Midterms were...fun...yeah let's hope I don't find myself with 5 exams in a row again, that was just a little bit ridiculous. Anesthesia and path were the worst but it was uphill from there. If such a thing is possible, I studied too much for my exotics exam but I guess hopefully that just means I'm a little bit ahead of the game when it comes to knowing exotic pets and NAVLE questions.
After a long week of exams, I found myself staying up late Friday night to study for SCUBA lessons starting Saturday morning. Most miserable thing I did all week quite honestly! Yeah yeah, it's supposed to be fun, but it is less than fun when you are exhausted and have to stay up late reading, taking quizzes, and watching videos!
Saturday morning started a bit too early. We headed off to the dive shop (Eco Dive Grenada) to begin a new adventure. Our group consisted of my roommate (A), one of our friend's wives (B) (he's already super special certified - i.e. he has a lot of credentials past basic certification!), a 2nd term student who organized the whole thing (C), and myself. We started with some theory (the book for this class is over 200 pages!) and more quiz taking. When that was over, it was time to get suited up for pool lessons! You need a lot yet only a few items for basic diving. A wet suit, a buoyancy control device (basically an adjustable inflatable vest), a weight belt (for sinking), a regulator (to breathe from), and an air tank. It seems like a lot when it's all in bits and pieces, but once you assemble it into one big unit, it doesn't look so overwhelming. You should also have a mask, snorkel, and flippers too.
The first thing we did was assemble all the equipment. I definitely had absolutely no clue what I was doing the first time through. It all feels so clumsy and awkward! Then we had to put it on and waddle to the pool. All that gear is heavy! No as heavy as my backpack can be, but really large on your back, and then there's the weight belt doing what it wants to do - be on the ground embracing gravity!
We climbed into the shallow end of the pool with everything except mask and flippers on. (A) complained that the water was cold, but it felt amazing after sweating in the wet suit and lugging all of the equipment over! It was also a huge relief to alleviate the stress and weight on my back when the tank entered the water! The first thing we did in the water was sink down and sit on the bottom. Easy, right? Yeah, sure, if you're not silly and clumsy like me! It was comical how awful I was in the water! I could not stay up right! Always flopping over and getting stuck - there was much laughing to be done.
We started practicing basic skills such as breathing from our regulators underwater, mask flooding, and quite a few others. The first two listed are clearly the most memorable for me. (A) loved breathing underwater. She thought it was the coolest thing ever and was thrilled at the experience. (B) didn't really have much to say on the matter, but (C) and I both felt really weird about it. It wasn't really an exhilarating or pleasant experience honestly. As it turns out, there are varying degrees of resistance to breathing with each regulator, and (C) and I happened to have ones with a little bit increased resistance and neither of us particularly cared for it. The best way to describe it was there was a short pause between taking a breath and getting the breath, and it took more effort to get the same amount of air normally. Not quite a fan of that. I ended up trading my regulator for a different one in the afternoon after realizing that not all regulators are created equal and was much happier.
The other skill that left quite an impression on me was mask flooding. Here's the deal. I don't like water on my face or in my eyes period. There are no exceptions. Splash water at me and I will freak out and yell at you. Washing my face involves a gentle wet cloth and NO running water directly against my skin. I'm a bit of a freak. I've been this way for as long as I can remember, including a significant portion of my childhood. At some point in time, either something happened or I simply decided that I never wanted to experience the feeling of water in my eyes ever again. It's not so much because it's an unpleasant sensation, it's actually more of a control thing. I want to be able to see at all times and feel in control of myself and my surroundings. Something in my eyes and face presents a distraction and a temporary loss of visual control. I will not put my head underwater without some sort of goggles, and since goggles make me feel cross eyed and I don't like water touching my nose either, it has to be a SCUBA mask. I swam with one as a kid all the time. I can't/won't jump into water unless it is shallow enough that I won't get water in my face - I won't jump into deep water because it carries a risk of the mask slipping off and it just makes me nervous in general.
Now that you've read the above, you can already start to imagine that having to flood the SCUBA mask (let alone the other fun requirements such as taking it off for a minute and taking it off and swimming without it) went over really poorly. It's actually a big part of why I've put off certification for so long. I'm absolutely terrified of having to demonstrate this skill. Anyhow, the way skills work is that the instructor demonstrates above water, then below water, and then asks us to practice while she watches. As soon as she starts talking about it, I start to freak out. Quietly, because I don't like to show that emotion. Next we go under water to do it, and at this point I'm panicking, hyperventilating, and crying. Apparently you can't tell when a person is crying in a mask - cool little known fact for me! I'm sure the terror in my eyes and the quick short jets of bubbles said exactly how I felt though. On top of it all, remember that I wasn't fond of my regulator at this point so in addition to being really upset, I had to work a little bit for the air. Not fun. That will certainly add to the panic.
