Safari Sam's Adventures

So there is one thing i forgot to mention to you guys that you might find amusing!

There was another Jelly attack… not quite as bad as the one i had in Cairns Australia, since there are no scars… but it was pretty painful!

Alright so I was helping Welson with a Junior Open Water course, and i was getting in the water with Harriet, and i wasnt wearing a wet suit.. only my rash guard… boy was that a mistake… Jellyfish can still get in to your rash guard.

Now i didnt want to freak out and scare Harriet, since she was only 11 years old.. so i had to act calm and collected (since jelly fish are the scariest thing in the ocean to me), although.. looking back she must have though i had issues or something.

The Jelly was stuck in my rash guard. i had all my scuba on and i couldnt flush out my shirt, and it was stuck… I am not even sure how i managed to get it out in the end, but i know at one point in between all my bouncing around and faning out my top with water it was stuck between my boobs… I know this for a fact because i came out with jelly stinger marks all over my cleavage.. It was just a disaster!

Anyways.. the marks are gone now! (thankgoodness) And Harriet is all done her junior open water course. I dont know if i mentioned about her before, but she is just the smartest little girl! From Hong Kong, and at 11 already knows she wants to be a surgeon! She can speak fluently, write and understand perfectly 4 languages, and she can have a decent conversation in another 3 languages. IMPRESSIVE!

Alright.. so all that was quite some time ago..

Now i am in my IDC Instructor Development Course (almost finished it)

I kind of told  you a little bit about what goes on in an IDC when I sat through portions of Matt and Kylas. Now i really know what they were talking about when they said they were tired!

To start off with we had an orientation, just like an hour and a half talking about what we are going to be doing in the course and how its going to be done… blah blah blah… The next day was the day we actually started stuff, so i will start from there!

Day 1: We all got to the marina where we were waiting for the boat to be ready to take us back.. when what did we hear over the radio? WHALESHARKSSSSSS!!!!!!!

OMG YES WHALESHARKSSSS!!!!!

When i heard it, i was rushing everyone onto the boat “WHALESHARKS WHALESHARKS”… no one believed me.. they just thought it was me “having a feeling” again. I did have a feeling..

So we got to the dive center, and Richard let us alter the schedule a little bit… I was so happy i just about cried. I dont think i have seen people get their dive equipment all together and set up so quickly in my life! IDC candidates got their own boat, since Richard wanted to bring in his camera and not have to worry about anyone having an issue. Which was so nice, even though we were not on the boat for very long.

Our entry off the boat, as always, is back roll entry, and as soon as my face was in the water… Mr. Whaleshark was RIGHT FRICKIN THERE! I had a little congestion, so i could not get down very far, but 2 meters was enough (except for the photo i was half cut out of).

»The photo i got cut out of kuz my congestion was so bad«

The Whaleshark was feeding so its massive mouth was open and faced towards me. I was mesmerized. I think at one point i even held my breath a little (oops, number one rule in scuba is “never hold your breath”)

It started to come towards me and turned its whole body so i got a good view of the 10meters or so. It then turned again and i swear the tail fin was a foot away from my face… i thought it was going to hit me. I couldnt move though.. i was so amazed by this creature. So graceful even for its size. And as I soon found out… so good with maneuvering. The water force from the tail actually made me move in the water. It pushed me back and it felt like i was dizzy at first.. and i though i was getting vertigo from my congestion… but soon realized it was from the tail. So crazy… and so cool!!!
We did see another one, just for a second though, it was a small one, maybe 4meters looking for some more crill to eat.
»Lynn with the whale shark«

»WHALESHARK in crill«

So that was the beginning of our IDC ! Best course introduction EVER!

Okay so first thing… well i should say SECOND thing on our schedule for IDC was a Skill Demonstration Workshop. There are 20 skills you have to perform to demonstration quality. Each skill is marked out of 5, and you have to get a total of 68 points with no score below a 3. We all did quite well on this.. i am not sure what my actual score on it was though. We then moved on to do our 800meter swim that made me feel like i was going to die, since i had mad congestion!!! .After that we did Rescue skill exercise 7 workshop. This is the same rescue skill you do for Rescue Course, Divemaster, IDC, and the IE (Instructor Examination) where you deliver effective rescue breaths to an unresponsive diver at the surface, while removing both yours and the victims equipment, and towing them to safety, with both mouth to mouth and mouth to pocket mask.  

All that took up pretty much the whole day, but we went to the office afterwards for a presentation on the Open Water Course.

We have a LOT of presentation in the IDC about all the courses, and standards and such… so we had a lot of realy LONG days in the classroom that just made you feel brain dead afterwards. On the brightside, you do learn a lot!

As well as listening to presentations, we also learn how to effectively give presentations, on a lot of different topics one would learn throughout their scubadiving career. Anything from AWARE Reef Conservation to the Physics of Diving. We learn to use teaching aids and promote equipment and continuing education as well.

»My presentation on where the correct place is to put your alternate air source. I threw in a Canadian accent joke in there “Nice BCD Eh?” for James, since he thinks some of the words i say are hilarious (about, out, mask, cant.. there are so many), but he wasnt even there to hear it. So sad.«

I think the hardest part of the presenting (besides the public speaking bit) is making up a contact to bring grab every ones attention and connect ti to your topic you are going to speak about. My favorite one i made was actually tied into the topic of rescue breathing. 

