Gym landscapes

There is something utterly serene about listening to a book while walking on a treadmill. As your muscles work, you’re taken on a journey far away from the gym, making the workout seem merely a minor participant in the larger scope of the play. At the moment, my ears read The Garden of Evening Mists by Tan Twan Eng to me. The book was short listed for this year’s Man Booker Prize (though it to my great despair did not win), and is so well written I’m forced to close my eyes not to miss a single sentence or word of the piece. Today, this allowed me to, quite simply, feel my workout, rather than observe it. Normally, I’m constantly checking my Polar HRM, following my body’s heart rate and calorie burn, always analytical, always observational. 

At the gym this afternoon however, my eyes remained closed for thirty minutes straight and my legs (crisper, it seemed, than normal) communicated to me in an entirely different way than they usually do. My 50-minute walk on the treadmill reminded me in some ways of going on an unexplored Disneyland ride, completely unaware of what wonders are about to ensue. My most vivid memory of such an experience is the first ever time I boarded the Indiana Jones ride in Florida, in which the wagon dodged both giant boulders and venomous snakes. None of the mechanics mattered; I was completely immersed in this make-believe story. When the ride was over, my mother and I immediately used another fast pass to enter the magical world again. 

While walking up and down as the treadmill changed its incline, at a steady 5,7 kilometres per hour pace, I felt like I was walking through the very garden Yun Ling, the female protagonist of Evening Mists, helps Japanese gardener Aritomo renovate and build. I could see the Malaysian mountains, trees, rocks, and plants vividly, as my legs rejoiced in the journey I took them on. The whole trip flew by, just like that Indiana Jones ride in Florida, and soon enough I had listened to a whole chapter of the book. My mind returned to the gym, while my legs continued walking, wishing themselves back to the magnificent Yugiri landscape of Eng’s wonderfully written novel. I’m sure they’ll be absolutely thrilled when we arrive Bangkok, Thailand in a week’s time, in all probability running me around the city like a child does a theme park.