Beginner skiing instruction on speed control in a video lesson from Slopestyle TV: http://www.slopestyle.org. A skiing and snowboarding mountain lifestyle series featuring everyday riders, up and coming athletes and tips from instructors.
Duration : 0:1:33

addthis_url = ‘http%3A%2F%2Fsnowboardandskigear.com%2Fskiing-tips%2Fcruiser-skiing-tip-9-beginner-speed-control’;
addthis_title = ‘Cruiser+Skiing+Tip+%239+-+Beginner+Speed+Control’;
addthis_pub = ”;

Technorati Tags: beginner, [...]
Snowboard And Ski Gear

The opinions represented in this article do not necessarily represent those of the staff of CUIndependent.com nor any of its sponsors.

Armed with surgical tools and operating behind the protection of academia’s bureaucracy is Dix Poppas, a pediatric urologist at Cornell University practicing “medical research” that is essentially genital mutilation supported by university research funds and a few degrees.

Under the guise of medical research, Poppas and others have been operating on what they judge to be “oversized clitorises” on women ages five to 25.

There is no research that states that having a slightly large clitoris will hinder the sexual or mental development of young girls. The potential risks that follow Poppas’ clitoroplasty are severe and highly probable as patients have the potential for nerve damage, urinary tract infections, incontinence and an inability to experience orgasm.

The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) withdrew their initial policy statement in May regarding female genital cutting (FGC), stating that FGC can be life threatening.

“…It is important that the world health community understands the AAP is totally opposed to all forms of female genital cutting, both here in the U.S. and anywhere else in the world.”

The idea that female genital cutting is a practice limited to the third world where women are considered to be second-class citizens is a grossly ignorant assumption.

The World Health Organization notes that while female genital mutilation is often carried out by traditional circumcisers in tribal communities, it is becoming increasingly commonplace for it to be performed by health care providers, like Poppas.

Female genital cutting, or mutilation, or “nerve sparing ventral clitoroplasty,” is happening in cultures around the world, be it in tribal huts or on Cornell’s surgical tables in New York City.

As if genital cutting prescribed by doctors wasn’t controversial enough, sex educators like Violet Blue, (whose post is where I first became aware of this evil) and bioethics experts have cried out about the malevolence and lack of oversight of the post-operative techniques utilized by Poppas and his fellow researchers.

In an effort to test whether the surgical tactics will retain the vital sexual nerve endings of his patients, Poppas and co. have decided the most efficient way to check their work is by placing pressure and vibrating devices on the post-op clitoris until it “blanches.”

As I understand it, Poppas is doing this illegally. It has been reported that he does not have the approval of the institutional ethics board for his post-operative procedure.

I believe that stimulating the sexual organs of young children after performing a surgery that is described as unnecessary and unethical is both reckless and evil.

According to the report patients older than five years old were considered “candidates for CST.”

CST is then described as a test where, using a cotton tipped applicator and/or “vibratory device,” the patient is asked to report the degree of sensation on a level of 0 (no sensation) to 5 (maximum sensation) as it is applied to the inner thigh and genitalia in various locations. The force of the vibration is increased on these patients until they can recognize the sensation.

It appears to me that there is no way to justify this post-operative exam, which occurs annually as Poppas tests the development of sexual sensation for the girls.

So, if the girl recognizes a feeble sensation, or none at all, the option for clitoral orgasms is out, because those nerve endings cannot be replaced or replicated.

It just doesn’t seem logical, ethical or fair to me that the sexual well-being of young girls is being gambled away by parents and doctors who likely have never experienced the trauma of genital reconstruction and sexual manipulation.

A doctor’s stimulation of a child’s post-op clitoris does not prove that she hasn’t been physically or emotionally harmed by the operation, nor that her sexual health will be “improved” by this operation that hacks away at important nerve endings, as well as erectile tissues and glands in the clitoris.

Allison Dreger and Ellen Feder wrote about this outrageous practice in the Bioethics Forum noting that, because the girls are described as older than five years old, they will remember being asked to lie down and open their legs as they are touched with a vibrator and report on the resulting sensations.

Dreger and Feder note that they will be able to remember their emotions and physical sensations experienced during this exam as a consenting parent watches as their daughter’s sexual stimulation is manipulated, charted and tested in a sterile room.

This practice is sickening and wrong. I believe that it is our responsibility as people of this global community to speak out against this procedure and how it manifests itself inside and outside of operating rooms.

Another point of concern is that it has been shown that girls with larger clitorises are sometimes more likely to identify as a lesbian after reaching adulthood. That’s not to say that everyone with a slightly larger clitoris likes to have sex with other women, but rather that sometimes lesbians have larger clitorises.

I am concerned that these surgeries may be motivated in some cases by homophobia.

The same research has shown that sometimes men who like to have sex with other men have larger penises than the norm.

I’d be curious to see the next time parents sit down with a doctor and decide to surgically shorten their son’s penis because it was deemed larger than normal.

Contact CU Independent Opinion Editor Sara Kassabian at Sara.kassabian@colorado.edu.

