Have you ever had a real 'wow' moment

looksee

If you are not sure, you haven't! And it doesn't have to be something that necessarily made sense in a logical way.

Mine was a few years ago when I had the opportunity to hold and examine an original of a rare print book which I had been researching. The effect was astonishing, beautiful sunsets, glorious works of art, no comparison. I still have no idea why I found it so amazing, in retrospect it seems quite out of proportion but it is something that really made an impression on me.

yes I know, book...impression...sorry!

Micky Dolenz

I once saw 4 dolphins surf a wave and then they jumped out of it. It was like something you'd see in blue planet. Never thought I'd be lucky enough to see if in real life.

ImpossibleDuck

I remember as a kid a cousin of mine took me and his friend to this really secluded spot in the middle of a forest. We had no idea why we were there. He took us up this little creek and at the end was a waterfall. He told us to wait here. He came back about 10 minutes later and dropped two wetsuits at our feet; He already had his on. We just kind of looked at him in confusion before he took off running and jumped off the edge of this waterfall into a big lake below. I remember just looking down at him and was completely mesmerised by both my surroundings and the fact that he had just jumped off a ****ing waterfall! :pac:

This is a little hard to explain, but it wasnt just a lake. The lake was x feet below us but was surrounded on all sides by cliffs as high as the waterfall.

I'm not sure if you're getting the idea but it was just like a huge hole in the ground. Like a big cylinder had been cut out of the ground and water was put into it. There were trees all around the cliffs.

It was just such a fantastic experience.

looksee

Did you jump? And more to the point, how did you get out again?

jaqian

I was in the national gallery today and was blown away by a Picasso (Still life with a mandolin). it was just so accessible.

imme

Have had a few wow moments while travelling.

In Reykjavik I turned a corner and saw the snow covered sheer mountain across the bay and all I could say was 'wow'.

In Ecuador I turned a corner in Banos and saw a volcano issuing forth. All I could say was 'wow'.

There've been many more, they're usually at times I see things that I didn't know were there and had never heard of.

puddles22

i live in donegal and love takin photos, when the weather is good here i take myself off usually round the coast , and even though i may have seen it hundreds of times before i still get that wow factor at the beauty of it :
)

gamgsam

I worked in a lab for the summer studying brain development in frogs.

As part of the study I had to fertilise frog eggs weekly then record development with photographs and descriptions of abnormalities.

Seeing the processes of early blastulation, gastrulation and neurulation happen in front of my eyes was the most humbling experience in my life so far.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IjyemX7C_8U

Also, hands get me all the time. I'll just sit there and stare in wonder at my hand thinking how briliant it is as a biological tool. Another wow moment happened when after explaining evolution to my girlfriend for ages, we went to the natural history museum and it all clicked for her. She could see the similarities in skeletons of different species and just all of a sudden cracked a hug 'aha!' smile. That was f*cking cool if you'll pardon the language.

rabb_lbad

gamgsam wrote: »

As part of the study I had to fertilise frog eggs weekly.

Kermit is that you?

I once witnessed lightning strike a tree within 100ft of a group of us that was a real WOW monent.
We were at a wedding which took place on the grounds of a castle. We went outside to stroll the grounds. It began to rain so we took shelter inter a wooden canopy at the side of the castle.
In fron of was an open grass area with a few large trees and a river on the other side really beautiful.
All of a sudden there was a brilliant flash of white light, sparks, a momentary hissing noise (from moisture in the tree instantly vapourising).
Next thing half the tree was scattered around the grass underneath itself.
The silence is what really got me. for such an enormous amount of energy to strike silently WOW.
Of course then there was a clap of thunder afterwards.

ImpossibleDuck

looksee wrote: »

Did you jump? And more to the point, how did you get out again?

Yes I did! I somehow forgot to mention that part :pac:

It led out to a little river on the other side. About 90% of it was cliff walls then just a little passageway downstream.

Lionel Messy

Going to Anfield for the first time in '96. Looking out at the stadium blew me away. It was in absolute pristine condition, the red of the seats and the green of the grass.

You can't describe the feeling going there for the first time.

Brussels Sprout

Emerging from the Homer tunnel on the way to Milford Sound in the South Island of New Zealand. The tunnel runs for over a kilometre right through a mountain in the Southern Alps and then you come out onto a road with towering mountains creating two walls on either side. As you drive along the valley dwarfed by these ranges you can look up and see hundreds of little waterfalls dropping out of the sky on either side. I remember thinking that I was after coming through the tunnel and out into another geological era. If a pterodactyl had flown by it would have seemed normal.

Sindri

Driving back from the funeral of a relative all the way back I got this really earthy fresh smell from the countryside that was really exhilarating and extremely intense. It smelt ancient and nutritious.