“Remember when you were living at your parents house and you still had a curfew? Did anyone ever come home after curfew?
I know i did a few times.
When i would come back home i would be listening for noises or footsteps, anything that would tell me that dad was still awake. I never could hear him, but i always knew he would be waiting there for me in the dark until i turned the lights on” (this story may be slightly (a lot) modified, as i never really did have a strict curfew.)
“this is just the same as if you found an unresponsive diver—even if you can not hear the heartbeat, it doesnt mean it is not there!!!”
»”Now please turn to page….” O boy do i love physics presentations I think this one was on air consumption at depth.«

Random Assignment story…
James aka Elvis (im not sure why he is called Elvis) was giving me an assignment, and showing me where to find the question my assignment was on, and he told me to go to the Project AWARE site, but instead of putting “Project AWARE” in the address bar i just put “AWARE” It came up with an “Arming Women Against Rape & Endangerment” site… so if you are interested….. It was pretty funny at the time though, maybe kuz we are all a little over tired, or just kuz we were expecting coral reef conservation instead haha.

Another kind of presenting we do is in the water. We have confined water teaching presentations, as well as open water teaching presentations. The difference is in confined water you demonstrate the skills before you get your students to do them and in open water (5 meters or deeper) you dont.

What happens in these are with the 5 IDC candidates we have one instructor that is presenting the skill, you have a certified assistant (CA) and three students. Basically its role play, and Richard assigns problems that the instructor is supposed to be able to pick up on. So we stay in the water until our tanks are pretty much empty of air, and do skills skills skills.
»me demonstrating “Neutral buoyancy—Oral Inflation” «

»Paul=Instructor, Lynn+Me=Students performing “buddy breathing” We look like we are on a mission!!«
»Hover«

So more or less that is what we do on IDC, with lots and lots of added homework assignments, and lot sof study for the 6 exams we write as well.

Tomorrow we have an adventure dive (i think search and recovery), one more confined skills workshop, and another se tof exams for us, just to make sure we are all ready for our IE (Instructor Examination) then we are all done our IDC.

I believe our IE is on February 15th, and durring an IE, we have one day of classroom presentations and exams, and then the next day is all in water activities. The Rescue scenario 7, confined open water and open water work shop, and i believe a skills demonstration work shop. Its going to be a long two days… i hope i survive… fingers crossed for me!! :) :)

I think i forgot to mention this funny dive that happened…

So coral garden is one of my favorite dive sites. It usually one of the ones we go to for the last dive of the day since it is one of the more shallow dives.

At the deepest point (14m) there is a homemade reef of tires. Where you can find cleaner shrimp and other fun things like marble ray and stone fish.

Anyways, if you stick you hand on the tires, the cleaner shrimp will come and pick all the dead skin off your fingers.. free manicure„, or if you take off your fins pedicure. Awesome!

Okay so all the funnest and funniest things happen at coral garden, usually around the tires. This is kuz there is so much sand around there is no worries of damaging any corals.

ANYWAYS, Sara was a little nervous to sick her hand in the tires, so when i led our dive down there i convinced her to put her hand in.. she was a little hesitant at first, but eventually she put her hand down…. as soon as she did, this fish got spooked and darted out at her head. We both screemed… it was so funny… needless to say she didnt stick her hand back in there after that.

Another good hand story is when Kyla was waiting for the shrimp to come to her fingers, she didnt notice the hungry crab hiding just over the bend of the tire. It creeped up with the shrimp when kyla wasnt paying attention and gave her a little snip… it freaked her out a little bit thats for sure. It almost reminds me of cartoons that you see when the crabs use their pincher and cling on to someones nose! hahahaha

Also, at coral garden ( and a lot of other dive sites all over the world) There are a lot of damsel fish. They can be very territorial, its pretty funny kuz they are so small and common you dont usually take notice to them. The fame day at Saras incident down at the tires was the time the damsel fish attacked me. I guess my face was a little too close to his home, and he kept attacking my mask, just slamming its little fishy face right into mine… it freaked me out at first and i kinda jumped  little, but it just ened up being really funny. Even more funny when that same fish followed us for the rest of the dive trying to intimidate me with attacking my mask and fins…. 

Coral Gardens sandy area has another purpose. Exercise. One dive we all decided to take off our fins and go for a run on the bottom in the sand…you would be surprised at how hard it actually is. Its like a super slow motion movie.  When we decided this was to hard… we re made the matrix movie underwater. dodging kicks and punches with bad ass weaving moves all in slow motion…. hahaha… i recommend trying it!

I would like to try to have a race with someone underwater… i need to find a strategy to make me run faster!

Alright so another fun game Sara and I have to do underwater… it doenst matter what dive site we are on, but we have to be diving with Roy. The game is called steel his fins. Basically we find strategic ways to get up close to Roys fins without him noticing, hold his legs and steel his fins off his feet. We have succeded once so far. And i almost drown i was laughing so hard underwater! I wish we had a video! hahaha

Alright, so the last while i have been a busy bee—-an underwater bee? (haha)

I sat through another rescue course. Instructor Paul was teaching this time with Intern Paul and myself as helpers… gaining more experience once more! Our students were Sara and Tiago, who are both two new interns, i dont remember if i have told you about them yet… Sara is from Denmark, and here for 6 months, and Tiago is from Portugal, and here for 6 weeks (he leaves right before me pretty much).

