After the gong show of Koh Phangan Kyle Kim and I head over to Koh Tao. Koh Tao was my most favorite place of my trip last time to Thailand. It's a quiet tropical island with tons of restaurants right on the beach. You could literally swim around the island in a whole day which I guess one guy did on a beat a couple or years ago. He stopped a couple of times on the way to eat and get water. Kyle and I decided to do scuba diving at Goodtime Adventures. (Okay this computer is lame as I keep having to double type létters such as ư W, ô o, â a, so I will continue at a later date most likely back in Thailand. So I'm contining because somehow someone somewhere disabled those key strokes so I can type as a normal human being.) I end up having a great instructor named Sarah Wallace. Two students to one teacher made it a goodtime. Accomodations are included all for $300. We end up staying a private air conditioned bungalow. It is very small but cozy. During our time when we werent scuba diving we spend time watching extreme sporting adventures on television. To get our open water certification (SSI) we needed to study some homework. The first day consisted of a half day of studying and Sarah going through safety info, the second half of the day we went out to shore about 100 meters and practiced scuba diving in 3 meters of water. It is such a cool and odd feeling scuba diving. Your mask fogs up, gets water in it and you are breathing through your mouth. You need to be aware of all your surroundings. You have a vest you need to wear that can add air or take air away which increases and decreases your bounancy. On top of that you need to wear a weight belt (the purpose of this is it helps you get to the surface quicker in an emergency. So trying to breath ackwardly, trying to look through googles and looking at a gauge that shows how much air you have etc... It was a huge learning curve at first. On top of this your ears get clogged easily and need to be neutralized frequently. First day we basically practice emergency procedures and learn how to clear out your mask, ask for air if you are low on air and assist one another in need. Needless to stay scuba diving is really safe if you are safe.
At the end of our first day Kyle and I are just exhausted, on top of this we have more homework to do. We decide to do homework and eat a bbq shiskibob. Super amazing food, it even came with fries all for $4. Day two we go over some more safety information and we take our first of four open water dives. What an incredible experience diving is. It is ackward breaking from your mouth, slowly descending and having to be aware of everything. Every dive lasts about 30 minutes but at the end of it, it feels like 5 minutes. It requires to much focus, energy and endurance you feel really tired. It is a great way to get in shape. Our instructor tells us we need to overhydrate to avoid decompression sickness (that's when the nitrogren in your system forms bubbles in your body and can be really bad news, worst case senerio you die). There are no toilets so get what? Every diver in the world pees in the sea/ocean. One of our final tasks is navigating a compass underwater which I fail misterably, Sarah tells us this is normal as it is not easy to get over the learning curve of so many variables.
It feels good to be certified with SSI at some point I want to take my advanced course and maybe continue to do more and more. Maybe one day I will teach as well. The world is our oyster.
