The rain was drizzling onto my face; it felt like every drop was a soothing touch.  I felt the freezing breeze blow through my body making my body shiver; every gust brought more goosebumps on my arms.  I heard faint voices of people speaking and asking one question over and over again.  But my brain didn't understand, my brain was so sluggish I couldn't understand the language.  My brain turned into a newborn’s and all languages sounded like gibberish.  In my head, I was repeating the same thing over and over again “I am never doing anything like this again no matter what.  Never going on something like this to ruin my life I’m not risking sitting in a wheelchair for the rest of my life!”

As I slowly looked up I saw the gray sky with tiny rain droplets falling from each cloud, slowly.  My head turned heavily to see my right leg.  All I see is a big cut in my pants covered in blood, my mind automatically started to panic but before my brain could send any signals to my body or tell me to say something, two people took me by the hand and forced me to stand up.  I couldn't feel my right leg; it was all numb and painless.  Then I found myself limping towards a little wooden house.

It was September 10th.  The first day of our 8th-grade discovery trip.  The whole 8th grade from our school was coming with some kids from the St-Petersburg who tagged along to join.  Sitting in my house waiting for the time to come when I have to leave.  My mind automatically started thinking about the amazing things that will happen and my mind started thinking of all the things that could go wrong.  My heart was a snare drum playing the quickest beat possible.  I was excited about the rafting, the horse back riding, the ropes course, and of course, the nights by the campfire and I was going to do every single one of those activities. Ever since I was small I was always a very adventurous kid and excited about things like these trips. I packed all the things I needed waved goodbye and left home not expecting to come back for a whole week.  I came to school, and when I opened the door, I could hear the screams of 100 kids I felt the rush coming.  I enter the room and 3 of my friends all came and surrounded me we started fist bumping hand shaking talking about who we are gonna room with until we heard a high pitch whistle.  The announcement was that we are leaving to the buses, I saw everybody rushes down the stairs like it was a stampede, everybody bulldozing over people just to get through the door, wanting to desperately sit next to their best friends. The second we stepped outside the school I felt the cool air breeze on my face.  I heard my friends tell me something but I wasn't paying any attention just focusing on the moment.

 
After an hour in the bus, we arrived at the airport.  The air-cooled from the time we went on to the time we arrived at the airport.  We checked in and put our bags away, after some time we were finally seated in the airplane.  Time flew through the whole trip the airplane ride everybody slept through most of it sometimes rarely people stayed up the whole flight.  Finally, after what felt like the fastest trip ever we were in our camp eating lunch.  When I finally fell onto my bed, I felt my eyes closing and my body gives up.  When suddenly I was woken up by a teacher knocking on the door.

Our first activity was the rope course, so everyone was so jumping with excitement, for the boys it was a big thing to excel at these types of things because everybody loved to brag about it.  When we arrived everybody raced to the instructors, impatiently waiting to go onto the course.  The instructors asked for three people.  People that were going to be climbing the climbing wall, before going on the ropes course... I was one of those three people.  The instructors geared us up and as we climbed slowly, as I reached the top I got that nice satisfaction my heart not jumping with stress or excitement but with nice slow satisfaction, my hand automatically warmed up.  My body ignored the freezing breeze and my whole body warmed up as I slowly let go and they let me descend but what I didn't know is the second time was not going to be as easy as the first one or as smooth. 
As I started climbing the wall, suddenly little drizzles of rain fell making each step more and more slippery.  I was tied to a rope, which made me feel safer, the rope gave me a nice confident touch that said: “Nothing can happen to me.”  I started to climb slower and slower knowing the danger of slipping increased every second.  Once I reached the top the instructor asked me to slowly let go and as I did I thought I was going to touch the ground slowly, when in reality actually I swooped through the air all the way down smashing the ground with my back I felt the shock in my breath like every piece of oxygen in my body vanished.  I was trying to grasp for air but it was no use.  Seconds later I hear a clunk and slight pain in my right leg.  Only do I realize that blood was all over my leg.

Being drug off to that wooden cottage was the time everything went downhill, the agony in my right leg was indescribable.  I felt my face still covered in water,  I felt my whole right leg burn with pain like somebody just finished a cigar and now are, extinguishing it by putting it on my flesh.  With the slightest movement or tensing of my muscle, I felt 100 needles being stuck in the wound all at the same time.  I heard the screaming of people trying call for an ambulance, then repeated with the following words: “It’s going to be ok, don't worry.”  I saw the light get darker and darker but never went pitch black.  I tasted the dryness in my mouth as if I ran a 5k without a drop of water, I could taste the dry air around me.  I felt like I could taste every little dust molecule.

After a painful 10 minutes, I heard the faint sound of a classical Moscow ambulance.  The ambulance was Formula 1 on a highway flying though.  Then two guys came barging through the door immediately taking me to the ambulance.  On the ambulance, every bump felt like somebody was punching me in the wound, again and again, every small tension of my leg felt like I was sticking my leg into a bonfire.  Scared to think about what's going to happen to me the pain I imagined myself in, was horrifying.  I never needed stitches in my life.  Which brought a whole new aspect to the situation I never felt pain like stitches this was going to be a brand new experience that I never had and was frightened for it to become a reality.  When we arrived at the hospital, they immediately took me to the room and asked me to lay down on my side.  I closed my eyes to see darkness focusing on not moving.  Steadily they got to work and gave me local anesthetics.  We were at the hospitals for hours.  The first 30 minutes were the worst, those were the ones that gave me pain I never witnessed in my life.  The second they put me on the table they started to work and operate the pain that my leg was in was incredible it felt like they were sticking a 2 by 4 into your nose just here it was into a wide open wound in my leg.  After discussing exactly what happened with the police we went to the bus that took us home.  The second I fell into my bed I felt 100 times lighter I saw the bright full moon outside the window,  I heard my roommate ask me questions.  And as time went by I felt my eyes slowly close my vision darker and darker until I painlessly went to sleep.

The next morning I had to leave for my flight to go home.  I immediately noticed that when I stood up I could actually limp, my mind automatically calmed down and looked at the little positive thing that I said to myself: “What a killer battle wound I will have, and have a story forever.”  The whole trip I tried to calculate and guess how long it will take for me to start playing basketball.  After we landed, and took our suitcases, my mom, waiting there outside ran to give me a hug just a look at her face and I knew she was worried, the eyes looking down, her lips saying...nothing.

Days passed and as every day went by I could walk more and more.  My leg felt better and better,  after 3 weeks the doctor gave me a thumbs up to start playing sports. Reflecting on what happened I thought to myself and said: “If I ever have the chance to climb a climbing wall I would just because of a slip I will not let that stop my future experiences because I believe experiences are the only way people live.”