FIRST DIVING TRIP - DAYANG (MALAYSIA)
My dive journey began in Aug 2004 with Team 51. My dive instructor was Dennis M. Reyes and I was certified with PADI Open Water as well as PADI Advance Diver on 9th Aug 2004 at Dayang Malaysia. Carmen, Joy and myself did our theory and pool sessions in Singapore many weeks before we made our trip to Dayang for the actual Open water and Advance certification.
The journey to Dayang was 4hrs bus ride from Singapore to Marsing and 41/2hrs boat ride from Marsing to Dayang. The waves in the night was so strong that I thought the boat might capsize. It was so choppy that I felt sea sick all the way there and kept throwing out =<
The journey to Dayang was 4hrs bus ride from Singapore to Marsing and 41/2hrs boat ride from Marsing to Dayang. The waves in the night was so strong that I thought the boat might capsize. It was so choppy that I felt sea sick all the way there and kept throwing out =<
There were 30 of us in the group and Erlinda, Carmen, Joy, Phyllis were my course mate and Amy Austin was my dive buddy for this trip. Sharon Siew and Bernard Chin (Leisure divers) joined us for this trip too. My room mate was Sharon Siew (Shaz), Bernard Chin and Matthew (Dive Master). Shaz was the one who encouraged me to take up the course and after this trip, we made many other leisure trips together to places like Manado, Redang, Liveaboard West Malaysia etc.
We arrived the island at about 5am, and had our first dive at 11am. We had 3 dives for that day. Wasn't feeling too great for the first day due to motion sickness. However, from the second day onwards, the dive was excellent after a good rest in the night.
The waves on the first evening dive was extremely choppy and visibility was bad. As we jumped into the water, we were unable to "congregate" at one point before we descend coz' all of us were drifted away while waiting for other divers to jump in one by one. Eventually we had to descend from wherever we were. As I descend, my buddy did a hand signal for me to look down and as I did that, I saw Joy grabbing my fin and waved at me using my fin!!! My fin has dropped off!!!! It was hilarious coz' I tried to reach for it but were unable to because Joy was descending too fast. Then she inflated her vest and started to make her way up!!!????!!!! Thanks to Paul, one of the Dive Master (DM), came to our "rescue". He grabbed the fin from Joy and stuck it back to my feet! :-P We lost the rest of the team by the time we reached the bottom because the visibility was very bad so few of us were led by Paul. All of us were safe and sound but our dive instructor almost had a nervous breakdown! The sea was rough, visibility was poor and the whole group were all over the place. Thanks to all the DM who took care of different individuals. It was no joke to have to handle such a big group of new divers.
The waves on the first evening dive was extremely choppy and visibility was bad. As we jumped into the water, we were unable to "congregate" at one point before we descend coz' all of us were drifted away while waiting for other divers to jump in one by one. Eventually we had to descend from wherever we were. As I descend, my buddy did a hand signal for me to look down and as I did that, I saw Joy grabbing my fin and waved at me using my fin!!! My fin has dropped off!!!! It was hilarious coz' I tried to reach for it but were unable to because Joy was descending too fast. Then she inflated her vest and started to make her way up!!!????!!!! Thanks to Paul, one of the Dive Master (DM), came to our "rescue". He grabbed the fin from Joy and stuck it back to my feet! :-P We lost the rest of the team by the time we reached the bottom because the visibility was very bad so few of us were led by Paul. All of us were safe and sound but our dive instructor almost had a nervous breakdown! The sea was rough, visibility was poor and the whole group were all over the place. Thanks to all the DM who took care of different individuals. It was no joke to have to handle such a big group of new divers.
The whole place was like a "war-zone", the makan area, the bunk, the bath room etc. My first experience of the night dive was pretty "scary" too. Because it was the first time for everyone in the group to dive in the night, certainly everyone was pretty anxious. It was pitch-darkness in the sea except those lights from our torch. No one wants to go missing in this pitch darkness sea, so everyone tried to swim near the instructor. It was like many chicks tried to crowd around the mother hen!!! Can you imagine what happened when all divers swam near each other? Especially when our instructor saw something interesting, he would use his "metal rod" to hit his tank in order to catch our attention. Once the sound is heard, everyone started to "dash" towards him. Then you would hear more sound...."kong! kong! kong!" the tank hitting another tank!!!! It was so noisy and painful coz' another tank hit my face!!!! "Ma Boh" after that ;-) It was also very cold to dive in the night and hence I've never really enjoy night dive even though some creatures can only be spotted in the night.
