Another glorious day, another day to dive. I got up bright and early again and headed down to the dive shop to meet SB my new instructor. After getting kitted up we headed down to the shallows to try confined diving again. Not dissimilar to the day before after sinking the formidal 3 metres below the surface I was being rocked around all over the shop and it was near on impossible to get anything done. SB took the excellent decision to hop on a boat and head to a bay on the neighbouring island. The water here was beautiful and calm and made for perfect conditions to conduct confined. Everything went nice and smoothly until the “out of air” test. The theory behind this is that your instructor turns off your air and you do the out of air sign and take their spare. Then the instructor will turn back on your air and all is back to normal. Unfortunately ours didnt quite go like that… After successfully completing the first section SB turned my air back on and I went back to breathing my own air… breath, breath, no air, no air, still no air, what the F*** give me your air SB!! I dived in for his temporary air and got breathing normally again. Far too realistic for my liking!! An accident by SB (or so he said, personally I think it was a cunning plan to finish me off but still..) he did apologise profusely afterwards for the near “death encounter.” The rest of the morning passed smoothly without incident. SB is great fun to dive with, he used to be a journalist back in the UK and jacked it all in to be a dive instructor full time. I can understand why, the way of life out here is so laid back and cut off from the stresses of the “modern” world.
A quick lunch break with SG who was sitting at our resort restaurant. She claimed to have got pooed on by something utterly repulsive.. There was a dodgy stain on her top which did smell foul. No idea what it was though… On my way up to our room I bumped into the wife of the neighbour who had knocked on our wall the night before… I apologised for waking them up to which she replied “I didn’t hear anything but my husband told me that I wouldn’t want to know what you were talking about..” Oh dear…
After lunch and SG went back to sunbathing whilst I went back to diving. First proper dive.. EEK. I had to do a reverse roll entrance into the sea which turned into a leg getting caught and bumbling my way into the sea. Still I got in and that was the main thing (with a slightly bruised leg as a present..). The feeling of being underwater is amazing and at the same time very strange… Breathing becomes so apparent in a way it never does above water (I guess it’s partly the noise but also partly the fact you have to remember to breath..). It’s really quiet and peaceful too.. Eerily peaceful in fact. The visibility for the dive wasn’t the best but it was an amazing experience none the less. We saw a lot of sea creatures I had never seen including “Nemo” clown fish. The dive went without major incident although I did struggle somewhat with my buoyancy control. SB had to stretch forth with his hand and drag me back down at once point as I drifted off to the surface in a panic! The feeling of powerlessness in that situation was overwhelming and you can understand at those points why you have a buddy to protect and help you – a very reassuring thing.
Back on land and diving was done for the day. For our evening meal we headed to our regular haunt of Mama’s cafe on the beach front with another yummy milkshake mm mm mm. After SG and I walked back to our resort where everyone was clustered in the restaurant/bar area watching bbc world. Turns out that whilst we had been soaking up the sun in the Perhentian islands, London had been closed down due to snow. Laughs all round from the assembled crew and another day in paradise over..