CU Independent

So yesterday as some of you knew (if you follow our twitter), I went out and snowskated my driveway. I made a makeshift box (the top not nailed on) and did some slides and shove-outs. This was my first time actually riding at home this season and the snow was pretty nice. We only got about 2 inches up here but it’s been nice and cold so the snow is super fast. I made a short video edit towards the end of the session. Waiting so long to film with my old digital camera wasn’t such a good idea as lighting wasn’t so awesome in the driveway later in the day. The footage isn’t anything amazing but I had tons of fun with this little box and plan to cut it up and actually nail it to the 2×4′s for next sesh. Video to follow, hope you guys are getting out there if you can! Happy Holidays to you all as well!

iSnowskate.com

Many children are impressed with freestyle skiing. This adventurous sport is now featured in the Olympics and impresses most (if not all) with its difficult and creative tricks. Children can participate in freestyle skiing exercises as long as they are being supervised by an experienced freestyle skier.

Be warned, children often have difficulty with freestyle skiing due to their small but growing bodies. As long as they are wearing the appropriately fitting skis and apparel they should be able to enjoy most forms of freestyle skiing. Parents often will bond with their children while the family learns to freestyle ski together. Just make sure you are learning about this exciting sport under trained supervision!

For more Skiing tips, visit http://Skiing.lifetips.com

LifeTips Skiing Tip of the Day

This is a guest post from our friend James of Untamedborders.com. James is a real deal. He skis where most of us will never even have a chance to ski. When James is not guiding people around Central Asia he can be found either in Peshawar drinking tea, in Amsterdam with his girlfriend or in London where he is slowly coming to terms with owning a flat with negative equity.

“Skiing the high snowy mountains of Afghanistan would be a dream come true for many backcountry skiers, but as we all know, it is not possible as long as the fighting keeps going on in the country.” – Marko, Homeboy ski.

At the time Marko was writing this in the Autumn of 2009, Afghanistan had already seen a number of skiers on its slopes and was preparing the ground work to accept its first batch of foreign back country skiers. As with many things about Afghanistan, the public perception of the country is often very different to actual life on the ground.

Picture taken by Chad Dear, March 2010

Ever since the International forces ousted the Taliban regime in 2001, intrepid foreign workers have been heading to the slopes near Kabul for some escapism during the winter months and today a small group now regularly use the slopes of the Salang Pass for few runs each week. In the winter of 2009 the Bamian valley in Central Afghanistan has had its first injection of a US.5 million investment to boost its fledgling tourism industry. Local guides have been trained to show how the region, most famous for its giant standing Buddhas which were destroyed by the Taliban 9 years ago, can be a year round tourist attraction. Two American ski consultants spent last winter there and can confirm that the slopes of Afghanistan’s Hindu Kush range is one of the worlds finest backcountry ski areas. Already the prospect of ski tourism has attracted some media interest and it seems that against all odds Afghanistan can be a ski destination.

The development plan in Bamian is to first attract foreign workers from Kabul and wealthier Afghanis before trying to attract foreign tourists in 3-5 years time but Untamed Borders, a travel company from the UK, is already advertising places for Afghanistan’s first ski tour in March 2011.

Untamed Borders is a small niche travel company that organises guides and trips to Pakistan and Afghanistan. They want to use their experience, knowledge and long lasting relationships in Afghanistan to allow back country skiers a unique experience that will be as much a cultural exploration as a skiing trip. Their itinerary intends to allow the guests to follow the routes pioneered by the ex-pat workers in the Salang Pass and then to use the services of the newly trained local guides in the Bamian region. They will also encourage the skiers to bring extra second hand ski equipment to help stock the fledgling local ski rental business of Bamian.

Picture taken by Chad Dear, March 2010

It seems incredible that peaceful pockets can exist in Afghanistan. However, one of the things that has driven the violence in Afghanistan is the fact the country is made up of many different ethnic and religious groups who are often distrustful of each other. Bamian is the home of the Hazara. The Hazara are descendants of an army left as a garrison by Genghis Khan and have mongaloid, oriental faces. They are also Shia muslims in a country dominated by Sunnis. Over the years they have persecuted and neglected by various governments and it is only since the US and ISAF forces have been in the country that schools, hospitals and roads have been built here. This is why the security situation there is far removed from the Pashtun led insurgency you see on the news in the southern provinces.

Untamed Borders use guides that have worked in Afghanistan since 1997 and have a deep understanding of the risks involved in travel to the country and where it is possible to travel safely and why. They have many friends in all the places on the trip who give them up to the minute information on what is really going on.

The question still remains whether Afghanistan, a country with poor infrastructure, no ski lifts and possibly crucially, where alcohol is illegal, can really attract skiers from Europe and America that are used to their creature comforts. However, it is clear that it will not be for a lack of opportunity should the brave wish to make the trip.

Homeboy Ski Blog

Accounting for the time difference, precisely 36 hours ago I was on my parents’ couch in posh suburbia, petting my poofy-haired dog and watching HGTV. Fast forward to now, and I am sitting at a desk in the main dorm of l’École Nationale d’Economie Appliquée in Dakar, Senegal.

