Snow Boarding
The sport of freestyle snowboarding is becoming increasingly popular among young people, but some older skiers resent the snowboarders because of the potential for accidents. Some ski resorts welcome the snowboarders, while other resorts ban the snowboarders.
His yellow-and-black snowboard makes scraping, scratching noises over the tightly packed snow as 13-year-old Jay Magis manoeuvres into position atop Calgary’s Canada Olympic Park. Clad in baggy Gore-Tex pants, a padded purplish jacket and a woollen tuque, Magis noses down into the ski slope’s “half-pipe,” a 100-m-long, groomed snow run that looks like a wide bobsled track. With both his boots strapped onto his board, he surfs across the flatter mid-section of the pipe, gathering speed as he heads up the curve, flying over the edge, turning in midair and gliding back down. This is freestyle snowboarding – a fresh Continue reading Mountain mania: ski hills give way to a new breed on the boards
It’s the dead of winter. It’s cold outside. Your are hiding in your living room, slippers on, fire roaring, weather channel tuned in and it’s calling for snow. The “February Blahs” are falling. You’re feeling blue and house-bound and very pale compared with the rosy-cheeked weather people, who actually look as though they’re enjoying the season.
WALK DOWN A CITY STREET in America today and you are likely to see teens trying out new 
On my first trip to Japan back in 2966, I arrived at a very small and icy dojo (gymnasium) in the middle of nowhere, and was told to sweep the floor before the lesson. The black belts looked down at us as if we were scum, and made funny noises of disapproval. Then, with a horrific scream, the sensei (teacher) ordered us to line up. Being the newest student, I was the last in line. He began, “Ichi, ni, san, shi, go, roku, hichi, hachi, ku, ju,” etc., all the way up to one hundred. We, in the meantime, were doing push-ups. Mr. Enoeda, our sensei, walked around the class carrying a large wooden samurai sword. Whenever he saw someone too tired to continue, he would whack him rather hard with it.