PADI Open Water Diver Course

YEAH!!!!

Now comes the REAL Tioman story..wohoo!

On my first day there, I was introduced to my instructor, Kelsey from UK. She was really friendly, and kinda eager and excited to have students. We were only starting the next day, and she told us to be at Eco-Divers around 9am. The course would take 3-4 days, so we had ample time to accommodate.

And so Karyee, Yihou and I made our way to the dive shop for Day 1 of our Open Water course.

A bit on the course contents:

5 video sessions

200m swim test

10min float test

5 confined water sessions

4 open water dives

After filling in the registration and medical review forms, Kelsey decided to let us watch the videos first, get them out of the way. In a way it was good; it gave us a good overview as to what we'd be learning from our manuals. I have to admit, i did get sleepy by the time it was video 2-3...didn't realize diving was quite technical (facepalm)...my physics is very well rusted by now, but nevermind...the course was designed for lay people anyway. Its for recreational diving, not technical/professional stuff. The PADI Open Water Diver course is the first step for the absolute beginner...as long as you can swim a bit and you are in good health. Cost? At Eco-Divers, it was RM1050...inclusive of the manual and equipment rental.

Anyway. Once we were done with the videos, it was around lunch time. We took a break, then came back for some practise on equipment assembly. Dang, that air tank was heavier than i thought! After that, Kelsey gave us the day off, told us to look through the manual and start doing the Knowledge Reviews. Told us that we'll be doing Confined Water 1&2, Open Water Dive 1, and the swim & float tests the next day.

OK, i thought. That night i read through the manual page-by-page, barely finishing Chapter 1 (I had read through the intro from Avni's book the night before)...There were 5 chapters altogether, corresponding to the 5 videos we watched; there are mini quizzes for each subheading along the way and there is a Knowledge Review at the end of each chapter. It is compulsory to finish all the Knowledge Reviews before the end of the course as there will be a few quizzes and a final exam.

Day 2. Time to suit up!

We assembled our scuba equipment : attached the BCD (i.e the vest) to the air tank, connected the regulator (i.e the hoses) and tested everything...put on out wet suits & weight belt (as if i'm not overweight enough, i had to wear 5kg around my waist), put on our scuba unit, grabbed the mask+snorkel and fins and headed to the waters. We did our Confined Water sessions in the shallow waters instead of in the swimming pool like most people. Here learned and practised useful skills that we'd need underwater. Example, clearing  the mask, finding/locating the regulator mouthpiece in case it comes off, controlling buoyancy...a lot of other things that i cant seem to recall for now. Then we headed to deeper waters (around 6-9m) for Open Water Dive 1, where we basically just swam around and got more familiar with our equipment & adjusting buoyancy and equalizing the pressure in our ears as we descend deeper.

It was quite tiring, because we are so conscious with what we're doing....and the walk back up to shore was  particularly painful, coz we had the scuba unit on and you can feel the full weight of it slowly returning as you come out of the water and climb the steps up to the dive centre. we took off our equipment, rinsed everything and went to lunch. After lunch, we were joined by Neil, who is taking his Divemaster course; a part of his requirement was to assist in an Open Water Course. I thought he was rather cool : blonde dreadlocks...tattoos...and a left nipple piercing..hah! first time i've seen one up close.

Back to diving. Neil took us for something extra : Skin Diving. Its basically diving in shallow water with only fins and mask+snorkel. I found that to be scary, coz the water was a few metres deep and i had nothing to keep me afloat. In the end i had to grab onto the float whenever Neil was giving a briefing or demonstrating. Kelsey was there behind us, keeping an eye on everything. After skin diving, we did the swim test and the float test. I thought i could relax when floating but suddenly i heard Karyee and Kelsey calling me back coz i've drifted too far away...huhuhu

After skin diving we went back to the dive centre, put on our scuba unit and headed back into the waters for   Confined Water sessions 3, 4 & 5. Here the skills we did were more for emergency-preparedness. How to share your buddy's air source, how to breathe without a mask, emergency ascending, removing and replacing the weight belts underwater...and the worst of it, BCD removal and replace. This was the time i truly panicked coz i couldnt get it back on. We had to do it both underwater and on the surface. Underwater it was quite manageable, but on the surface with the waves pushing you here n there...well.. eventually i managed to get it back on, and i was exhausted. All 3 of us did this last skill pretty badly so Kelsey said we'll do it again the next day. She also said today was the most tiring day of the course, so we can expect lighter activity the next 2 days. I was so tired by then, i dont know how i managed to do some studying that night.

Day 3. Open Water Dives 2 & 3.

Frankly i didnt wanna get out of bed. Partly coz i was tired, and partly coz i was scared of the BCD remioval & replace that happened the day before. I didnt wanna panic n feel helpless again i the water.

I dragged myself out anyway and walked to the dive centre...put my equipment together and went into the water. We went into deeper water...about 12m and revised some of the skills we learnt the day before...swam around...and i relaxed a bit. We got up, got out of the water, and went for lunch. In the afternoon we had Open Water Dive 3 : our first boat dive. We were taken to Renggis Island nearby, and after gearing up aboard that tiny dive boat, rolled ourselves backward into the water...which was fun. Underwater we practised some skills with Kelsey, and then followed Neil's lead for the dive. This is when diving truly begins. I saw a sloping wall of corals on the side and down below...a puffer fish!....and we found Nemo!! Saw a few anemones and the clown fish that live in them. Some angelfish.... We also saw a big black eel...well, just the head really coz its body was within the reefs. Kinda scary looking. Saw a lone barracuda... and the Neil was trying to point out a black-tipped reef shark, but we all missed it...partly because we couldnt understand what he was signalling. The experience was great; i was reminiscing on my snorkelling trip in Redang a few years back and how it made me wanna go diving. Getting back into the boat was quite a challenge for me...it was hard to find my balance after being underwater. I even got a little seasick. 

That night was mugging time. I started to worry about the exam we were gonna face the next day. I was only at chapter 3! I stopped reading page to page and jumped to the mini quizzes and then do the knowledge reviews. I was halfway through chapter 4 when i decided to call it a night.

Day 4. That morning we were just sitting at Eco-Divers, finishing our knowledge reviews. Then we headed to Pirate Reef for Open Water Dive 4. Again, we practised some skills on the surface, and again on the bottom. Here there are a lot of cement blocks at the bottom...meant to be artificial reefs. Frankly i preferred the sights at Renggis. But anyway...the dive is more relaxing, and this time we went deeper...up to 15m. As Open Water Divers, our maximum depth is 18m.

Back to shore. After lunch, we just chilled at the deck at Eco-Divers, going through the knowlegde reviews with Kelsey while Neil was nicely sleeping on the hammock...After that we did 4 quizzes and surprisingly, i scored 10/10 on all 4 quizzes....wohoo! On to the final exam...which was basically the same questions as the knowledge reviews and the quizzes. For this, i scored 47/50...not too bad.

Great news : we are now qualified PADI Open Water Divers!!!

Time for paperwork. We filled in a form, and now we have to mail it to Australia to get our certification cards...which takes 1-3 months.

That's it really. Now i'm looking through what specialty dives to take for my Advanced Open Water Diver's Course in future....but i'd like to have a few more dives under my belt first before i proceed. Hopefully, my next diving trip will be around October this year...probably heding to Redang..we'll see

Thank you Kelsey Jade Foot, thank you Neil-from-Scotland, thank you Eco-Divers for making my scuba dreams a reality.