Also while on a flight from Germany back to Ireland; the plane after taking off ascended above a huge blanket of cloud that stretched for miles underneath us and was completely level like a meadow and above it there was a huge red moon that looked like it was perched just off the wing of the plane.

angelman121

The WOW feelings is just showing you the real you beneath the human, we don't catch feeling's good ones or bad ones from outside of ourselves, the outside only serves to show us the diversity of feeling's we are capable of producing or creating within ourselves, we have choice and the ability to learn from our experiences to be able to decide what feeling's we want to keep experiencing. I have WOW moments every day.
Happy Every Day !

NIMAN

The birth of my 1st child.

Never felt emotion like that before. Amazing.

vitani

The first time I walked into the Long Room in Trinity.

Tombo2001

watching my children being born is the obvious one.

in a wider social sense, loads while travelling.

a few that stick out:
hiking in a very peaceful and quiet valley in morocco and hearing a shepherd who was on the mountain top singing out loud to himself. He was about two kilometres away but we could hear him the whole way through the valley; as a soundtrack, that was amazing.

in India, staying in a boathouse in Kerala and waking to see a duck farmer out herding is flock of ducks, about 500 of them, from one side of the river to the other.

in Mongolia, out on horses, and meeting a farmer along the way who was out gathering up his cattle.....all was nice and peaceful and civil for about half an hour, he was chatting to our guide. All of a sudden one of the cows bolted and then they all started running.....the farmer (in Mongolian but in a way that it was pretty fuppin obvious what meant) said "Ill go this side of them, you go that side of them and we round them up".....so for ten minutes of my life I was a bona fide cowboy.

In terms of buildings, I would have to say the Taj Mahal was my most wow of wow places.

In terms of scenery, being quite close to a major avalanche on Nanga Parbat (8th highest mountain in the world) was pretty cool.

In sport, Paul Brady's comeback in the first game of this year's World Handball Championship is the coolest thing I've seen live. That was wow. 2010 hurling final was pretty awesome too, as was 2009.

By the way, hats off OP, its a very good question.

Tombo2001

puddles22 wrote: »

i live in donegal and love takin photos, when the weather is good here i take myself off usually round the coast , and even though i may have seen it hundreds of times before i still get that wow factor at the beauty of it :
)

plus one to the west of Ireland.

One not so well known one.....the Ballycroy national park interpretive centre has a small little walk beside it to the top of this hill, its not a big walk, but the panorama 360 degrees around on a fine day is wow.

blue5000

I remember seeing a self portrait of Vincent Van gough in the lourve museum in Paris and it was a 'wow' moment. You can see all the strokes of the palet knife in the paint, and I remember thinking, Vince you were really raving that day.

SeanBeach

The moment my daughter was born. It was like looking into a little mirror. Suddenly, everything made sense.

arybvtcw0eolkf

NIMAN wrote: »

The birth of my 1st child.

Never felt emotion like that before. Amazing.

I've had that moment too, 21 years ago this week in fact.. When he was delivered I burst out crying, and still get teary eye'd when I think back.

wow ~ I'm old

Mindfulness

The most profound for me was watching my daughter being born and holding her for the first time. That incredible feeling that I had helped create this life in my arms.

The next Wow moment was when we got her home and sat down while she was asleep in her basket. The sudden realisation that this person was now 'here to stay' for many, many years was exciting and terrifying all at once.

On a practical level, I remember in Uni, we were given a programming assignment and had three hours lab time to do the work. As everyone around me started coding away, I sat thinking 'How the hell am I going to do this?'. I thought about it for about 10 minutes and then suddenly the answer hit me. I started coding and 18 lines later, I was finished. I compiled and ran the code and it worked perfectly. Almost everyone else in the class took hundreds of lines of code and numerous rewrites to get it to work. The closest person to me had over 60 lines of code. I just 'got it' and got the highest marks in the class for that assignment. Still failed Comp Sci that year though :pac:

EDIT:
Also, as a lab scientist during the first year of my PhD i remember receiving a yeast sample I wanted to work with, from a lab in the US. As I began working with this yeast, I looked at it on a microscope slide and realised that I was looking at an actual sample of yeast that had been taken from the body of a man and that this sample had killed that man. The strongest anti-fungals on the planet had failed to save him and I had the sample right in front of me and would work with it for three years. (I eventually determined why the anti-fungals hadn't worked )

13spanner

When I was on work experience with a geologist working in the Burren, we wandered off the beaten track and she showed me this place. On a fine day, it's my favorite place in the world. You can't see any houses, hear any cars. Silence.

