Diver Diver Are You OK?

Only if knew I had to say this line for next 3 days all the time before rescuing the same instructor or fellow students for 100^th time, I wouldn’t have considered taking up this certification. And the tiring hours of ascending and descending every 5 mins to rescue someone enacting as tired, unconscious or lost gradually changed from having ball time learning to frustrating time when I had to do each scenario atleast three times with the instructor and other two fellow students. One of them reminded me of cry-baby, so I really didn’t miss the experience of diving with him.

Steve the dummy

The German girl was a better buddy. We saved Steve the dummy’s life intermittently, so often that we ceased to feel our hands on the first day, its draining to keep up with 100 beats per minute chest compression one set 15 mins odd on a huge playlist of songs matching bpm. Each time you miss a beat start all over again or rather each time you miss one step in safety procedures start all over again. Now I can sing “Staying Alive” with each word on its lyrics like pro.  Imagine the amount of time spent watching videos for safety procedures, doing some theory around it, answering questions; practice them on dummy or each other. I wasn’t even sure if I was going back to hotel that day, but we were fast and managed to finish everything post lunch, including the EFR exam. We were happy to leave early, but that was not the end as soon as we stepped out of the classroom our mock practicals were awaiting for us, Instructor had forewarned me about such mocks but I didn’t expect it to come as a surprise with one instructor falling down the staircase another just lying motionless around pool and third one choking on food. I had a broad smile on my face pondering at the fact that they are actually enacting everything which broke down to think which one of us wants to handle which situation. So I had to look after the one fallen down and choker, while the German girl started the CPR on dummy which then replaced the instructor. Phew! That mock drill went real smooth without goof ups and I checked my back twice before leaving the dive center. So much for “License to kill” or Emergency First Response what the world calls it.

Unable to sleep the previous night, I guess I was missing my bed the only thing bothering me was I had to dive next day and I just couldn’t allure sandman. The next thing I remember is my alarm ringing next to me and I had to push myself out of the bed thinking about whether or not to dive, I had no option though, cancelling on that day would have sabotaged my Gili plans and that I was reluctant of. Back at dive centre met the team I was going to be diving and learning rescue skills with, a new Chinese instructor named Zeng Xing, very cheerful and patient lady. Patient enough to teach me and make me do each of the seven skills for the day atleast thrice and being an unconscious diver for me all the time, because by the time it was my chance to practice skills the other two students would be tired practicing with each other. Most of the day one skills included snorkel to regulator switching, gear removal and wearing it back, sharing air with an alternate, how to handle a panicked diver without getting yourself drowned and towing or throwing float to a tired diver. By end of the day one Xing perfectly got the trick of grabbing my attention each time she found me lost in my own trail of thoughts and not paying attention to theory. By end of the open water rescue skills day one, we were super hungry and waiting to go back to dive center, I was under a notion that this was the end and I was going back to hotel after this, but PADI lessons are made to make you study harder. Xing asked us to finish lunch and we were supposed to be practicing three more skills in the pool before we practiced it in open water the next day and also we were supposed to be finishing the 2 hour video lectures and the reviews. Now that’s when I thought I was better off as Diver than the “Rescue Diver”.  Downhearted somehow I ate my lunch sulking at the news, but still no signs of sleep after all this tiresome routine.

The next three skills were arduous, me and German girl already timed that we would finish this in another hour and half and then probably another two hours video lectures and we were good to go by 4 pm. But that plan didn’t workout, ascending with an unconscious diver, giving them rescue breaths while removing their gear and pulling them out of water is taxing on your strength especially when the diver is heavier than you, and both of us had to practice this on the male co-student including re-doing it each time we missed a step or forgot to give one rescue breath. I can still hear those voices in my head one-one-thousand, two-one-thousand until five-one-thousand for next breath and meanwhile removing their gear as well as yourselves. One mistake and you do it all again, so vexing. It took us three odd hours to finish it, the three of us were very happy with the fact that all the strenuous things for the day were done, but the most boring thing was still waiting for us. Xing definitely felt bad for us, but that was part of her job and she tried to fix our mood by throwing us an ice cream treat while we were watching the video lectures and answering reviews simultaneously. We could catch-up with most of the answers for the questions from videos but still missed out some as the videos were typically fast and not as profound as the book. She definitely made my day with the ice-cream if not others, and thanks to the sublime version of cry-baby who didn’t like ice-creams, I ate his share as well. In next two hours the videos were over and we were on our way back to hotels with a lot of homework. All I did after coming back was cribbed about the homework to instructor who was ready to help me with it, but the wise self in me refused the help, though I finished much of the reviews watching videos only a few were left and finishing it didn’t spoil my party plans in the evening. 

On day 2 Sanur beach greeted us with really bad currents, visibility very poor and left me doubting if we were really doing those three skills in these bad conditions. Also outlined for the day was administering emergency oxygen to breathing but unconscious diver and finding a lost diver. “Navigation be my guest” my frenemy returned this time with zero visibility and strong currents. I practiced it precisely 5 times on land but water is just water, 3 kicks straight and then 5 kicks right that didn’t workout in the strong currents but I managed to reach the place where we had to. Followed which were the three skills, extreme strength is all you need to do them in choppy water and the waves pulling you away from boat. With half of your mouth in water how are you supposed to give rescue breaths to unconscious diver while you are struggling to catch your breath, it was a retreat moment and we decided to practice it in shallow part of the beach. The moment we got back on the boat half of the divers on the boat were sea-sick and looking at one puke made me sea-sick as well, it was time to go back to shore and finish the skills. After having practiced the skills numerous times a day before we could do it very quickly in shallow water. Waiting back at dive center was Rescue Diver test which we decided to finish an hour after lunch. I was glad to know that the foreigner kids also cheat; I always thought that was something we inherited from our culture. The test was mutual one for us while Xing was busy putting our gear back in dive shop and with combined knowledge on rescue diving we passed the test and got our  “Rescue Diver” license in so called Indian jugaad way.