So as the job of the helper, as you already know if you have been following my blog, is that you demonstrate or role play as a “Panicked Diver”  and Instructor Paul does the skill as an example..    …. Intern Paul got to do the first Panicked Diver… he was a little intense. Instructor Paul almost couldnt do the skill it looked like kuz Intern Paul was so crazy! needless to say, i did most of the other panicked diver skills for Instructor Paul to demonstrate.

Sara and Tiago did well in the course though, and once again the ladder lifting was the most interesting to watch the two of them do… even with TimTam being the Victim of 48 kilos.  Sara is just little, short and pretty much no muscle (like myself… with the muscle bit), so it was quite the struggle…

After the Reacue course, i did my EFRI (Emergency First Response Instructor) Course. Kyla and Matt did this one with me as well. Well if you remember from when Katie was here doing her Rescue course, EFR was pretty funny for us. Which is good since it is usually sooo boring. Anyways, we made jokes through the whole bit again (it helps me learn i swear).

In this one we had to practice the skills on the mannequins as an instructor and give presentations as if we were teaching people who didnt know. All in all i think we all did pretty well, except i still have that fear of public speaking(even when it is just a couple people there) and my face just goes so red… i wonder if there is medication for that hahaha.

So it was a day and a half course, so we did our exam before lunch on the second day, and treated ourselves with a fun dive to finish off the day. Matt brought his Camera, and we took some pretty awesome underwater photos. We went to a new reef that none of us had been to before (ribbon reef i think it was called), which was super nice for a change. Although Coral garden (a reef that we usually always go to for our last dive is one of my favorites)

When we got back from our dive James had marked our exams, and we all passed… ITS OFFICIAL.. We are now EFR INSTRUCTORS! I passed with 86%… and as dad said, i could have done better… but the instructor manual says that its not looking for perfection, as long as you try! hahaha (It may have another meaning in that besides the exam… but shhhhhhh)

After the ERFI course we had a couple free days to do what we liked since it was Matt and Kylas last couple days. We did lots of fun diving, and took some sweet photos on Matt and Kylas bad ass camera!

Other than the stuff on the Island there was some nights out… two to be exact!!

First night, i stayed out WAY too late.. in fact, i almost didnt go to the island kuz i was so tired.. but i had to since it was Matt and Kylas very last day! We started out at this little out door resaurant pub type thing.. it wasnt anything fancy… but i got my brain picked about what it was like to be orang putti (im not sure how i actually spell it but it means white person) and from another country. All the guys want to come to Canada now.. i told them they better start saving a lot of money! After that we decided to put a little action into out night at a karaoke bar. I didnt sing with the microphone, but i did hum along…. it was for the good for everyones ears. I think it is a fact that EVERY asian person is a good singer! After we got bored there..or it was closing, i wasnt sure what was going on.. but the guys still wanted to drink. so we went to a Corner store… yup.. a corner store.. and they set out a table for us, and we ordered the beers they sold in their shop. It was really interesting sitting there.. I saw my very first group of pondan (lady boys) working the street.. I thought they were women for sure.. they were so good looking. Not like the pondan that goes to ranchmans on occasion! hahahaha

So after this night i got in at about 6am, and slept for 45 min before getting up to get my stuff together and head to the island.. I felt delirious and EVERYTHING was funny. I took a nap in the hammock for about half and hour and felt a little better after that.

The second night we went out it was celebration of Matt and Kyla finishing their Divemaster and Instructor Development Course. It was INSANE! First we went out to this CUTE little restaurant called El Centro, its western food, and they have the best burger i have ever had in my life there. It came with salad and fries… just writing about it now is making me drool! hahaha I gota coffee with my meal so i wouldnt fall asleep at the table.. or afterwards when we met the others for drinks at the BB Cafe. Which is also a karaoke bar. These things are seriously everywhere, kuz as i said before every asian loves to sing, and they are so good at it. So we bought some buckets of beer, which made kyla want to dance… and dance she did!!! So much so that we ended  up at the nightclub called “Bed” (which is probably where i wanted to go at this point hahaha). It was ladies night so i drank a whole bunch of fruity drinks for free… they just tasted like juice.. i didnt think they had alcohol in them… They did. I saw some more lady boys.. i couldnt tell they were pndan though…. i just thought they were girls… they are so so so ooo convincing here!

Anyways, not long after that we just went home and went to bed. It was a really fun night… but i most definitely can not do that all the time!

After Matt and Kyla were gone, i was teamed up with Sara and Tiago to do a few skills to work up dives and experience in the morning, and then we would get a fun dive in the afternoon.

So we worked on our time management, as well as practicing skills and logging dives. There were skills with navigation, fish identification, lift bags, and a few others that i can not think of on the top of my head.