At the end of the pool session, the instructor held me back to work on the skill more. Learned my lesson then! Do it the first time or else more misery ensues! Enter all of the above listed fun, but I was eventually able to partially flood the mask and clear it. Oh by the way, the importance of this skill is so that when it inevitably happens on a dive (leakage, dropping of mask, total loss of mask) you can handle it and cope/survive. Lets all prey right now this never actually happens to me! I think the biggest surprise I have when I'm working on this skill is that I have to remind myself that I can still breathe. It is not quite the same as being in a pool underwater without the mask, I can still breathe freely and easily (I had exchanged the regulator at this point so it was much better).
We had a quick lunch break and then headed out on a boat with some snorkelers to do our first dive! Our first stop was a beautiful reef in Flamingo Bay where the snorkelers got to wander about while we completed our swimming test. It was beautiful to swim in the water over top this gorgeous reef and I really enjoyed it! Next stop was the sculpture park in Grenada where we suited up, dropped backwards into the water, and were off on a tour! Descending to the bottom for the first time was a really weird feeling. I thought it would be rather uncomfortable and painful (because whenever I dive down while snorkeling it really hurts!), but equalizing was really easy to get the hang of and when you equalize, the pressure doesn't really bother you at all - it's neat! We took a tour of most of the underwater statues, took lots of pictures, and enjoyed the surrounding reef. It was a little bit frustrating to swim about because I haven't mastered being neutrally buoyant yet, but I think when I get the hang of that I will feel much better. All in all a really awesome experience!
Sunday morning was just (A) and I, as the others had commitments for the day and couldn't attend. (A) and I had a different instructor for both the pool and the dive. I wasn't exactly thrilled with this because this is kind of an activity where you really have to trust the person teaching in order to feel safe enough to proceed. I had developed this with the other woman the day before, and so I was anxious about having someone else. She was just as great too, but I'm a spaz, what can I say!
We didn't have much to do in the pool. We had to do the stupid mask skills again, this time doing a full flood, removal for one minute, and removal with swimming. It went over just as well as it had the day before, except I exchanged crying for sobbing. They say sound travels 4x better in water so I'm not sure if the others could hear me or not, but there was plenty of it going on! I had to take my time and certainly didn't like it, but I did it all on the first go. Like I said, learned my lesson! They're not going to let me sneak by without performing it, so I might as well persevere through the first time and not have to repeat the whole sobbing/panicking/hyperventilating bit for longer than I have to. I'm sure I was quite a sight underwater sobbing with my eyes closed miserably!
For our afternoon dive, it was again coupled with snorkelers, but there were more divers of different levels this time. We had a guy doing his first dive, two of my classmates (D) and (E) doing their third dives, and even more of my classmates just logging dives for fun. This time we dove in Flamingo Bay. Unfortunately we didn't get the same free ride we did for the first dive, and we had to demonstrate some of our pool skills in the ocean. It was my lucky day - more full mask flooding for me! Same deal as before - I can sob like a champ in the open ocean too ;) haha. It's a bit of a buzz kill and mood depressant for the rest of the dive for me. I liked it and certainly enjoyed seeing hundreds of beautiful animals and corals, but it was not as fun as it was the day before with the stress hormones circulating. The last thing we had to demonstrate was at the surface, and it involved successfully taking our weight belts off and replacing them, and then doing the same thing with the whole SCUBA unit. As we do this one at a time, the instructor says "try not to drop your belts, we're in 80 ft of water and it would be rather difficult to retrieve them at this point." Thanks, no pressure or anything! The boat pulled up as (A) was finishing her skills. Even though the engines weren't running, the presence of the boat made us suck towards it and it was REALLY annoying when trying to get the belt off and on! It made it so much harder and extremely frustrating. Because of this, I didn't complete taking the unit off and on and we just headed back to the sculpture park for some snorkeling instead.
At the end of the weekend I was completely exhausted. I was both glad and sad to see it come to an end. We still have two more dives to complete before we will be certified and I am really looking forward to them over all. I find myself craving this activity, I want more! I want to spend more time in the water, more time observing beautiful nature, and more time hanging out with some really awesome people. My father is really into fishing and aquarium keeping (salt water), I think maybe my ocean calling might be through SCUBA. Our next dive is scheduled for a week from Friday, and I absolutely cannot wait to push myself a little bit further!
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