Diving through the depths of the world

I stood hesitant on the border of the boat anchored in Chumpon Pinaccle. A skinny Burman kid with premature cracked skin handed me my rusty goggles, smiled and invitingly showed me the way into the ocean with one hand, as he encouragingly patted my shoulder with the other.
I jumped.
A gradual descend later, my mates and I were diving thirty meters deep surrounded by the infinite mass of the Thai sea. I could only hear the sound of my own exhalations, my struggle to remain alive in an environment not meant for us, my mind fully aware of it.
I think I was decompressing my ears when everything went black. I grabbed my buddy’s arm as rapidly as the sluggish motions underwater would allow me. He pointed into the distance with his finger. I tilted my head back and saw it.
As my heart tried to pound out of my wetsuit, an overpowering whale shark was swimming towards us, its massive dotted pattern body blocking the sun from reaching our confused eyes. Our tanks were full of oxygen, and yet each one of us paradoxically felt completely out of breath. In just one second of long awaited realization, I felt the overestimated weight of humankind lifting off my shoulders.
The shark slowed down its pace when reaching us, its colossal still gentle and inviting presence justifying our submarine adventure and withdrawing any sense of fright or alienation we might have initially felt. During a moment of perfect interspecies mute communication, we understood the importance of each other’s existence. It remained next to our microscopic group for what seemed an eternity that belonged to another dimension and then swam away, lifting our spirits higher than any terrestrial experience ever did.
Inhabitants of Koh Tao then told me that there is a myth on the island that claims you need to rub your nipples repeatedly while diving to encounter a whale shark. While none of us engaged in any nipple rubbing, we learned that you can never find these moments. Once you are in the ocean, they find you.
I eventually flew back to the world of concrete, unable to ever feel immersed in it again, my awakened soul forever swimming freely next to the whale shark.