On an off the island note. i went to another movie. This time it was journey 2. It was pretty funny, i got a few laughs out of it. but boy was i tired afterwards.. i dont think i went to bed till midnight. totally worth it though. Its nice to have a life outside of diving as well.

Speaking of things that do not concern diving.. Chinese new year happened. Gong Xi Fa Cia. It goes on for like 5 days, and there are little fireworks every night, but on the last night (23 of Jan) there is a big firework display. And i got to watch it! We went up to the lookout point of Kota Kinabalu and waited for the show to start. Sadly when it did… the trees were too high and we could only see the really big ones. We then drove to a little community to watch them. They were soo good! It went on for probably a little over an hour, and they were coming form every direction.. in front, behind, both sides.. it was amazing! Unfortunately i did not get any photos of the fireworks since my camera died… Olympus sucks butt! I did get one photo of the city though before it bit the dust.

Back to diving.

I was helping out with a junior open water course with one girl, Harriet. She is from Hong Kong, and probably one of the smartest little girls i know. She can speak 4 languages fluently, and another three she could carry a simple conversation with. I was so impressed, and a little embarrassed when she asked how many languages i speak… um… one… sort of.

Anyways, she did her open water course, and her dad came to the island every day with her. It was so nice. And she did so well. She can only go down to 12 metres and she has to be with a parent guardian or instructor until she is 12, when the depth changes to 18 meters, like a regular open water student. She still has to have someone with her though. I was so happy to see that she was all finished though! She was really proud of herself as well. 

YAY!!!

I am having a day off today so i can catch up on studying, do my laundry, write my blog, sleep in and relax.. i already failed on sleeping in… i woke up at 6:50 am this morning.. 10 minutes before i usually wake up… whats up with that. Obviously i was Really excited about my cereal haha.

So the last few days i have been sitting in on the IDC (instructor development course) course that Kyla and Matt are doing. I am mostly just doing the in water activities with them. So basically what this consists of is role play. Where Kyla and Matt alternate being instructors and me and this one guy (Paul), who is also doing an internship for Divemaster and IDC (im not a big fan.. but ill get to that) role play as students. Richard (the course director) tells us what mistakes to make and Kyla and Matt have to stop and correct the problem. It can be pretty funny sometimes, but i think it is super stressful for Kyla and Matt.

So one of the day i was working with Matt and Kyla in their IDC, we did a rescue scenario from the rescue diver course that we also have to do with DMT (divemaster training), IDC, and IE (instructor examination). Anyways.. Matt and Kyla were partners (they are married afterall) and Paul and I were partners. The scenario is basically you have one unresponsive diver at the surface and you practice what you would do in the event that would happen. Step one: approach the diver and check to see if they are breathing. Step Two:give rescue breaths every 5 seconds while taking off scuba equipment and towing diver to the exit point. Step Three Exit and give CPR… We didnt do the third part in this scenario training (thankgoodness)

Alright so Paul… O my goodness.. I thoughIt i was going to be an unconscious diver when he was “rescuing me”. I am pretty sure he forgot EVERYTHING he learned in his rescue course. I swear he was going to drown me, and everytime i would start to sink in the water he would grab for ANY part of my body he could and yank on me to stay up. I am surprised i dont have hand print bruises on my arms… or my boobs… he figured that was a good place to grab to pull out of the water… It wasnt a good place… i freaked out. I said i felt violated after that scenario, and he claimed not to know what i was talking about…

Later we were doing another rescue skill for the IDC, and i had to be Pauls buddy again… i was violated yet again… the skill was how to surface an unresponsive diver from underwater… and you are supposed to hang onto the regulator in the mouth and open the airway and the other hand holds onto the deflater hose on your BCD (buoyancy control device)… apparently Paul thought my boob was the deflator hose on  my BCD… it wasnt… I tried to move his hand away… but he put it right back there… and claimed he didnt know it was my boob he was grabbing… Now lets be serious here for a moment HOW CAN YOU NOT TELL?!

So enough about Paul.. Until i need to vent about him again… like how he almost drown me (again) doing a buddy breathing skill.. hahaha ANYWAYS…

Its really good for me to learn sitting through Kyla and Matts IDC…. so i kinda know whats coming for me in February :s …

There is this one skill in your open water course where you have to know how to remove and replace your weight belt underwater. Kyla was the instructor for this one, and I was her student. We are both SUPER floaty if we do not have our weights on…. and my “problem” that richard told me to do was when i take my weights off just drop them..so i did… it was ridiculous. i just started floating up, and kyla tried to stop me and she was floating up… disaster in the making… every one of her limbs were around me trying to get me down… i wouldnt budge! so eventually when she brought the weights back up to me so i could sink, i had to redo the skill.. I dropped the weights again, but kyla caught them and me before i could float again. so you see… we learn to problem solve..

