I began diving in Cairns, Australia in June 2003. The first two days were spent in the classroom and swimming pool, learning all the technical and safety aspects and practicing with the scuba gear. For the next 3 days, we went to the Great Barrier Reef. The colors underwater were spectacular. There were thousands of different colored fish and plants around. We even got to see turtles, though luckily we did not get the sharks the instructors promised us. The Australian humor kept our spirits high throughout the course. For example, when the boat took off, we had this safety warning, "Should the boat sink, please wave to any passing ships or planes. Not only will you get to be on television, but the life jackets cost $50 and we want them back!" We were all worried about the dangers of diving, such as decompression sickness or bursting ear drums if we did not equalize properly. Now, we also had to worry about what we should not touch underwater, as many of the living objects were poisonous. For example, the Lionfish's long spikes can cause death within 5 minutes of touching it. As luck would have it, our Australian instructors took us down to 18 meters (Basic Open Water Diving Limit) and showed us a whole bunch of Lionfish. We then swam only about 3 meters away, sat down in the sand, and started doing our drills, such as taking our masks off! In the end, both my fateher and I successfully passed the
PADI Open Water Diver Certification.
