Wicked Diving Archives - Travel Marinade

In Indonesia

The Wicked Good SEEDs of Manggarai

March 18, 2016 1 Comment

My activist friend, Marta, runs the Wicked Good SEED (Support Environment & Education Development) accelerator project in Labuan Bajo, a 7 month scholarship program sponsored by Wicked Diving. She invited me to spend a couple of hours talking with the teenage students of SMKN 1 High School, a vocational tourism high school, in Manggarai. I love getting in touch with the local culture through my travels, especially, curious and enthusiastic teens, and agreed to meet her the following morning.

She meets me on her motorbike in front of La Cucina Restaurant at 7:15 am, but she didn’t have an extra helmet for me. The cops can be a bit strict on the helmet policy around here, unlike many other places in Indonesia, so we decided to hail down a motorbike cab instead. It’s about 10 minutes away in a ruralish area outside of Labuan Bajo. The students are all dressed in a matching baby blue and yellow uniforms wearing Vans or Converse shoes in crew cuts and ponytails.

I was a few minutes ahead of Marta, and while I wait for her to arrive at the school, I get plenty of rubberneckers wondering what this foreigner is doing standing by herself in front of the school on the side of the road until she arrived.

Marta escorts me pass about a half a dozen of full classrooms, and I get big hand gesture waves, bright smiles, and welcoming hellos from the students. If there’s anyone that knows how to boost my self-esteem, it’s definitely Indonesian kids!

We get into Marta’s classroom where she teaches 4 hours a day on Monday’s and 2 hours a day on every other weekday and most of the kids were already in their seats. They’re all wondering who is this foreigner guest their teacher brought into the room.

Marta introduces me to the class and then allows me to tell them something about myself and encouraging they ask me questions to help practice their English.

“Hello, my name is Celia. I’m from California…in America. I have 3 brothers and 2 sisters which is a big family for Americans. I have been traveling since October, and this is my third time to Indonesia.”

I’ve never been great at introductions.

There are several students quick to raise their hands and ask me more questions about myself wondering if I like Indonesia, what my hobbies are, and then one of the girls followed up and asked…

“How old are you?” she asks.

HOW DARE SHE!?

I hear the turntables scratching through my head with “How old are you?” Beat. “Erwee, Erwee.” Scratch. Beat. “Erwee, Erwee.” Followed by a dozen pots and pans falling through a glass ceiling.

Marta quickly steps in and explains to them about cross-cultural relations and what’s appropriate to ask people, and this was wasn’t necessarily polite among Western culture. 🙂

Thank you, Marta! But I answered anyway.

“I’m 34.” I say confidently.

32 pairs of eyes went big in the classroom as if they felt sorry for me. Hey, kids! I’m not that old, okay! Am I?? Well, whatever, the 30s are the new 20s in America! Take that even though you Indonesians all look like you’re 30 when you’re 60 and 60 when you’re 90. Oh, go away with your impressive anti-aging genetics! 😉

Whew! That was a digress. Ha! Back on topic. Where was I?

Oh, yes… the introduction.

As I am finishing up introducing myself, one male student walked into class late apologizing for being late and proceeded to say to me, “Sorry, sir.”

The class chuckles and corrects him before he apologizes again and accidentally calls me sir a second time.

Oh, kids. You have a long way to go, but you’re so adorable.

I take a seat in the back of the classroom and observe Marta going back and forth between speaking Bahasa and English. She then asks for a few of the students to give a presentation on a topic about a place that tourists could go but also how to make it environmentally conscious. I was interested to learn about the Bajawa Hot Springs to Cunca Waterfalls to the Batu Cermin Caves. I haven’t really even thought about the land attractions since I’ve been here.

Then the class concludes, and Marta welcomes me to spend 15 minutes with the students and allow them to practice their English. Several of the not-so-shy types run over and ask to take photos with me. We needed to allow the next class to prepare and finished off with a few group photos of the class.

One thing I’ll say is I’ve always loved the inquisitive and warm Indonesian teen minds. I spent a month with them in Java a few months ago and now a couple of hours this morning on Flores Island, and, while adults are usually much more my speed, I sincerely love their age in this culture.

In Indonesia

I Got Punked!

March 17, 2016 1 Comment

I can’t believe I got punked by one of my Wicked Diving instructors. I have spent over a month with the Wicked Diving Komodo team working on advancing my dive certifications and recently started my Rescue Diver Course.

I wasn’t initially thrilled about getting my EFR (Emergency First Responder) certification required for the Rescue Diver Course. Why? Classroom time means no dive time! Instead of a day out diving keeping cool with the manta rays or discovering camouflaged cuttlefish and scorpion fish underwater, I’d instead be spending a full day in the classroom watching guys in mullets in 80’s generation training videos. But this is a necessary and crucial step, and I knew it would be relatively easy because I’ve kept up with my CPR & First Aid over the last decade.