So other than sitting in on the IDC course, i did a little Project Aware Activity!! the first illegal fishing net was found on Rons Reef, and I went with some of the Downbelow staff to cut it out of the coral, roll it up, and take it out of the water. It took about an hour in the water, and we all smelled a little fishy afterwards. It was worth it though. Such a neat experience..

http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.2664625168876.2119322.1053412016&type=1

there are some more photos that are on facebook of the net removal! :) :)

(all the photos are copyright)

One more story i forgot to tell you about… I had the MOST embarrassing story EVER! …. well ever for most people… for me… it was just another embarrassing moment to add to the millions. I WALKED INTO A POLE! yup… i really did.. and it was in front of a whole bus of people…

No one except apparently my parents on occasion.. haha (Thanks)

So that’s why i have been kind of neglecting it… ANYWAYS, i just wanted to let you know that i am alive and well still. I actually like it over here now.. its not as bad as i though haha

So point form on whats been happening..

—SOMEONE PASSED OUT IN THE WATER!

Kyla, (if you remember me mentioning her before… doing her DMT and IDC with her hubby Matt) was doing one of her skills for her DMT which is free diving (i never had to do this one when i did Divemaster !!!) and when she came up she had a shallow water blackout.. and passed out face first in the water and started to convulse… SCARY SHIT! She is alright now, but i dont think she is going to be teaching the skin diving course any time soon!

This was still the time when Katie was doing her Rescue course, and she wasnt even around to save her…

—The Downbelow dive shop has three kitties they addopted, and they stay in the dive shop. When we went there to get Katie’s mask and Dive computer i played with them for forever.. and i think i must have tasted good kuz one kept licking me.. the point is… I LOVE KITTIES

—I think i embarassed Tim-Tam again.. or maybe just myself.. One day when i was walking down the street, two guys in a row made the signal at me where you tap your two pointer fingers together like “buddy team” in scubadiving and said something in malay to me.. i didnt know what they said.. so i thought it would be funny to ask Tim what it meant… I think this time i got more embarrassed than him… he said it means they probably “wanted to get to know me better” hahahaha

—I ate my first totally fresh squid… it was like biology class where i had to disect my own food again! haha it was so weird… not to bad tasting, but there was a real gooey bit on the inside that … well.. not my thing haha

—Mangosteen is a very interesting fruit… but really yummy! It has a bit of a grape texture on the inside!

—For my christmas present, i payed 85 ringgit for a massage, foot refexology, and leg massage and a pedicure.. it took about 2.5 hours.. and it was fabulous… 85 Ringgit is about $27 CAN… ya… cant complain about that! My full body massage (1 hour) was what they call a Thai massage, and she litterally knelt on my but and put me in some sort of pretzel shape… and cracked every bone in my body.. it was intense!

—With my course, i have just joined in on things like open water, adventure, discover scuba, and snorkling tours.. One of the days Matt Kyla and i just went in the bay ourselves to practice our skill circuit, and while we were going it a mama and a baby puffer fish came to join us and hang out! It was so sweet, the mama puffer though my pinky finger was food though and tried to suck on it hahaha and the baby really liked to just hang out beside my leg. We also found a fish that lived in a can… it was half burried in the sand with a hole in it and some fish made it its home haha

— For christmas lunch on the island, Welson stole my plate after i dished up form the buffet, and brought me back some bbq turkey! IT WAS SO DELICIOUS !

—There was a guy named David that had done his open water course a bit ago in Phi Phi island in thailand… well… from my opinion.. i dont know how he actually passed his open water course… when he was under water he looked like he should be in discover scubadiving program.. which is most people first time EVER under water… anyways.. he was ridiculous.. and numerous times i got kicked in the head by him… or he would come crashing down on top of me..ugh.. he was horrible in the water..

—Things ive seen for the first time (i didnt have my camera with me though :( Wahh…)
CUTTLEFISH AND A SEAHORSE!!!!!! The Cuttlefish, Richard was playing with it with his fingers, and it was grabbing on to them.. SO COOL… and the sea horse was so adorable, it looked a little shy when it swam… so cute!

—Also.. IT IS THE BEGINNING OF WHALE SHARK SEASON! I AM SO FRIGGIN EXCITED !!!
There have been two sightings already, but i havent seen either of them.. I am thinking on dive 100 maybe ill see one. Ive heard that dive 100 is supposed to be naked… but i might pass on that one, 1. kuz that would be totally awkward staying with all the guys for so long afterwards… 2. in 27° water… thats gunna be FREEZING! (i know ive turned into such a baby) and 3. I would make the whale sharks blush… hahahaha

but seriously, i am pretty sure some guys just told me that kuz he was a creep…..

—I took my camera on a couple fun dives recently, and got a few photos of the underwater world in Sabah.. They are on facebook… if you want to see more i could send you a link…

I think thats is all i really have to say about my stay here so far.. ill write more again when something interesting happens :)

»Day 6«

Tim-Tam was our instructor for the EFR course. Katie Kyla Matthew and I all did it, and James the manager of Downbelow said that he had never heard ANYONE having so much fun with this course. I think it may have been a litle bit of us all being a tad over tired… Poor Tim-Tam had to deal with us through that.

