March 05, 2008

Koh Tao (THAILAND)

An Exhausting Day Spent Rescuing Divers in the Water

I spent several hours this morning at the Corner Cafe completing chapters 1-3 before my morning class began. I was still tired from the day before, but with only a few days to complete the long course I didn't want to waste any time. Today's focus would be on skills out on the water, so after two hours of more one-on-one instruction with Brad we caught the 12:20 pm dive boat with the rest of the afternoon's divers.

Accompanying us to help Brad in the training was a guy from California named Steve, and he was basically acting as the test dummy for the afternoon while I saved him from a variety of things that can go wrong underwater, such as dealing with: a panicked diver, someone who runs out of air, an unconscious diver, a non-breathing diver, and so on and so forth. The most important thing was staying calm as Brad and Steve did their best to fluster me - taking my mask off and knocking out my regulator while aggressively attacking me in a panic - so I will be prepared to deal with anything. It really was fantastic training, and even better considering it was a 2 to 1 teacher to student ratio. At the end of the day, I ended up with a variety of bruises and open cuts because much of the surface work involved taking hold of the victim and restraining them, while ensuring they are above the water (and a flailing arm and swinging tank does real damage.)

There really isn't much else to write about as most of the day was spent doing such skills work, but I have no doubt that all of this will prove to be a godsend later in life - both for the diving training and the general life support skills.

Later in the evening I watched the free showing of The Bucket List (featuring Morgan Freeman and Jack Nicholson) at Choppers restaurant, and paid Koh Tao's famous pancake man a visit. He is famous on the island for having some of the quickest cooking skills, but unfortunately my camera ran out of batteries midway through his routine. Video below...

At 2:30 am my internal alarm kicked into gear and I pulled myself together so I could head downtown to watch the Arsenal vs. Milan Champions league tie.