We go through our DVD material, and the DVD kept restarting. To get back to where were we, we had to manually fast-forward at a 2x fwd rate. I’m feeling like I’m watching a Hawksbill turtle. Slooowww!

It’s about 1/2 way through the day. We decide to take a break, and when I get back, he’s not ready. He calls one of the other dive guides down to help with the TV and I think nothing of it. I’m checking my Facebook and Instagram not paying any attention to what’s going on before I hear a loud POP!

It took me a second to register what was going on. There’s chaos, and I see our dive guide is leaning over the TV unresponsive. I’m thinking, “WTF! Is this a joke?” No way did he just get electrocuted. It would seem too obvious to pull a stunt like that when I’m working on my EFR. What are the odds of something like this happening? I mean, it is Komodo, and I can’t say that the electrical sockets are the safest.

I ask them if this an exercise, but they’re yelling at each other and fingers are being pointed back and forth to do something. I think what if this is a real accident? I immediately switch gears and run up and check the power supply and then lay him down to check for breathing, and then I finally get one of the guys to break a smile, and I’m relieved! What the hell guys!? Okay, you got me.

What I learned was that they popped a balloon from behind the TV. Since I’ve been in Indonesia, I’ve not seen ONE balloon at all in this country – let alone this tiny town of Labuan Bajo. I swear if these guys could get an Oscar, it would be well-deserved. I am happy to say I passed the exam with flying colors, probably because I didn’t want ever to have to deal with that mini heart attack ever again. 🙂

In Indonesia

Dive Refresher in Komodo Island

March 7, 2016 No Comments

I’ve been lucky enough to spend the last month with the Wicked Diving Komodo team working on my certifications from Advanced to Divemaster. It was nearly 15 years (yes, that dates me!) since my last dive and now I get to immerse myself fully at one of the greatest dive locations in the world (raise the roof!).

Because it had been so long since I’ve been back in the diver life, I had a lot of questions. What is a BCD and regulator again?? Octo-what?? I hope I don’t have any trouble equalizing. But then one of Labuan Bajo’s finest instructors, Marsel, introduced me to the underwater world again with a few simple steps in a refresher course, and since I put my mask on the right way, I knew I was off to a great start!

Our first dive was in Siaba Basar, also nicknamed Turtle City, and it was pretty easy-peasy for beginners. I’m feeling like a natural. Fins are appropriately placed on both feet, and I remembered how to breathe without using my nose again. We saw a some tropical fish and my confidence is up. In other words, I got this! Like a true champ.

Now that I’m feeling all mermaid status, it was time to step up our skills and visit a more interesting site – one with [drum rolls] MANTAS! I’ve never seen mantas before, so I know this is going to be freaking awesome!

On our way to our second dive, I hear Ilham, one of the other dive guides, screaming, “Whaaaale shark!!!” We all run to the side of the upper deck and see a baby whale shark swimming next to the boat. “Stop the boat!” The guides grabbed their masks and then jumped into the water without hesitation. I’m watching from above and then I see other divers following suit. I don’t want to miss out on this opportunity and jump on the whale shark party train with only my mask being able to see it for the last 10 seconds before it drifted deeper into the sea.

At this point, we’re feeling ecstatic. We get back onto the boat and continue to our second dive site before mantas came flying out of the water from a short distance away. Now I’m even more mindblown. What an incredible thing to witness and we’re not even in the water yet! This is surely a good sign.

Everyone is pumped and eager to get in. Andreas, one of our other dive instructors, was trying to give us a dive briefing, but we couldn’t help but take our attention off of him to see the mantas flying from different directions. But once he said the sooner we get through the briefing, the sooner we can see these mantas underwater, he had our undivided attention.

The second dive was at Makasar Reef that is known for being a cleaning station for Mantas. It started off with a light drift dive. I’m trying to be cool and mimick Marsel’s perfect buoyancy looking ever so relaxed and keeping my arms in place instead of like an amateur doggy paddling under water. I think I did okay!

We passed along some brown bamboo sharks, sweet lips, Little Nemo, and even unicorn fish – but it wasn’t until we saw four mantas between 3-4 meters circling that we decided to lay low and observe these majestic creatures for about 10 minutes.

Nothing compares to the very first time seeing a manta ray – especially when it hovers so close above you that it could touch you. I remember being in awe as we watched these guys get closer and closer to us, one of them even spouting out something from it’s rear in sets! I’ll let your imagination run wild with that one. At that point, aside from nature’s sense of humor, I knew I was exactly where I needed to be. No other world existed but this one at this very moment.

We have one more dive for the day, and we ended it at Tatawa Besar. This was another low-key drift dive with plenty of coral to see. We saw both white tip and black tip sharks, Hawksbill turtles, and many other great marine life. A nice and relaxing way to end the day after being filled with so much excitement as we chase the sunset back to Labuan Bajo.