The next day, we had our first dive at 10am. It was a better day because the sea was calmer, visibility was clearer and stomach felt better (no more throwing out). I started to enjoy the splendid underwater world, the beauty of the corals and the uniqueness of God's design ;o) Lots of Blue Star Fish, colourful Christmas Tree Worms, adorable Clown Fish and Anemone, Sting Ray, poisonous Lion Fish, yummy Spagetti Worm (eeerrrrr ;P), Giant Moray Eel, Giant Hermit Crab, Turtile, Cuttle Fish, LA pool of Ikan Kuning Scad swimming around us, Eagle Ray etc
The next day, we had our first dive at 10am. It was a better day because the sea was calmer, visibility was clearer and stomach felt better (no more throwing out). I started to enjoy the splendid underwater world, the beauty of the corals and the uniqueness of God's design ;o) Lots of Blue Star Fish, colourful Christmas Tree Worms, adorable Clown Fish and Anemone, Sting Ray, poisonous Lion Fish, yummy Spagetti Worm (eeerrrrr ;P), Giant Moray Eel, Giant Hermit Crab, Turtile, Cuttle Fish, LA pool of Ikan Kuning Scad swimming around us, Eagle Ray etc
SECOND DIVING TRIP - MANADO (INDONESIA)
A month later, Shaz, Carmen, joy and myself made our way to Manado! Wow! Manado's experience was heaven!!!! After this trip, we became so "spoiled" ;-))) We were being treated like the "King"!!! After each dive, someone would help to pull us back to boat, help to ungear our equipments and help to change the tank etc... plus fresh water was available for us to wash up!!!! .... Basically, we don't have to do anything. Just put on the gear, jump in, do our dive, surface and get back to boat, relax, do our log and prepare for the next dive......no hard work needed lah! ;-P However, we cannot be too spoiled for too long or else we might forget the skill on how to change the tank, check the air and do all the necessity for the next dive etc plus our pocket would suffer a great lost!!!!
:-))))
On 23rd Sep 2004 at 9.55am, we took Silkair from Singapore and arrived at Indonesia about 1.40pm. Then another hour of bus ride to Tasik Ria Resort. We got a connecting room. Carmen and Joy shared a room and Shaz and myself another. We rested for the entire day and celebrated Carmen's birthday in the night. Started our diving only the next day, fresh and alert, all really for the sea!!!! Monica, our dive guide, did an excellent job to bring us around the Manodo sea!!! The sea was calm and visibility was clear. The boat was clean, neat and spacious, and the resort was luxious. The meal was fanastic and scenery was magnificent. The dive guide were excellent and the dive was superd!!!! How can I not fall in love with Manado???? No No No, No way I'll not fall in love with Manado!!!! Yes Yes Yes, too many good things to say about Manado!!! Hee, hee, hee....Manado need to pay me for the free advertisement lah ;->
On 23rd Sep 2004 at 9.55am, we took Silkair from Singapore and arrived at Indonesia about 1.40pm. Then another hour of bus ride to Tasik Ria Resort. We got a connecting room. Carmen and Joy shared a room and Shaz and myself another. We rested for the entire day and celebrated Carmen's birthday in the night. Started our diving only the next day, fresh and alert, all really for the sea!!!! Monica, our dive guide, did an excellent job to bring us around the Manodo sea!!! The sea was calm and visibility was clear. The boat was clean, neat and spacious, and the resort was luxious. The meal was fanastic and scenery was magnificent. The dive guide were excellent and the dive was superd!!!! How can I not fall in love with Manado???? No No No, No way I'll not fall in love with Manado!!!! Yes Yes Yes, too many good things to say about Manado!!! Hee, hee, hee....Manado need to pay me for the free advertisement lah ;->
On the third day, we started our day at 6am, making the 3 hrs boat journey to Bangka. "Heavenly dive, crystal water" and that's Bangka!!! Stopped by an island for lunch, jumped off boat from the upper deck and had a good swim.
During one of the dive, I had to stay longer in the water than rest because I was chasing the Napolean fish and therefore went a little deeper than the rest. Hence safety stop has to be longer and while waiting for the time to pass, Milky (my dive guide) taught me how to blow bubble rings in the water ..... hee, hee.... it was fun!!!!
During one of the evening dive, I lost 40 bar of air right at the beginning while descending because Carmen's camera stripe got entangled to my Octopus (another mouth piece for oxygen) and thus caused the oxygen to escape. I tried to preserve the air by limiting myself from breathing freely but as a result of that, I suffered severe headache. This could be due to CO2 retention. On top of that, the water tempaerature was 20 degress and that surely didn't help to ease my headache. Soon my buddy (Shaz) signal to me that her feet was numb because of the cold and therefore we both decided to stop our dive. We ascended faster than the rest.
We also visited Lembeh Straits (2 hrs bus ride from Tasik Ria). There were six of us in this trip, four of us plus two English dive instructor, Susan and Jackie. Our dive guide were Richard and Deeker. There were lots of colour Nudibranch (slug) at Lembeh Straits and it was a great place for photo taking. However, this was also the place that my camera got flooded!!!! sob, sob, sob!!!! Just as we were descending, we had to make our ascend coz' camera flooded. You can imagine the shock on my face and how my heart "sinked" to the bottom of the sea as I watched the water filled up my camera housing. Manufacture fault lah, therefore got replacement from Nikon. Since Lembeh Straits were known for its beautiful "micro" creatures, photo taking would add colors to the dive.
