I appreciate your encouragement recently.
Regarding this geological feature, it is useful to consider how materials act differently under pressure than they do in our hands. These layers of sediment were extraordinarily compressed and confined by rock above and below when they were bent. Similarly to how you can bend a metal pipe full of sand or in a pipe bender without crimping, which it would do if the sand were not inside it or the pipe bender outside it, even brittle materials can be bent if the surrounding matrix prevents it from cracking by forcing it together. It's not something we can do on the surface in the open air, because we don't have the equipment to do to this rock what we do have the equipment to do to metal pipe.
Even so, it's pretty incredible.
Thanks!