Climbing is a unique experience and in my view surpasses sport. But like Eric Shipton said: ‘The ascent of Everest like any other endeavour is only to be judged by the spirit in which it is attempted’