I could only watch other divers taking all the pictures and move on. To comfort me, since we were not supossed to touch the creatures, a Nudibranch swam to me and landed on my gloves. It stayed with me throughout the whole dive. I was so excited and delighted that I could stroke it with my finger :o)))) Had lunch on an island.... yellow rice in banana leaves and it tasted great with our bare hands!!!
Creatures of Manado Sea:
Spotted Porcupine fish (Big head), Pyramid Butterfly fish, Crinoid Clingfish, Black Snapper, Porcelin Crab, Morray Eel, hundreds of Dolphins, Pygmy Seahorse (very tiny, had to use magnifying glass to take picture), school of Barracuda, Devil Scorpionfish, Ornate Ghost fish, Pipefish, Tomato Anemone and Clown Anemone fish "kissed" my fingers, Cheron Baracuda made us dive 36m deep coz' we chased it to have the picture taken, Denrone Phatone (Pink) Carb, Bannerfish, Trumpet fish, Orang Utan Crab, Giant Turtle, Cushion Starfish, Lobster, Napolean fish, Plastic bag.....hahhahaha!!!! Carmen thought it was some weird creature of the sea and went for a chase, only to find that it was just a plastic bag!!!! Giant Clam, Emperor Shrimp, Cleaner Shrimp, Anemone Hermit Crab, Red Fire fish, Sting Ray, 'Feather' Sea Pen, Bubble Shrimp (transparent), Sea Urchins, Emperor fish, Frog fish, Blue Ribbon Eel, Anemone in Green Apple Shape, Blue Ring Octopus, Banded Sea Snake swallowing an eel (I was delighted to catch this site and had a great footage of it!!!) Razor fish, Emperor Shrimp, Sea horses, 2 White Tip sharks, Cowfish (family of Box fish).
Some asked me what was it that I like and dislike in a diving trip?
As for dislike....got two of them....
- nausea and sea sickness
- nausea and sea sickness
The "non-stop throwing" can make me cry!!!!
While diving ...... nausea!
Upon ascend ........ threw out again lah!!!
Liveaboard trip ..... nightmare!!!! No land, no land, no land!!!
Our Liveaboard trip to West Malaysia was a nightmare because I threw out at least 20 times on the first day. Nothing seemed to help. I've tried both the patch as well as the sea sick pills but I still kept throwing out! The patch should be stronger than the sea sick pills but somehow has got no effect on me lah!!!! I was so miserable and literally stood by the sink coz' the "pipe" leaked non stop!
- Headache and nose bleed
It could be due to the CO2 retention, my dives usually accompanied with headache plus the frequent nose bleed upon ascending ;-P
Despite these discomfort, die hard diver still dives lah....hee, hee.... coz' the pleasure and delights overweighs the discomfort and misery.
During another Dayang trip in March 2006, my luggage was much heavier on my way home. Only when I reached home that I found that the four weights were still in my weight pocket!!!! Each weight was 1 kg, therefore I had 4 extra kg in my laggage!!! Usually after the dive, we will return the weights to the dive operator so we need not bear those weights home. However, I forego my last dive coz' wasn't feeling too well and thought to relax and had a good shower. We packed our gears only when the rest of the divers came back from their dives and it was very rushed before we made our way back to Singapore. So in the midst of the rush, I forgot about the weights :-O
During another Dayang trip in March 2006, my luggage was much heavier on my way home. Only when I reached home that I found that the four weights were still in my weight pocket!!!! Each weight was 1 kg, therefore I had 4 extra kg in my laggage!!! Usually after the dive, we will return the weights to the dive operator so we need not bear those weights home. However, I forego my last dive coz' wasn't feeling too well and thought to relax and had a good shower. We packed our gears only when the rest of the divers came back from their dives and it was very rushed before we made our way back to Singapore. So in the midst of the rush, I forgot about the weights :-O
Since I had the weights with me, I got a friend to divide the one kg weights into half. So, both Shaz and myself can have 1.5kg on each side of our weight-pocket. In the past, we always have the problem of the number of weights to use. 3 kg is just nice for us but since the weight comes in 1kg and if we put two in one pocket and 1 in the other, we will be lopsided. So we will use two on each side but that was not the ideal weight for us. Now that we can have 1.5kg on each side, we balance much better without much problem ;-))))
My last diving trip before I fell ill was Redang in May 2006. We took 10hrs bus ride and 30 mins boat ride. Though the journey was long, I kind of enjoy this trip as compared to many other Malaysia trips because I did not throwing out (",) Travelling on land is still better than sea and the coach that we took was comfortable as compared to the small van to Mersing in our last trip.
Saw "Nemo" (Clown fish) egg in this trip. I tried to stir some current so as to get a good shot. The clown fish was as usual, very protective. They were frantic and tried to "attack" my fingers but they looked very cute!!!!
While looking to the right, a large puffy fish suddenly swam pass me from the left. It was so close, about 5 cm away and it gave me a fright!!!
There were few white tip sharks swimming around us. Managed to capture them on video =>
to be continued.............
