Under the Water

Dec 4: I did my first open water dive yesterday, descending to 5.5 meters over a coral reef. I and my instructor were down for 45 minutes, and saw a variety of sea life. The time passed so quickly, and we were back on the surface in no time at all. I had to do two Confined Water dives before this, so-called as they are usually done in swimming pools. I of course did them in the ocean, which aside from the somewhat limited visibility and the salty water, is exactly the same as it would have been in a pool. The skills portion involved clearing my mask underwater, emergency breathing from another regulator as well as achieving neutral buoyancy. In all, things have gone well, and I am on track to finish up the Open Water course by Friday. I had a bit of congestion in my sinuses, which hurt a bit, but after ascending and then descending again more slowly, I was able to deal with it. Claire swam slowly about, with her arms folded neatly in front of her, just using her fins to propel herself through the water. It took a while to achieve that ease, and for the first fifteen minutes or so I spent most of my attention on staying level in the water. I had to use my hands to do this, sculling with my right and then my left, and was at some points almost straight up and down in the water with my face to the floor, at other times all the way over on one side or the other. After I cinched up my weight belt – it had slid up onto my stomach when I was upside down – things went much more smoothly, but the comfort that Claire exhibits underwater will be a while in coming.

This morning, yesterday’s congestion caught up with me, and I woke up with a full-on head cold. I slept for another couple of hours after breakfast, and then was feeling back to normal for lunch. Regardless of my condition and whether or not I can dive, there is not enough air in the tanks anyway, so I will write my final exam this afternoon and then do the last few dives on Friday to complete the Open Water certification.

Ifaty, only a five minute walk away from Reef Doctor, was the scene of some seldom-seen Malagasy violence last night. The bar that I went to with everyone on my first night here to see off another volunteer had a fight in it last night. Jose’s, as it is called, is one of two bars in the village, and the word “bar” grossly exaggerates what you might expect. It is a little shack, with about half a dozen rough-hewn tables and chairs, with a thirteen-inch television on one wall showing the same Bob Marley concert over and over. This is the place to be, as the other bar’s only claim to the name is that they serve beer. Anyway, last night, around nine o’clock, there were half-a-dozen gunshots, and this morning at breakfast we learned that a few bottles had been broken over a few heads, and that one Malagasy had been shot in the shoulder. Everyone here is pretty relaxed about it, and I feel safe in my little hut made of reeds. This may be an unreasonable sense of safety, as the walls wouldn’t stop a fist, let alone a bullet, but we have a security guard who walks about all night, which is a good deterrent for anyone looking to come onto the property at night.