Koh Tao, 6/13/11
Despite diving 7 times in Australia and Puerto Rico, I'm not actually certified. All of my dives have been "Discover Scuba Dives", basically fully led expeditions where you swim shoulder-to-shoulder with an instructor. (Except somehow I got to go on a night dive with sharks in the Great Barrier Reef, Australia -- a type of dive typically reserved for very advanced divers).
Classes start at 5pm, taught by a leggy, blond, German Cameron Diaz doppleganger named Yvonne Fries ("freeze"), who is endlessly gregarious and loves saying "yeah" after each sentence, but pronounced more like "Yaaaahhhh". Sometimes this is followed with "Awwwwwlllll right class". When diving, her headmask is labeled "The Germanator", which is relevant as she is a drill sergeant under water, providing us with the death stare and finger point any time we perform a skill incorrectly. Despite diving for only seven years, Yvonne has logged over 2,000 dives and has recently lost count. Not a bad resume for someone who just turned 30. I try to woo her with my extensive lexicon of Procter & Gamble acronyms, which took years to learn, but she doesn't seem as impressed.
Yvonne's assistant Chris, has short brown hair that is always turned up to the sky as if just he rolled out of bed. Or got electrocuted. He has a matching brown beard, wears transparent blue Ray-Bans indoors and out, and when he takes them off, looks surprisingly like Charlie Day from "It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia".
In the class, I'm the only yankee among two Brits, a Swiss, and two Germans. One of the initial thing I notice in class is how all the diving equipment is giving odd names: The alternate air regulator is an "octopus" and the inflatable "diver's below" sign is a "safety sausage." We remember our buddy check system of BC - Weight Belt - Air - Regulator - Final Check due to the acronymn "BWARF" which either means "Bangkok Women are Really Fellas" or "Bruce Willis ruins all films".
Following several hours of video instruction, we begin our homework. Being out of school five years, I am certainly not used to performing any work outside a classroom setting, but beers, an open picnic table, and a view of the sunset make the schoolwork more palatable. Plus the whole class is doing it together, which reminds me of middle school, when there is always one runt at the table who just joined to copy everyone's answers and spends most of the study session thinking about how to get into Susie's pants.
Following several hours of video instruction, we begin our homework. Being out of school five years, I am certainly not used to performing any work outside a classroom setting, but beers, an open picnic table, and a view of the sunset make the schoolwork more palatable. Plus the whole class is doing it together, which reminds me of middle school, when there is always one runt at the table who just joined to copy everyone's answers and spends most of the study session thinking about how to get into Susie's pants.
With homework behind us, I join the two British girls for dinner on the beach. I have Massaman Curry, which is velvety, spicy, with a strong taste of coconut milk. Pieces of chicken, potato, and toasted peanuts are mixed throughout. With jasmine rice dumped in, it acts as quite a filling soup and helps make the heat more manageable my bringing my body temperature up.
The night ends with more Chiang Beers, as we lie on beach blankets at the nearby Lotus Bar and watch a trio of adolescent showmen twirl fire poles and fire sticks with furious speed and accuracy, often times walking into the crowd and performing mere feet away from starring eyed tourists.
Tomorrow, we dive.
Tomorrow, we dive.
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