All I Can Do

I went to my first ever spinning class today, and wow, was it an experience. Chelsea, Danielle and I arrived at the gym at about 5:30 this afternoon. We walked in and payed our 5 soles (little less than $2) to the man sitting behind the counter. I was surprised by the big weight machines they had and the numerous cardio machines. It looked like a real gym. I guess when I pictured a gym in Ayacucho, I pictured a tiny dark, dusty room with two rickety treadmills, one of which probably wouldn't work, and a few hand weights. Nope, I was wrong. There was a big room with lots of equipment and there were about 20 huge posters of body builders flexing their much too large and certainly chemically enhanced tan muscles. I mean we are talking posters high on the wall where the men (and women) are at least twice actual size people. It was pretty funny.

We could hear the music blasting in the spinning room. We opened the door and walked in. I thought I had entered a discotheque. The room was dark except for three flashing strobe lights (a red one, a white one, and a green one). A muscular Peruvian man was the leader and his bike was stationed on a platform at the front of the room. He was wearing a yellow tank top, blue hat and pants. He must have been using some sort of muscle growth/enhancement something because he was the most muscular Peruvian I have seen all trip.

We navigated our way past the other people already biking hard and each found a bike at the back of the room. There were 18 bikes in three long rows placed end to end (no room to spare) nearly touching the end of the long skinny room. We hopped on and started pedaling to the strong beat of the music. I was dripping with sweat quickly and wished I had brought a towel. It was a tough work out and I was glad there was no clock in view. Pedal faster. Va, va (go, go). Danielle and I started making, "oh my gosh, I can't keep up," faces at each other. I increased the resitance on my bike. I pedaled standing up. I pedaled sitting down. Stand up, sit down. I loosened the resistance. Sweat was pouring out of my forehead. The skinny seats were uncomfortable. Super Peruvian kept yelling at us to pedal faster.

Out of breath, I turned around to see it getting dark outside. I also saw the fake McDonalds directly across the street. McBolas it was called and definitely stole the Mickey D's logo. Kind of ironically placed so close to a gym.

Finally, I passed my wall and started getting into the class. I was actually enjoying it. We saw Marisol, our volunteer placement director, pedaling in the front of the room. The smell of sweat and old gym filled my nose. My small silver St. Christopher necklace kept slapping me in the chin as I pedaled side to side. Chelsea and Danielle couldn't take any more. They left the room to do some abs outside. I thought, "all I can do is keep going." I wanted to finish strong.

I kept pedaling enjoying the feeling of a good workout. I also thought about how I am really glad I don't have epilepsy, as these flashing lights at the front of the room would certainly induce some sort of epileptic seizure. Finally, Super Peruvian turned on the main lights and slowed down the music. I think it was close to the end. I had survived. A familiar song started to play. It got to the chorus, "Don't want to loooose your luuuvvv toniiiight." I had flash backs to nights of karaoke or fraternity parties. We stretched and cooled down. What an experience!

All I Can Do, Jack Ingram