Alright, so i am going to start with Chest compressions… Matthew had the stongest body force for all of our CPR dummies.. he didnt even have to put his body into it, where as Us girls and Tim (since he is only 48 kilo) had to put our whole body into it (Katie looked like she ws trying to dance while she did it.. it was pretty cute. Matts chest compression got a baby looked like it would pop a lung, and we agreed that the baby saving should be left to Kyla when it came to the two of them! haha

Learning Secondary Care, Katie and I got real personal again giving the body a check for injury. There is one bit where you have to look for deformities on the chest… as soon as Tim-Tam said that we all burst into laughter (since Kyla and I, who both have 2 very large abnormalities were the ones being examined)! We then asked Tim to show us what he meant, we succeeded in making him embarrassed that time i think! As we moved down the body in our secondary assessment, we found out that Matt could not find Kylas hip bones… this is not right since they are married i think Matt should be able to find those! hahaha

As an emergency first responder at an accident scene, you have to verbally let someone know who you are and that you have EFR training by saying “Hello, my name is Samantha, i am an Emergency First Responder, can i help you?”. So in our scenarios we did at the end there was one where your gramma is in the kitchen, and you find her slumped over not responsive, but still breathing… We all had a little laugh at this because when we had to act it out it went a little something like this.. “Hello, Gramma? Gramma? Are you alright? My name is Samantha, I am an Emergency First Responder, can i help you?” Where as in reality.. if i saw my gramma slumped over, i am sure i would just help her and she wouldnt mind at all!!

I found out i am a PRO at bandaging, perfect techniques, and pressure! Watch out sprained ankles… you’ve got nuthin on me!

We wrote out EFR exam, Primary, Secondary, and Child Care, and we all crossed out fingers that our fun learning day was all soaked in!

Back on land, I made my way to Katies.. but on the way there i was approached a couple of times about a minute after eachother by guys walking down the street. They used a hand signal where you tap your two pointer fingers together and said something in Malaysian… I wasnt sure what it meant, but i asked Tim and he said they probably wanted to “get to know me better” This time i got embarrassed!

For dinner this night Katie and i went for Hungarian food. The restaurant is called Chilli Vanilla, and it is right next to my accommodation. The food was phenomenal! We ordered to share so we could try a little of everything. We got fried Cambert (its like a cheese close to bree but a little more mild), goulash, and these meatballs that were called something like fitzbelle. Everything was so delicious, and we were stuffed to the brim afterwards.. it didnt matter though kuz it tasted so good! This place was a little more expensive, but still cheap compared to Canada or Australia.. it was about 30 ringgit, so like $10 CAN!

»Day 5«

So today is the day we finish up everything in the Rescue course except one more scenario that we will have to do after our EFR training..

Katie learned how to do search patterns and how to set up an oxygen tank from and emergency oxygen unit.
With the search patterns we were supposed to do the patterns until we found whatever Tim-Tam hid from us.. but for some reason it was always so easy to find it. We maybe took 2 corners in our patten both times and found the “missing diver” right away!

After the search patterns and practice both Katie and i learned for the first time how to do a shore exit. I never learned when i did my divemaster because i was on a liveaboard boat, and there was no shore to exit anyone on to..The shore at Downbelow’s dive centre is really long and really shallow for Tim-Tam just let us get to almost the end and then practice a packstrap/firemans carry out of the water (i got stung by another Jelly on the way there on my leg.. this one was box Jelly, and thankfully it didnt react as much as the blue bottle did last year)…  Tims demonstration was a disaster kuz as he kept telling Katie and i “I am only 48 Kilo” and well Katie and I are a tad bit more than that! Even for Katie and i to life Tim-Tam up into that carry was hard. When you are crouched down so low and then have to use all your strength in your thighs to life an entire person (even if they are only 48 kilo..) it is just really difficult… we managed though after a little struggle!

Another exit both Katie and i learned was the ladder exit… for this one Tim-Tam had to get a volunteer to help with the example.. It was one of the boys that Katie and i hadnt really met before… so we got real personal real fast with him. What you have to do is sit the person on the ladder and put their arms around your neck and kind of slump them there meanwhile your leg goes between theirs (i feel bad for the guys) and you pull them real close while you make your way up the ladder with your body weight and theirs. Tim-Tam looked like he had no problem with the excellent volunteer, but Katie and I struggled for sure!

After our lessons for the day, back on land, i went out for dinner with Katie again and we got street food (my first time). We first started off with fried bananas.. We got 10 for 1 ringgit which is like 30cents CAN..They are the little small bananas, and they are fried in a sort of pancake batter. They are so sweet and yummy, i could probably eat them everyday! For our actual meal though we ended up settling on a fish.
When you get a fish here, its not like Canada where they give you a hunk of meat from the fish… this is the whole shabang!! You get the whole fish, head, eyes, bones and all!! The type of fish we got was a parrot fish, and we sorta felt back because it is such a pretty looking fish.. and they served it with rice and a chili sauce… that really doesnt look that spicy but man you will burn your whole face off in you take a lot of it. We also got a coconut water.. You can get a whole coconut if you would like, and you can scrape out the meat from it as well if you want. Here you eat with your fingers, but since we are white they offered us cutlery… we used it at fist kuz the fish was still really hot from being on the bbq.. but once it cooled down we did it the Malaysian way!
To wash you had a little tea kettle looking thing that you just poor over your hand and you are good to go.

It started to poor rain so we ended up going through the night market until it let up a little… If you are looking for jewelry here, you better like sparkly.. everything is blingin’.. they also sell knock off Toms which is super cool.. cheap cheap too! We had to go to an actual supermarket after that though, kuz i needed some better sunscreen. My forehead was so burnt it warmed up my whole body with the heat it was radiating!

