Garry Was A Diver But He Was Never Down

This week I've mostly been scuba diving, relaxing and partying...

First off I spent four glorious days learning to scuba dive in yet another paradisaical island, this time Ko Tao, and now I'm a PADI certified Open Water diver. This means I can now dive to depths of up to 18m anywhere in the world, and although it was primarily a learning experience, it was also a great fun. Being back in a classroom, receiving homework and even sitting an exam were novelties that I doubt will be repeated often on this trip. It was both interesting and essential to learn though, as the equipment was brand new to me and and the dangers faced very real. In fact the scared the bejesus out of me discussing lung expansion injuries, decompression sickness (the bends) and of course plain old-fashioned drowning.

But after all the theory, the practice was immense. After a quick session in the swimming pool on day one, where breathing underwater for fifty minutes felt very unnatural, we were let loose in the ocean at the dive sites of Twin Rocks, Mango Bay and White Rock. It remarkable how quickly any awkwardness subsided and by the end of course everyone was doing somersault entries from boat to water and then taking advantage of their weightlessness to do front/back flips and even some 'Matrix' style kung fu.

In between the larking around there was also a fair few fish to be seen including clown fish (Nemo), barracudas, boxfish and also lots of cool coral and sea cucumbers. No sharks as yet but hopefully I'll get to use my new skills when I get to Oz.

On the final day after we had all been certified, myself and a few fellow divers were going to grab some lunch when an intense but friendly guy on a motorbike pulled up offering to take us to his mothers restaurant... It turned out my dive buddies had met this character Zingo (surprisingly not short or ginger and knew nothing about the inner working of a Landrover Discovery!!) the previous night and he was a Burmese waiter in a local Indian restaurant. We decided to take him up on his offer and must have walked for 30 minutes down dirt tracks until we calm to a 'tea house', which constituted the main meeting point for the Burmese community on Ko Tao. After Zingo sorted us out with drinks, he joined us at the table where we were each given a bowl of rice and then plate after plate of food started to arrive. Beef curry, squid, exotic salads, noodle stirfry, potato soup and we all helped ourselves. All this time 'Sceptical Weir' here had been thinking that we may be getting swindled and was expecting an extortionate bill but when the time came to pay, Zingo refused all our offers of money. An insanely generous act -reaffirmed by his Burmese roots, as we in the West use Thailand as a cheap labour force well Thailand in turn looks to Burma for its cheap labour. We arranged to stop by a bar he worked in that night but unfortunately there was no sign of him...

That night the whole group had a few celebratory drinks and the combination of alcohol, fire and my easily influenceable nature led to the following video...

From Ko Tao I headed South to Ko Pha Ngan to meet back up with Andy and Greg whom I'd been with in Phuket and Phi Phi. We stayed at a great place Mai Pen Rai bungalows which translates as 'no worries'. When we were there on our secluded beach at our perfect bungalow with amazing sea, beach, and jungle views we had no worries but the trip to and from the camp was a different story. It involved an hour journey off the beaten track only suitable for 4x4 vehicles which we had to make in a regular taxi. We had to do the trip four times in total and it never got any easier but these things all add to the experience.

The only time we really left our relaxed surrounding was for the legendary full moon party in Haad Rin, where 20,000+ partygoers descend onto a couple of kms stretch of beach and dance from sunset until sunrise. When we arrived it was pure insanity and took me a few minutes to be able to close my gaping mouth. Such a sensation overload - the music, the number of people, the colours as everyone was covered from head to toe in glow paint. An incredible sight and a great night, so good I lost my flip-flops.

Current injuries include a nasty knock on the head on said death trip back after the full moon party and I've got something stuck in my foot which is making me limp around. I also overstayed my welcome in Thailand by a couple of days so had to leave quick sharp, and after a hellish twenty-four hour transfer I now find myself in Penang, Malaysia - smelly, hungry and tired. Apart from that it's all roses...