Figured I'd share it with you all

Yardleys Lavender

Maybe this is not a "Wow" moment, but I can still remember with absolute clarity the moment that I "got" & understood Algebra.

I was always good at maths until compound interest in my Busy At Maths 6 / 6th class when it totally went over my head. My father who is an engineer and my mother, a teacher spent nights explaining it to me. Then when I started the Intercert course, Algebra was absolutely beyond me. Then started the grinds on a Monday night in an effort to learn which I detested. It was the mock exams before the Intercert, I was sitting at the table in my room doing my study and staring at the Texts and Tests (the big red book) when Algebra just made sense. I can still remember the feeling in the hands and mind and heart. It was amazing!


Not exactly like finding a cure or cancer but it will always stay with me!

MintyDoris

I feel this a lot.

I remember one when I was about 8 months pregnant. It was mid summer and I stood out on the balcony which looks out over amazing views of the Wicklow Mountains. I stood there in my bare feet, hand on my bump feeling my child kick watching the most amazing sunset throw colours across the sky. The breeze through my hair just feeling so ... in tune with it all

dr ro

13spanner wrote: »

When I was on work experience with a geologist working in the Burren, we wandered off the beaten track and she showed me this place. On a fine day, it's my favorite place in the world. You can't see any houses, hear any cars. Silence.

Figured I'd share it with you all

looks like florin or is it guilder?

Nutgrover

ImpossibleDuck wrote: »

Yes I did! I somehow forgot to mention that part :pac:

It led out to a little river on the other side. About 90% of it was cliff walls then just a little passageway downstream.

Where was this place (which country, county??), if it's not a secret?

Joesh82

Sometimes, especially when lifes problems seem to drag you down, you go out for some fresh air and look at the stars and planets etc. Your problems seemed big but you get a perspective that defies your logic and realise your insignificance in the grand scheme of the world, strangely I mean this in a positive way.

Justin1982

Getting off the train in Montreaux, Switzerland on a hot summers day and just looking up at the Alps. Its actually hard to imagine how high the mountain range lis until your at the foot of it looking up at a cliff face that seems to stretch for a few kilometres straight up.

Also, closer to home, walking up to an almost unknow Dún Dúchathair which is on the cliff edge in the Aran islands. Myself and my friend were both speechless. Its one lonely and spooky place. Feel like your a million miles from civilization up there.

jellyboy

i was once with the most beautiful girl in the world,we stopped and went for a walk on a beach ,on the journey back i noticed she had a daisy in her hand ,all she was doing was twiddling it ,i watched her for a half hour in complete silence(and eyes on the road as well)

all she said was "isn't everything beautiful"
The deepness of that journey was a wow to me ..


Even reading this thread is wow ,the humbleness of sharing

HansHolzel

The unveiling/unleashing of a great pair of breasts. Wow.

tacofries

Climbed a mountain in the dark once so that i could watch the sun rise above the sea,,,.. Was a clear night so the sky went from black to blue to indigo to red to orange to yellow to gold.. Amazing watching the transformation as the sun came into sight Played good life by one republic as the sun tipped above the horizon!

RossFixxxed

Watching the sun come out behind Everest and the snow blowing silently off the sumit, 8848 meters above sea level was absolutely mind blowing. Brought a tear.

Muppet Man

Seeing Saturn and it's rings for the first time through my telescope... I first said "WOW"' followed shortly after by "holy fcuking sh!te".... It really was that amazing.

The other wow moment was nearly drowning while white water rafting in Yosemite... I was About 2 Seconds from taking a lung full of water and some lad reached under the water and pulled me into the boat... Took two deep breaths in said in my head... "Wow, that was too close"

Muppet man.

Poulgorm

Climbing up the steps to the top of the Skelligs, on a warm summer's afternoon. Getting to the top and spending about 30 minutes sitting down and gazing all around.

A really special place.

Can't explain it. You have to experience it.

deise08

My wow moment..
snorkeling in Sharm El Sheik.
wow.
I can't swim so thought I would never experience anything like that.
3 drop off points, 3 wows.
the colours,the fish,the reef,the drop below, the big dark blue space out to the left and the coral ledge to the right, the guides were like mermen swimming underneath. Speechless when the big Ray just soared past and disappeared into the blue. wow.
I could never do it justice by trying to describe it but wow!
Every time I came back to the boat all I could say was wow. The guides were even laughing I sayin it so much and copying me too :-)
all I can say about it was wow!

gerrybbadd

Entering the gas chamber in Auchwitz, and walking along the selection ramp at Birkenau. Incredibly humbling, when you consider the amount of lives taken, right there.

bumper234

14 years old and I was walking through a circus in Blanchardstown with a group of friends (where the Lidl is now on Blakestown road) and as I walked past a caravan the woman was sitting just inside feeding a baby Bengal tiger. I stopped to look and she asked me if I wanted to hold it. I got to feed a baby Bengal for about 5 minutes (friends were well jealous ) and then got to see the Mother close up (from behind bars of course) have had a passion for tigers since.

gerrybbadd

Also, Sept. 11 2011. Seeing those planes hit the World Trade Centre, and watching those towers fall, and knowing somehow, the world would never be the same again.

