Diving school: Living Seas
Instructor: James Lim
Peer: Wang Guangquan
Divemaster: Dag
The whole early stage planning started off pretty simply. A few email exchanges between James and us (GQ&me) settled most of the issues, schedule, payment, reading material pickup, etc. One week before the theory class conducted, we got our very first PADI textbook, attached with a handy blue table. Since then, a series of imagination about the diving course and the coming first experience in deep ocean began.
:: Theory 1 | 15 Sep | Living Seas ::
This was the first time I met James, my diving instructor. He started with a friendly smile, and then very slowly he brought us into the sea of diving knowledge. After suffering so many years in the physics lectures, this was the first time that I could sit back and enjoy listening to teacher's talking. No need to take notes, and no sophisticated thinking. James was rather clear on explaining things, and he could always make pauses to ensure that we had no more doubt before moving on. Time passed faster than I expected. We finished going through 3 chapters of textbook in the first class. There were some exercises to be done after James finished each section, but most of the questions were rather straightforward, and we could answer if we paid attention. In between, GQ and I could not stop asking how this and that would be like on the real diving sites, and from time to time we expressed little fear or excitement. James tried very hard to convince us that, if we fully understand the theory behind, and do things according to proper procedures, nothing dangerous would happen. Well, let's believe him for the moment. He looks like some guy worth trusting.
:: Theory 2 | 17 Sep | Living Seas ::
We spent some time going through the remaining two chapters, and by finishing the last question, this more or less closed the theory part. Followed by that, it was time to try out some real equipment ! Essentially James wanted to find out suitable size of wetsuit, mask, booties, and weight-belt for us, but I wasted lots of time on turing around in front of the mirror. I found myself rather different in this suit. Suddenly I felt that I didn't look like a nerdy physicist any more.
Getting everything ready for the in-water exercise next week. Go ! Go ! Go !
:: Pool Session 1 | 22 Sep | Outram Secondary School ::
The traffic was getting really terrible before the F1. Luckily we got a cab in the crowd of vehicles, and managed our way there on time. James had already been there waiting for us. When we arrived, we saw the pool was filled with diving beginners, from some other schools. They all had dressed up, and carrying colorful tanks, arranged in small circles in water, with their instructor in centre giving them next order. GQ and I rapidly got changed, and heart was still beating firmly when we sit down at the edge of the pool. Not sure if it was because of the rush, or I was getting nervous before a real practical lesson in water. James started with explaining procedures of putting on equipment, eg installing regulator onto the tank, putting on BCD, wearing fins and mask. He reminded us again about BWRAF, and I then realized how my memory could decay in time.
"Hold your mask and weight, right foot step forward". From that moment, my world was separated into two.
We couldn't waste one single minute, and there were quite a few techniques to be learnt in this class. My weakness of not focusing in class showed up again, in the very disturbing environment. Everything I saw and I heard in the pool was attracting my attention, and I couldn't help looking around, like a kid just got into a new city. Despite these, we tried our best to finish each task, and James was getting exceptionally strict this time, but whenever we could finish one exercise beautifully under water, he would clap softly, and shake hands with us. I wanted to give a smile as return, but couldn't do so with the regular in mouth. Divers should invent a hand signal for smile, in addition to "ok?ok!". I slowly got a bit addicted to this silent communication.
By the end of this class, we learnt how to clear mask, remove mask and put back, how to perform buddy sharing, and we also explored a little bit in the pool, to experience how buoyancy was affected by breathing. I was extremely exhausted on the way back home, partly because I skipped lunch and dinner, but mainly due to the 3-hour lasting tense nerve, and irregular breathing. A dim thought about giving up slipped through my brain, but the excitement about exploring a whole new world confirmed me looking forward to the next pool session.
:: Pool Session 2 | 24 Sep | Outram Secondary School ::
A few more challenging tasks were given in this class, but as we were gradually getting used to the water environment, these tasks appeared even simpler to accomplish. However, bearing in mind about the difference in sea water and unpredictable situation in a real dive, I feared that we needed much more practice before setting off for the weekend trip, but time was very limited. By finishing the last task, it was already time to run for a quick shower (mainly running for toilet in fact), and start packing up for Pulau Aur. How would this trip be different from my many others ? We will see the next day.
:: Day 1 | 25 Sep | Night trip From S'pore to M'sia ::
Dag drove us from CQT to the meet up point Riverwalk, where we filled up a few forms, and left with half an hour for dinner. GQ and I walked into a nearby restaurant just across the street, where they sell really tasty Bah Kut Teh. Maybe this indicates a good start of a trip, although we didn't really have time to try the "teh". The pickup point changed from Living Seas to Riverwalk, because we became the minority this time. After some time of waiting, a group of 20 or so appeared, together with their diving equipments. They would be our company for the following two days.
