Dive School - Days 1 and 2

Day One:
This involved reading chapters 1-3 of the manual and watching the corresponding sections on the CD. Each chapter was followed by a knowledge review (open book). Anything you get wrong on the knowledge review was explained in detail by the instructor. After the knowledge review came a short exam, multiple choice. Then we also watched the sections on the CD for the remaining 2 chapters.

Day 2:
First I finished the knowledge review and exams for chapters 4 and 5. After that it was to the pool for confined water dives 1 and 2. Then lunch and confined water dives 3 and 4. Confined water means in the pool.
At this point I've learned all the things I need to know, the next 2 days will be diving in the ocean, and repeating/practicing these same skills.
Some of the skills include: Assembling your gear (attaching the tank, regulator, etc.), putting the gear on in and out of the water, removing your gear and putting it back on in the water, removing gear and putting it back on at the bottom of the pool, clearing water from the regulator and mask, swimming without a mask, removing your mask underwater and putting it back on again, learning what it feels like to run out of air (the instructor closes the air valve on your tank), signaling to your dive buddy that you are out of air and sharing his/her air (each unit has a primary regulator and an alternate regulator, so to share air the second person simply uses the alternate regulator), maintaining a specific height in the water (you go up and down as you breath, but with a time delay - breath in and a couple seconds later you start to rise, by then you want to be breathing out again so you stay level.... etc.). I've missed a few - I think there are a total of 24 specific skills, but I can't list them all yet.

During the theory section (yesterday and this morning), you learn a whole bunch of stuff, the key thing is the dive table. This is a table where you look up the depth you want to dive to and it lets you know the max. time at that depth. Also allows you to calculate multiple dives. The whole purpose of the dive table is that by staying within the limits for depth/time given by the table, you never require decompression stops. You can always go right up to the surface without any significant risk of decompression sickness (bends). After this course I will be allowed to dive to 18 meters, but the PADI system lets you dive down to a max. of 40 meters. The whole thing is laid out so you are never, ever at a risk of decompression sickness (assuming you always follow the rules, which you do).

The instructor was duly impressed that I aced all the chapter multiple choice exams as well as the final 50 question multiple choice exam. Apparently not many people do, but I read the book mostly the day before watching the CD material, which really helps.

Tomorrow is the first "real" diving in the ocean - I think we go to a reef tomorrow, and to a shipwreck the day after. Hopefully I can get a camera... I do know we will do 2 dives in the morning, one after the other and that will be it for the day.

On a different note, I decided to splurge and rent a room here at the dive center for 3 days. About $36/night, as opposed to about $18/night where I was before. But in the room I was in before, some of the bug screens had come loose so I was getting bites all over at night. Not really what I want in a country which does have malaria, even though very little. So I'm looking forward to restful, hopefully bug-free sleep tomorrow. Of course it could also have been fleas biting me. Either way, hopefully nobody will feast on my blood tonight.

The cost of things here is interesting. Anything imported, such as chocolate or bottled water, is about the same as in Canada or Australia (in the same range, maybe a bit more or less). Local items (renting a room, and food in particular) is much cheaper. A good meal in a restaurant is usually around 5-10 dollars. It is possible to get homestay rooms as low as USD 10/night, or USD 120/month. This is without air conditioning (which I don't want anyway - I like it hot), and without hot water (cold showers are not so bad, cold water here is not as cold as in Nova Scotia). So if I was here for longer, I could have a place to sleep for USD 120/month, and I could eat quite nicely for around USD 10/day. And this is probably not the cheapest place in Indonesia, being a somewhat tourist-heavy area.

My instructor told of an interesting local custom. Once a year (next month I believe) they have a national (or maybe only Bali) "quiet day". For 24 hours, you are not allowed to leave your house, or have bright lights (candles only) or otherwise be loud. This includes tourists. The only people allowed outside are police and security people, who will make you go back inside if they catch you roaming. Everything is closed but the hospitals and police stations. Of course if you are sick you can ask to be taken to the hospital, and if you have a baby you can have electric lights but not too bright. The next day everything returns to normal. Certainly a neat idea - at least you have one day a year for introspection...