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A day in the life of a dive instructor

7 am: Arriving at work, I start by looking at the board. 8 fun-divers today and an awesome day planned – Umbrella and Tongo is on the schedule! Umbrella is also known as the airplane wreck and is one of my favorite dive sites in Moalboal and although I’ve dived the site numerous times before, the thought of going there always excites me. I start preparing for the day; there is almost 2 hours until the boat leaves and there are still lots of things to be done: set up guests equipment, prepare the boat, count extra-tanks….

Busy day ahead!

9 am: All guests have arrived to the dive-center. Today I’m guiding a lovely couple from Israel who are here on holidays. The best part of my job (except for the obvious – getting to dive in paradise every day) is that I get to meet people from all around the world; hearing their stories and getting to know their cultures.  All dive guides and instructors here at Quo Vadis are happy guiding divers of all qualification levels, everything from beginners to professional divers. It turns out that my divers today are very experienced and for that reason, I let them plan their dive entirely, which they seem to be very happy about. All in all we had two wonderful dives with lots of laughter in between.

Exploring Moalboals only wreck at dive site Umbrella

1 pm: As the boat returns back to the dive center I help the divers to rinse their gear and inform them about this afternoons dive.  An hour and a half to go before the boat departs so I take a seat in LaPayag seaview bar and restaurant to grab some lunch. As a person of habit, I get the Arista Burger and enjoy a quiet lunch in the shade.

2.30 pm: As I come back from lunch I’m pleased to see that my student for this afternoon’s Discover Scuba diving session has arrived. For those of you who don’t know, the Discover Scuba program is a quick and easy introduction to the underwater world for non-certified divers. My student for the day is a young fella from Canada who tells me he has wanted to dive for quite some time but never got around to it. He also tells me he is somewhat nervous about this afternoon. I tell him that this is a very common feeling as it is a whole new experience to breathe underwater, but that most people can overcome this and quickly learn to relax once in the ocean. In addition, Moalboal is one of the best places to start diving as we have many shallow dive sites that are perfect for new divers.

We take a seat in the outside seating area of the dive center and go through some basic dive theory before we head out to the pool for some skills and in-water practice. Half an hour later we are done and I see a much more confident student in front of me, which makes me even more thrilled for our dive in the ocean. Long story short, an hour later we exit the water from our beautiful house reef, having seen 14 turtles (!!!), a giant frogfish, a nudibranch and a never ending number of beautiful corals. Not bad for a first dive huh?!

Coolest dudes on the reef! We saw not only one but 14 of them!

1 out of the 14 (!!!) turtles seen on one single dive

5 pm: A long work day has come to an end. Around this time I usually meet my coworkers in the Seaview bar for a refreshing beverage and to enjoy the sunset. This also gives our customers the opportunity to come and chat to us and ask us any questions they might have. And as I’m about to take a sip out of my frozen mango shake, I get a pleasant surprise. My student from this afternoon’s discover scuba dive session comes up and tells me that he wants to become a certified diver and so we decide to start his Open Water Course tomorrow. What a fantastic end to a fantastic day!

The perfect ending to a perfect day!

– Sarah, Instructor & Dive Center manager at Quo Vadis Dive Resort

Why I became a Scuba Diving Instructor

Caroline-Padi
Just next to our house is the ocean. This never ending deep blue that used to give me the shills now makes me feel like nothing else. To submerge myself in this salty home of a thousand of marine creatures makes my heart beat. When I was six years old all I wanted to be was a dentist (for some unfamiliar reason,) then when I was older I wanted to save the orangutans (I still want to save them,) I wanted to be a dolphin trainer (before I discovered all cruelty that comes with it,) built a shelter for rescue dogs (and someday I will,) I wanted to travel the world and I wanted to be a dive instructor. The dreams I had always differed a lot from my friends but my parents have always encourage me telling me it’s all possible. They believed in me and let me tell you, that means the world for a little girl. I will always love them for that.

To do something out of the ordinary
As long as I remembered I wanted to do a difference, I wanted to do something I believed to be important. To share the oceans with others, to tell my students why not to eat shark fin soup, where all our plastic ends up, why not to eat certain fish and why not to pay to see animal in prisons. I feel like I can do a difference, how small it might be I’m making an effort. I try with all of my heart.

manta

Respect
I’m very lucky to be able to do just that. Every time I take people diving that never before have seen the underwater world I feel good about myself. If you thought it was hard to show expression behind a dive mask on your face and a regulator in your mouth, think twice. I can hear them laugh, “wow” and “aaah” of excitement. Sometimes people smile so much they constantly have to clear their mask from water and it makes me do the same.

Every time I tell my students not to touch, not to collect, not to harass the marine creatures and I tell them why, I always get surprised by the respect they show. How people barely in controlled of themselves trying with all they have not to get to close to the reef not to kick anything. When we are back up again some of you thank me for showing you something you didn’t known to exist and telling me how much you tried not to hurt any corals while under water and I can tell that you will dive for the rest of your life and that you will be bloody good at it as well.

flying

We are so scared of the unknown
I have to explain to some of the people why the sharks will not attack them, that the poisonous fish will not come after them and the ocean is not some black hole that just swallows people. It fascinates me how many people that are scared of the ocean before the actually splash in. Into the unknown. And how easy it is to take this fear away. We humans will always fear the unknown, but it will always be something stronger than fear and that is curiosity. What we don’t know so much about scares us but it also fascinates us. That is how we work and that is why I’m so happy to do what I do. To enlighten people, to show them the magnificent about the ocean and to be able to replace what before was scary with something exciting and warm.

 

/Caroline #353983