Mathapa faces flagging mishap

By: Isaiah Bruce

MCSUN.org EXCLUSIVE from Mt. Carmel High School’s Journalism 1 class.

On a warm summer day, freshman Kristina Mathapha can’t think of any better way to spend her time with friends and family than at mission bay. And being the athletic person that she is, water-skiing sounds like the perfect thing to do.

“I like sports,” she said. “And I never tried jet-skiing so I felt, why not?” Mathapha had never been jet-skiing before but felt like being with family and friends was the perfect opportunity to try. And after going tubing, she decided to take it to the next level.

Flagging was the new challenge that Mathapha wanted to defeat. Flagging is when a person sits backwards on the jet-ski and holds on to a flag. While doing this a rope attached to the jet-ski pulls a person in a tube and if they fall off the person holding the flag must throw it so that the driver knows. To some it may sound easy but sitting on the back of a jet-ski while facing the opposite way might intimidate the actual people trying.

“My sister encouraged me to go flagging,” she said. “It was scary at first but I got the hang of it.” After a while Mathapha felt pretty comfortable with flagging as her confidence level kept rising. But this self-assurance of her ability to do well while flagging would push her to a level she couldn’t handle.

“I had this energy rush going through me because it was my first time jet-skiing,” she said. “I was so excited that I told my sister to go seventy miles per hour!” Not realizing the difficulty to go at a higher speed Mathapha just smiled and held on. As they started to speed up she began to grasp the complexity of staying on as she waited for what was to come next.

Her sister, having already had experience on a jet-ski, went faster and faster as Kristina Mathapha became more and more troubled. The jet-ski finally hit a bump caused by a small wave which sent Mathapha flying trough the air. After she flipped off the jet she safely landed in the water.

Until she came up to the surface to see the rope of the tube sliding right passed her. And with the blink of an eye the rope slashed her neck as it went by. Feeling like she almost died Mathapha fainted for a moment from the shock of what just happened.

“I felt like it was about to break my neck,” she said. “It whipped me really hard.” She was finally brought into the boat with her family and friends as she was woke up just to be bombarded by everybody as she was asked questions and being looked at to make sure everything was alright.

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