The bus was just half filled, and everyone got enough space so that they could sleep on bus in whatever gesture they liked. Highway, custom, highway, the journey went on as routine. We had a stop at a petrol station, so that people could get some drinks or cigarette; otherwise we slept through the few quiet hours in darkness, until it arrived Mersing.
It was a small jetty, and most of the travelers who were about to take boat at this time of the day were divers. It took us some time to settle down in our boat. I forced myself into sleep, because the next day will be a long day, although I was still quite keen on going out to enjoy a starry sky.
:: Day 2 | 26 Sep | 3 Day Dives ::
* The left most house belong to we four (Dag, James, GQ & me)
We arrived our resort at about 5am, and the few steps from our boat to the guest room somehow became adventurous, because it was almost completely dark ! The electricity generator was not on during those hours, but we didn't bother about it, and we were thankful that we could get another few hours of comfortable sleep on a double bed.
The alarm rang us up when sun rose. I took a quick shower and grabbed some toasts, then went to wait at the platform for a pre-dive briefing. James reminded us one more time about some important issues, to at least get us prepared mentally. The scenery brought a peaceful and relaxing atmosphere, together with the rhythm of breathing the sea wind, but we had to stay alert at the same time, because this would be our very first dive in the sea. Heaven or hell, I couldn't tell yet.
The diving boat brought us to the first diving site, and during the time on boat, we could put on wetsuit, prepare tank, and check all the equipment. James' small bottle of shampoo became popular, and later on it proved that shampoo worked pretty well on preventing fog's formation on mask. When the boat stopped, we thought through again about what to do before jumping into water, what to do in water, and how to descend. So then, Ok. Ready? Go!
------------A partition between our normal world and another undersea kingdom----------
Things went on much smoother than I thought. I struggled a bit on descending in the first 5 meters, afterwards I started approaching a colorful world of coral and fish at a constant speed. We found a clear sandy bottom to land, where we repeated a few exercises which we did in pool, and amazingly successful. We followed James to explore around, and Dag was behind to make sure no one get lost. I couldn't control buoyancy well, and since I was more scared of crashing onto coral, most of the time I was a bit positively buoyant, to watch James pointing funny creatures below me. I found lots of things strangely funny, and I couldn't stop laughing sometimes, which made water run into my mask all the time. It was a complicated feeling. I had to spare my attention to look around and find beautiful things, and also to check gauge and dive computer from time to time. You yourself became fully responsible for any potential trouble, and others could hardly help if bad things happened.
Sound travels faster in water, but I did not expect time passed faster too. We had to get out of water before the tank ran below 50Bar, although we were quite reluctant because we immersed too much into this fantastic world. After the first dive, my intuition told me that I love diving. TG!
The following 2nd and 3rd dives became more and more relaxing, and we got to see big turtles, lobster (or shrimp?) and lots of other cute creatures which I couldn't name. Some fishes were really curious. They stop one foot from you, and stare at you; some were really shy, they run away once they saw you. Communication skill with these friends became one of the techniques we got to master.
After a long day, we finally could have a rest at the resort. The Malay family cooked really great BBQ food for us, which was kind of unbelievable considering the facilities on the island. A group of advanced divers went for a night dive, and while waiting for them, I joined some Singaporean on playing Choh Dai Di. I could never forget the laughters we made that night, with the sound of sea washing the shore as background. I wished, this was not the last time.
:: Day 3 | 27 Sep | 2 Day Dives ::
The 1st dive on next day took place in very early morning, which could be a good way to shake us awake. However, something which I couldn't expect happened. When four of us signaled descent, I straightly deflated my BCD, and descended as usual, but this time the visibility was very bad. There was a few seconds, when I could not see anything, not the coral on bottom, not any fish. When I looked up, I realized all the other three were above me. I then looked at my depth gauge, and it was surprisingly showing 19.8m!! Oh no, I went deeper than I ought to be. I rapidly struggled a bit to stop descending, but for the next second, something even more terrible happened. I couldn't find any buddy any more! No Dag, no James, no GQ, not even a living creature. All what I saw was a thick layer of floating dust in water. I thought I was dead for that second. I tried to calm down and relax, and I turned 180deg around, I saw Dag was behind me. The horror movie ended here.
The lesson I learnt was, always be aware of the situation, and stay calm and alert. This could be a game playing with life.
Alright, enough scaring words. In fact, if we follow all the steps properly, and stay close with buddy all the time, there will not be any danger in principal. Especially diving with one PADI instructor and a dive master, I was sure that I was in safe hands. 100% trust on them.
On the way back to Singapore, I closed my eyes, and screened every scene in mind again. I felt lucky that I did not hate this activity. I was very thankful that friend introduced this whole new world to me, and LivingSeas made my path to it possible.
I wished this could be a non-stop dream.
:: Ending ::
... here.
