littlewoodenman

Never Hold Your Breath Posted 2007.10.23 by Matthew with 6 comments

We’re back on dry land and had a great time learning how to scuba dive in the waters around Utila. We completed our Open Water certification at the Utila Dive Center and can now safely dive up to 18 metres anywhere in the world! Here is a 10-minute video of one of our dives—with music and everything:

Vimeo
Diving in Utila
10:03

This video is not by me. It’s from a DVD shot and produced by Jessica Cirkus (Sea Cirkus Creations). Thanks, Jessica!

This was a different kind of vacation for us—reading textbooks, doing homework, even writing quizzes and final exams! Our instructor, Johan, calls this “the boring stuff”. He never skimped on instruction, but he was all about getting through the two days of theory and getting us into the water.

In between the theory and the open ocean we did what are called “confined water” sessions. This is where we put on all the gear (wetsuit, mask, snorkel, fins, weights, BCD and oxygen tank) and hopped into the pool to demonstrate our skills. There are all kinds of things you need to know how to do underwater in, as Johan says, the “unlikely event” something happens. Once in the pool, we’d first watch Johan do something and then show him we understood by copying him. Monkey see, monkey do.

The skills are pretty fun, actually. There are trivial things like hand signals, clearing water out of your mask, taking your mask off and putting it back on, getting in and out of all your gear while underwater, or throwing your regulator behind you and then retrieving it. Then there are the really important skills like descending, ascending, buoyancy, or sharing oxygen with your buddy when you run out. This last one was a real treat because they deliberately turned off our oxygen so we’d know exactly what the lack of oxygen felt like.

For me, controlling my buoyancy was pretty tricky at first (by the end of the course I was getting the hang of it). You have to learn how to make yourself neutrally buoyant—you neither sink nor float—at which point you then control your depth precisely with just your lungs. Breathe in, and you rise. Breathe out, and you descend. Lung control is a very subtle thing and takes practice. But when perfectly executed, you can hover in one spot indefinitely. Someday, somehow, I will hover and it will be a beautiful thing.

Of course, all of UDC’s instructors made it look really easy. UDC’s policy is to make sure every two students get an assistant instructor underwater. Skill demonstrations go faster and you get more help. On top of that, there were always a couple of instructors-in-training floating in the background for extra assistance. It made for a pretty crowded pool, but everybody appreciated it.

Our assistant instructor was Fernando, and boy, was he good! And I mean good. He’d ask me to demonstrate a skill and then just float there, watching me. He’d always hover cross-legged, seemingly fixed in the water, with his arms folded across his chest while he stroked his beard pensively. He looked so fucking Zen, man. You wish you were that cool.

At some point Johan decided we were ready for the actual ocean, so we hopped on a dive boat for our four “open water” sessions. This was the real deal, folks, and let me tell you, our first dive was a gong show.

Once the group was underwater, hilarity ensued. Some of us sank too quickly, plunking down in the sand at six metres while trying to clear our ears before the pressure crushed our sinuses. Others couldn’t even get down, repeatedly bobbing up to the surface. People were rolling and tilting and kicking their fins and waving their hands like drunk children in the kiddie pool. We put on quite the show that afternoon.

If the first rule of diving is to never hold your breath, then the second rule is to relax. Once everybody kept their wits about them, slowed down and breathed calmly, we did much, much better.

In fact, after each successive dive, we felt more relaxed, confident and in control. By the time I did my fun dives, I was making fewer mistakes (except for that teensy little boo-boo where I accidentally descended to 24 metres!) and having a blast.

Divers are a very social group, and they like to have fun both in and out of the water. Every night the entire class and all the instructors ate dinner together. Johan ended classes each day with the crucial question, “Where are we eating tonight, guys?” It’s a sweet job he’s got, isn’t it?

In addition to the eating there’s the drinking, smoking and partying. One day, we had just gotten back on the boat from a dive and I looked over to see Fernando, still dripping, with a cigarette in his hand, taking apart his gear! I would’ve mentioned something from the textbook about smoking and diving, but Fernando is fucking Zen, so I let him be.

Pretty much the only things to do in Utila are go diving, or hang out after diving and talk about… diving. And the folks at UDC sure know how to have a party. Every Thursday they host a barbecue. The one we went to featured free drinks, fire dancing, and a guy chugging rum and raw eggs through a snorkel. It was a crowd pleaser.

Utila both borders the second largest reef in the world and offers the cheapest scuba diving certification on the planet. That’s a dangerously tempting combination. It’s no wonder so many people extend their stays and get hooked on diving. We, unfortunately, had to return to the real world—in land-locked Olancho. But we’re hooked. Thanks to Johan and the Utila Dive Center. You guys are totally fucking Zen.