Cyril Mazibuko grew up in the shadows of the mountains. Born in a small kraal at the foot of the Drakensberg range in the southern part of the KwaZulu-Natal province in South Africa, Cyril would often look up at the 3,000-meter basalt peaks, a playground for African paragliders. Enthralled, Cyril made a decision: He would build his own glider and join them in the sky.

Now 26, Cyril is the only black South African currently registered with the sport's ruling body. And it all started with a glider he made from plastic bags, purloined rope and baling wire, a glider that flew – sort of – though it both amazed and horrified the professional paragliders who saw it.

Like many "extreme" sports, paragliding is relatively new. In the early 1950s British sportsman Walter Neumark was one of the first to advocate the possibilities of ultra-light gliders that could be launched by foot power alone.

A decade later the sport received a big boost when American Domina Jalbert invented what came to be the template for the modern glider. His vision for a wing consisted of cells that were soft and supple on the ground, but became rigid when inflated by the wind. Dalbert's invention would eventually allow pilots to go farther than ever before, and it provided them with significantly more control in the air.

Today the average glider is a marvel of engineering. It has more than 300 meters of steering lines, as well as between 25 to 35 square meters of ultra-light, ultra-strong porous fabrics.

And despite the gentle image of a pilot floating softly to earth, wings can move – fast. A low-end glider can hit 50 kilometers per hour, high-end gliders top out at 65 km/h.

Paragliding is also a sport for the well-heeled. A brand-new glider and harness can easily cost upwards of $4,500. In short, these aren't the sort of machines amateurs are supposed to build, especially not 12-year-old boys with little formal schooling.

Cyril started small, using plastic bread bags for the wing, with lines made from orange-bag strings. He would add weights to these early prototypes and let them go. "Throw it into the air and it would fly," he says proudly.

But for his glider to carry a person, Cyril needed better materials, so he improvised. At night he and his friends would raid a local farm and make off with fertilizer bags, rope and baling wire. He chuckles at the memory: "He (the farmer) never knew what was happening."

Cyril stitched together the fertilizer bags to make his wing, using the wire for a needle and the rope as thread. He also built himself a harness, and even added basic safety features.

"We used to see paragliders all the time, (and I realized), 'Oh, there is an airbag to stop somebody from hurting his back if he crashed,'" he remembers, "so we used to put wine bags, inflated ones, in (our) harness."

And after more than a dozen attempts Cyril had a working glider. It could carry 45 kilograms, and it flew, albeit backward and uphill. In a strong breeze the glider could be inflated and would take its "pilot" to the top of a small hill, while he faced downhill. With soft wind the glider served as a sort of parachute allowing the boys to jump off the top and float down gently to terra firma.

Cyril's efforts soon drew the attention of more experienced pilots.

"It was so well imaged on what we were flying," Jonathan "JJ" Bass says as he sips a coffee. The 40-year old has the easy grace of an athlete. Bass now runs his own IT consulting company, but for several years he was a full-time paragliding instructor. It was his students Cyril watched fly from the teeth of the uKhahlamba. Bass remembers Cyril showing off his creations at the bottom of the hill.

"The way that it was put together was very impressive," he says. "There were the right number of lines, they were even in the right place.… (The glider) was very cleverly done."

Cyril's work so impressed Bass he decided to get involved. Within a few weeks he was teaching Cyril the finer points of piloting. And a few months later Bass scrounged up a real glider for his new friend.

Cyril took quickly to his piloting lessons. "He was a natural talent," Bass says. "His passion is flying. I mean the guy's got it." By age 14, Cyril had earned his paragliding pilot's license.

Being a Zulu in a sport dominated by whites at the tail end of apartheid brought Cyril attention – not all of it good. "I started flying during bad times," Cyril recalls. Not everyone was pleased to see a black taking to the air – especially not one who got significant help from whites.

Undaunted, Cyril earned his sporting license at age 16 and began entering distance competitions, and became known for his solid showings. He also gained a reputation for partying. "I was a young man, I must admit," he says.

James Braid, who flew with Cyril, says, "He quickly became a respected pilot in the community. But he basically became in love with girls and moved all round the country chasing them."

More problematic, though, were the people who saw Cyril as an economic opportunity. Abortive product-endorsement deals and a failed movie contract followed. Eventually, depressed by his belief that he was being used at every turn, Cyril quit gliding and wandered through a series of jobs around the country. Paragliding had enriched others, but Cyril felt it had left him with less than he started with, and he decided his time as a pilot had been a curse.

"But," he says, "I never forgot about flying."

His return to the air came through a chance meeting. In late 2006 pilot and paragliding instructor Jo Chananie ran into one of Cyril's friends and coworkers at a Durban hostel. Jo took Cyril's number and started pestering him to get back into the air. Eventually he capitulated, went flying with Jo, and began to contact his old friends.

Now, several months later, Cyril is working for Laura Nelson, one of the grand dames of South African paragliding. Cyril helps train Laura's students. In return Laura is easing him back into competitive flying. Swing Paragliders has sponsored him with a glider, harness and helmet, and members of the gliding community have donated other needed items. Cyril is on target to compete in the Eastern Cape Open this October.

After that, who knows? Standing on top of a hill, getting ready to launch after having helped the students into the air, Cyril says his desire to fly is still as strong as it was more than 20 years ago when he first saw a paraglider.

"I was always flying in the back of my mind," he says, adjusting his helmet. "I stopped flying, but I never gave it up."

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