»Day 4«

Since i am doing an internship and i am staying and basically working with all the guys at Downbelow (( » http://www.divedownbelow.com/ «)) i feel like i should be helping as much as possible. For some reason the guys dont think i can do a lot.. either that or they dont like me doing a lot… i do tend to looks  a little clumsy when i am on land. hahaha

Anyways, i ended up carrying the Anne, Little Junior, and Baby Anne CPR dolls to the boat, and all i have to say is Anne needs to loose some weight. For only being a body with no arms and legs she is one hefty girl… A very flat boob-less girl as we discovered when we were doing out EFR course. ;)

So for the next 3.5 days i will be helping out with the Rescue course that Tim Tam is teaching. A really awesome girl originally from California (now lives in Hong Kong) is taking the course, and ill basically be the person she saves all the time. In other words, we are going to be getting very personal very quickly!

One of the skills you have to do when you are doing a rescue diver course is learning how to calm your dive buddy down when they run out of air and share yours with them. Me being an assistant and all, i help Tim-Tam with the demonstration, and then i do it with Katie as well. Tim-Tam, was telling us the steps above the water and using his second stage octopus as an example on how you will hold it to give to your buddy. When he went down he accidentally just put that one in his mouth, and left his regular second stage just floating behind him…So when he went to give me the octopus when i said i was out of air, he couldnt find it… and it took him about 45 seconds to figure out that it was in his mouth… we all started laughing underwater.. (when you laugh underwater your whole mask fills up with the salt water.. and makes your eyes water… which means he basically made us cry kuz of laughing hahaha). It was pretty funny kuz we all kept forgetting things this day… like i forgot to take of my weights TWICE  after i took off my BCD.. and i couldnt figure out why i was sinking… i was such a moron haha.

There is another skill where you have to remove all your gear and the unconcious divers gear at the surface while pulling them back to the boat, shore, or the jetty…. and basically it says just to drop the gear, and save the persons life… thats for real life… when we are simulating and learning the skill, we want to hang on to our gear, and not drop it to the bottom of the ocean. So Katie is doing wonderfully on her rescue breaths while taking her gear and mine off.. until she finished and we were putting all our gear back on and Tim-Tam goes…”Sam, are you holding onto your own mask?” and i tell him no.. and Katie goes “o… ya.. umm… i think i dropped it…” we all then look down and we cant see the bottom it was so dark…Tim-Tam came to the rescue though, and found a little glimmer of my mask sitting on the bottom. (it was saved)

» The moral of this story is when you get a mask and strap cover for your mask… make sure you geta bright color that everyone can see when you loose it… or loose your diver… haha «

From being on the waters surface all day, with basically just my head showing, and occasionally my arms, i got a pretty bad ass goggle tan/pinkish burn and a watch tan line where my dive computer goes!!

After we got back to the main land, i had to go get a medical with Kyla and Mathew, we all passed. YAY we can dive!!! I wish doctors in Canada were as fast as these ones.. it took them 20 minutes to go through all three of us, and no hour long waits to get in.. it was wonderful. We had to do an eye exam, find out our height and wieght, do a urine sample to find out if we have diabetes, and the actual doctor checked out lungs and ears. IT was so fast it was insane!

I thought o broke my iPod today too, i accidentally put it in the same pocket as my wet bathing suit… BAD CHOICE! I put it in a ziplock bag with a bunch of dry loose leaf tea though and it came back to life 24 hours later! I was a lucky little girl!

Katie and i met for dinner this night, because we were talking about these avocado milkshakes that she found last time she was here, and i wanted one.. BAD… sad to say the place didnt make them anymore, but we got some food there anyways, i got some Nasi kamping (i think) dish (rice and lamb dish) apparently is was lamb.. but i didnt see any haha… and we had apple juice with it.. it was freshly made apple juice.. it tasted like i was eating an apple, but didnt have to chew. IT WAS SO DELICIOUS!

After that we just walked around and went to the food market down by the water where they have all there street food. When i walked by here last week, i was freaked out, kuz i was unsure if it was safe to eat.. but Katie says its usually fine if you see all the malaysians eating there… if its all whites stay clear!

There were these little kids here that had a box of baby chickens and baby ducks, and they were trying to scare us with them by yelling “RAWR” at us and shoving the ducks towards us… the poor little animals looked like they were going to have a heart attack, but the kids were super cute.

We also got some fresh fruit for our morning breakfast.. i got a mango.. and i am not going to lie to you.. it was the BEST mango ive eaten.. BY FAR! I was thinking about having a piece of toast afterwards too, but i wanted the mango to be the last thing i had in my mouth… i needed to taste it as long as i could. BEST. MANGO. EVER.

We also did a little studying Katie and i.. it was a bit modified to what a normal person studies like…. »What is wrong with this photo???« 

Yup.. the stella was like $2 CAN from the corner store next to the Lavender Lodge where Katie stays. :)

Thats all i have time to write about right now.. its bed time for me, but i have lots more to talk about with this rescue course!!