For many Americans, Senegal is just a spot on a map—though for some that spot’s location is a mystery—something I realized while staring at a flight map through sleep-heavy eyes on a plane some 12 hours ago.

From the crack I had left open in the shade of my rounded window, the sky seemed impossibly dark outside. Pulling up the shade revealed a familiar web of stars in an unfamiliar position. At the horizon, just below the wing of the plane, were a set of three stars I vaguely recall knowing the name of during astronomy lab in Fiske Planetarium at CU three years ago.

Sitting at this desk, the West African capital city of Dakar has only barely gained more life than a spot on a map for me. Jetlagged and uncertain, I have yet to leave the school’s compound.

What I know is that I had a breakfast of bread and Nutella, a shower with no curtain, a toilet with no paper (yet), and puddles of muddy rain and piles of trash surrounding the rear of cafeteria building.

But none of this change of convenience has curbed my excitement to be here. This seems the same of the few dozen other U.S. students in my study abroad program. Because really, as the back-lit Senegalese silhouette I passed in the hall of the dorm told me, “It’s a beautiful day out.”

There are twinkling stars on the horizon whose names I have forgotten or have yet to learn.

Molly Maher is a longtime contributor to the CU Independent, and will be sharing her experiences during her semester abroad in Senegal with the CU community.

Follow Molly’s blog.

CU Independent

SSI’s Quad shreds through used skis and snowboard equipment.
———————–
Sign up to receive SSI’s “Shred of the Month” at http://ssiworld.com/watch
Duration : 0:1:33

addthis_url = ‘http%3A%2F%2Fsnowboardandskigear.com%2Fsnowboard-videos%2Fskis-snowboard-q’;
addthis_title = ‘Skis+%26amp%3B+Snowboard+%28Q%29′;
addthis_pub = ”;

Technorati Tags: Boots, industrial, shred, shredded, shredder, shredding, Skis, snow, Snowboard, ssi, watch

Related Postsnowboarding compilationAtomic Urban [...]
Snowboard And Ski Gear

iSnowskate.com

My apologies to the non-eastern instructors out there.

I dug these sample score cards up on the PSIA-E Web site. The score cards give you a little checklist to use in your exam prep.  There are four points available in each module.  Currently, you need 10 points out of 16 to pass.  It all seems really fair and straight forward to me. 
 
Creative Teaching

Communication Skills – Group Involvement, Personal Attention/Skiing Skills – Demos

Movement Assessment

Observations and Descriptions
Potential Solutions/ Prescriptions
Cause & Effect Relationship
Effective Feedback

Teaching Movement and Skills

Diva Ski Tips

I heard about Fredrik Ericsson’s death from my buddy Jarkko Henttonen. It was sad to hear that Fredrik “Frippe” Ericsson had died on K2 in Pakistan, which is the second highest peak in the world. According to several sources Fredrik joined Gerlinde Kaltenbrunner on the way to the summit of K2. For unknown reason Ericsson fell 1,000 metres (3,300 ft) and was killed. Kaltenbrunner aborted the summit attempt.

Weather forecast on K2 was stated to be excellent. It was clear when Fredrik Ericsson left for the summit, but suddenly a very strong storm moved in. Fredrik, Austrian Gerlinde Kaltenbrunner and other climbers were already near the top, but something went wrong and Fredrik fell.

According to Austria Press Agency (APA), German climber Ralf Dujmovits (Kaltenbrunner’s husband), who had initially made the K2 climb, confirmed there had been a serious accident. Gerlinde was able to return to Camp IV, and is already coming down from K2.

Conditions on the mountain have not been easy. The team has reported numerous avalanches.

According to Wikipedia, Fredrik Ericsson was born in Sweden on 1975. During the summer of 2003 Ericsson climbed and skied the 7495 meters high Peak Communism in Tajikistan. In 2004 he became the first Swede to ski descend the  8000-meters peak when he skied from the central summit of Shisha Pangma (8012m) in Tibet. In 2005 Ericsson and his Norwegian friend Jörgen Aamot made an attempt to ski the coveted Laila Peak (6069m) in Pakistan were forced to turn back due to bad weather condition. Same year they also skied from the summit of Gasherbrum II (8035m). Ericsson returned to the Himalayas in 2007 to attempt Dhaulagiri (8167m) in Nepal. Massive amount of snow and dangerous conditions forced him to turn around at 8000 meters from where he skied 3000 vertical meters down to base camp.

This is a sad day. Fredrik Ericsson was attempting to ski world’s three highest peaks: Mount Everest, K2 and Kanchenjunga. I still remember how excited and enthusiastic Fredrik Ericsson and Trey Cook were when I received Trey’s email from Peshawar. They were really looking forward to climb and ski K2. We agreed to publish several stories with stunning photos from K2, and I was eager to hear all the news from Fredrik and Trey, but it all went different.

Our thoughts go out to Fredrik Ericsson’s family and friends.

Homeboy Ski Blog