Bafucin

Usually while I am walking.

medici

A solar eclipse a good few years back - putting on my dad's welding mask and watching the sun go black. I remember songbirds quietening down a lot as it happened and daisies in our lawn that began to fold up their petals as the sky grew darker.

I thought "Wow" imagine being an ignoramus from the Middle Ages and thinking the world was going to end because of this..!

miamee

Getting a train called the TransAlpine in New Zealand from Christchurch across the island and across the mountain range in the middle. I wasn't sure what to expect but the train stopped in the middle of nowhere and everyone got out to see the view of the snow-topped mountains in the distance. Wow. I fell in love with NZ there and then

Starscream25

My first time seeing such a massive collection of people, my first international football game between Ireland and Portugal in 95, walking up the steps in the west stand peering through the entrance onto the stand itself, I was 10 at the time and football crazy, for me it was a big wow moment.

NewCorkLad

Watching the sunrise in Ankgor Wat.

First time seeing sharks while scuba diving.

Walking through the reception of the Europe hotel in Killarney and seeing Killarney lake and mountains on a sunny day.

Taltos

Seeing the Northern Lights in Wicklow back in the 90s - no-one believes me but it's true.

Being knocked down by a car as a kid - jumping up and realising I was still alive if badly injured (blood is a good indicator).

Climbing any of the mountains in Ireland - carrantuohill; the Sugar Loafs in Wickow; seeing Djouce waterfall frozen solid.

Getting trapped in an upturned sea kayak (panic had me wedge myself in); accepting that this was it and suddenly popping out.

Justin1982

Taltos wrote: »

Seeing the Northern Lights in Wicklow back in the 90s - no-one believes me but it's true.

Being knocked down by a car as a kid - jumping up and realising I was still alive if badly injured (blood is a good indicator).

Climbing any of the mountains in Ireland - carrantuohill; the Sugar Loafs in Wickow; seeing Djouce waterfall frozen solid.

Getting trapped in an upturned sea kayak (panic had me wedge myself in); accepting that this was it and suddenly popping out.

You'd think you'd learn after being knocked down by the car

Dogwatch

Taltos wrote: »

Seeing the Northern Lights in Wicklow back in the 90s - no-one believes me but it's true.

Being knocked down by a car as a kid - jumping up and realising I was still alive if badly injured (blood is a good indicator).

Climbing any of the mountains in Ireland - carrantuohill; the Sugar Loafs in Wickow; seeing Djouce waterfall frozen solid.

Getting trapped in an upturned sea kayak (panic had me wedge myself in); accepting that this was it and suddenly popping out.

I make that 2 down ....7 to go :D:D

Esho

Great forum OP!

Looking at a ball of sardines swimming in a huge, huge tank in Monterray aquarium.
My wife and I were transfixed - Wow! World-stoppingly beautiful.

Walking home round 7am on New Years Day through a path which was in a shallow gorge with blocks of flats on both sides. It was in Poland, and everything was grey or white - the sky, the snow the concrete of the blocks and bridge. There was not a soul about, it was below zero and completely silent. The sun was a disc of pure crimson. Stunningly beautiful - Wow!

Chanting with over 100 other Buddhists directly in front of a mandala in a golden frame.
Everything turned golden, Mystic - Wow!

gormdubhgorm

I remember as young fella when I got glasses for the first time about 16 (they said glasses would not improve my eyesight before that - long story).

I was walking out of the specky shop and every thing was jumping out at me crystal clear.

I was staring at everything and anyone, with what must have been an insanely happy head on me.

I remember a girl thought I was checking her out and she smiling to herself.

And on the train home I was extremely fascinated by a fly moving its wings on the edge of the window on the Dart home. I was never so interested in reading the advertisements on the Dart either.

maninasia

Looking at a slice of moon rock through a microscope. I didn't expect that it would look anything different than any rock you'd pick up from Earth. Wrong! There is no weathering on the moon and very little water, so the crystals look sharp and very clear, very different than any rocks I had examined microscopically previously. It was an alien rock I was looking at. Oh, BTW, this rock was a sample brought back on the Apollo missions.

looksee

Maninasia, is that colour enhanced, or does it really look like that? Its amazing! Why would there be small bits of rock around, given the lack of weathering, atmosphere etc?