Alright so Day 2 and 3, were just fun diving days again which is nice since i think the visibility has been clearing up a little bit. :)

Day two was extraordinarily HOT and really HUMID! I felt like my skin was going to melt off while i was waiting during the dive briefing, once in the water though it was so beautiful! The water was once again like a bathtub, 29-30 degrees all the way down!

I made a little game for myself on one of the three dives this day.. to see how many nudibranch i could find, since this area is famous for its macro life ‘n’ all. I found 16! !! IN ONE DIVE!! !! I couldnt even believe it. Richard (the owner of Downbelow*) made a really good suggestion for the next time i do one of these fun counting games… “how many different kinds of nudibranch can you find?!” A good way to find them is to find out what they eat.. So that will be something to research soon :)
*(( »»   http://www.divedownbelow.com/   «« ))

On the same dive as i was counting my nudibranch, one of the guys in our group, Darren, went missing for a while kuz the visibility wasnt the greatest and he was fiddling with his camera and not really paying attention at all. It was pretty funny though kuz he keeps talking about how great he is at all these different things, making sound like he should be the best, most perceptive diver of all..  but that wasnt the only time he got lost from the group… He went missing from the group again on the next dive as well. Obviously we found him both times eventually either back on the boat or on the surface.

On the third dive that day we went to a wreck site, although we decided that we would take a look at the piles of tired on the same site as well.. GOOD CHOICE! There are little cleaner shrimp living in the tires, and when you put your hand on top the tire they will come out and clean off all the dead skin on and around your fingers. It is like a mini manicure for free… by shrimp underwater! The feeling was a bit creepy, but at the same time really neat!!

« DAY THREE »

While waiting for the Downbelow bas (how you spell bus in Malaysia.. it is on ALL the busses!) we saw a car accident some big truck smashed into this little tiny car at a light ahead of him. It made the hugest cracking sound and the whole back window shattered and fell out!! It was intense!

Another day of fun diving, I saw a lot of neat things again! Including a monkey swimming in the water by the dive centre…. the monkeys are everywhere (and are around the dive centre all the time), and i just wanna catch them and give them a big ol’ hug!! hahaha

On my dives i saw an array of things, Lion fish are always in abundance it seems, Nudibranch of course, a couple blue spotted lagoon rays and i found a two stone fish hangin out by eachother that the guys with cameras didnt see… boy were they happy when i pointed those out!

After our boat ride back to land, i had to go to the office and pay for a few more things, like the O2 provider course so i can take my instructors in it! I feel like being able to teach people to administer Oxygen is a good skill to have!

I went out with the couple that are doing their Divemaster and Instructor Development Course, a guy from New York, and another German guy that lives in Japan (but absolutely hates it), to this little open restaurant type thing. All the menu was in Indonesian, but it was alright because The lady doing her DM can read it (such an amazing talent!) It was malaysian-indian food. REALLY TASTEY! I got Mee Gorenge Ayan (i think) It was noodles with chicken.. a little spicy, but just enough so there is still some yummy flavor!

So i have moved into my new accomodation now. It is called the Hotel New Nan Xing, its pretty nice, i have to walk up 4 flights of stairs, but its not to bad, as long as i am not carrying my bags with me hahaha.

I have my own bathroom and it even comes with toilet paper… Here are a few photos of the place, including my very noisy view… 

I thought the bus picked me up at 7am… i was wrong… it was 8…. and it was late… so i waited for an hour and a half of precious sleeping time… i can tell you right now… ill never do that again!

So we took the Downbelow (the name of the place i am doing my internship with) bus to the marina where we then proceeded to take a boat to the Island where my internship is being held.

The boat ride over was so green, and so lovely!!

So today, was just fun dives to see the ocean ill be interning in.. and on surface intervals i got to talk with Richard about my course and check out all my books and junk!

the visibility wasnt too great today though, kuz of all the raining that has been happening (someone PLEASE stop doing the rain dance here), but i did see lots of neat things! TONS OF NUDIBRANCHES!!! We saw more than 5 on one dive.. they are just EVERYWHERE. I also got an anemone fish (nemo) to swim into my hand… what a little cutie, and saw a neato stripped black and white sea snake. Saw my first ever in open water scorpion fish, that was neat… ill probably never be able to spot one on my own without knowing where he lives fist hahaha. Anyways, just lots and lots of stuff. 

OMGOSH and GUESS WHAT! THE WATER WAS 30 DEGREES!!!!! It was like a friggin bathtub!!! Just Beautiful!!!

Richard talked to me about what we were going to do with my course, and he said he is going to catch me up on the stuff ive missed in the Divemaster course, since i did mine last year and it has changed slightly… so ill sit through one of those. by sit i mean participate, and watch to see how the teaching is done, as well as make sure i know my exams inside and out!! And then i get to go though an IDC (Instructor Development Course) before i actually do my so i get the feel of it, and then i start my own IDC, and then my IE (Instructor Examination) Where someone from PADI comes to me, and tests me in the water and out of the water and everything i have learned… Then we see if i become and Instructor. :) THEN after that i have my MSDT (Master Scuba Diver Training) where i have to learn specialty courses, and certify students! WOOOHOOOO!!

So ya… that is the jyst of it anyways…