That first morning was beautiful. I emerged from my hut early but the sun was already out and so were the breezes. There were coconut trees all around me and, as I walked towards the beach, I sent them admiring glances, not unmingled with suspicion. (They kill 200 Indians a year.)
I was to be in a state of trepidation throughout the trip despite my mother informing me that I have an abnormally hard head that will probably survive a coconut dropping on it. I never accept what she tells me blindly. She is not like the mothers in books who are always right about things.
I reached the beach but it was low tide and that first evening had taught me how conniving rocks can be so I didn't wade in. I sat on the sand, drinking the moment in, but then I saw a couple of large crabs scuttling around me so I choked on all of it, spilled some of it and hurried back to the "restaurant" for breakfast.
After I was done, I had to report to a Diving Instructor (it's a specific designation) who assigned me to a Dive Master - a lower designation though it sounds like it should be the opposite. My Dive Master's name was Rylan and I was disconcerted to learn that he was a couple of years younger than me.
What I like about Barefoot Scuba is they take their training very seriously. (I can't remember if I mentioned this in a previous post but I'm too lazy to go back and check.) I had to pass a bunch of theory tests, Rylan told me, and once I was done with that, I could start my open water training. Many places tend to have the training in swimming pools but very sensibly, Barefoot believes in starting with the sea since you're going to end up there eventually.
"How long will it take for me to finish the theory exams?" I asked.
"That depends on you."
He explained the process to me. First I had to watch a bunch of video tutorials grouped into five sections. After finishing a section, I had to answer the questions on the test in front of me before moving on to the next one. Once I was done with all of that, he'd quiz me on them.
I was determined to be a diving prodigy so by the time he checked in on me a couple of hours later, I'd only just started watching the second section. They were all very technical and had a disturbing amount of physics in them. Physics and I have never had an easy relationship.
"Why is it taking you so long?"
"I've been re-winding bits I don't understand three or four times until I do understand them," I said. "So I can do well on the tests."
"Oh these aren't the tests."
"What do you mean?"
"These are to make sure that you're going to be ready for the test."
Well, fuck.
Things did get faster but the videos got longer so it was 4.30 by the time I was done. Rylan came and quizzed me on all the answers. I got some wrong but most right.
"Cool, you're ready for the exam." He said.
"I take it tomorrow?"
"No. In an hour."
Excellent.
I made Mum quiz me while I was eating and I seemed to know, well, everything so when I reported back to Rylan and he gave me the test papers, I was fairly confident. I was right to be confident. I kicked ass. I even managed getting through the physics sums. I realised that whatever numbers they were using in the problem needed to be added by a 10. (E.g. If something was 40, the answer was 50.) Or something similar anyway.
I only got one question wrong and it was the tutorial's fault. The one thing the tutorial stressed on was that you are responsible for sticking to your dive buddy. The onus is on you, it repeatedly told me. So when the test asked me what I'd do if I were diving with two buddies and one got lost, I naturally wrote "Stick to the dive buddy I have and let the lost one find us."
Man. He acted like I was a sociopath.
"You're supposed to spend at least a minute searching for your third buddy together before heading to the surface and raising the alarm....you're not supposed to ABANDON him."
The only other hiccup was when I ended one of my (verbal) answers with, "I guess."
"There are no guesses when you're under the sea," he said ominously.
"So have I passed or are there any more tests?" I asked cautiously. (Keep in mind that by that time I'd answered at least three hundred questions on paper and gone through two rounds of verbal exams.)
"You've passed. We'll start your training tomorrow."
Yes, oh yes.
That night there was a huge storm. I sat on the little platform outside my hut and got soaked. The wind howled. I could hear the sea crashing in the distance. It was almost primeval. But then I remembered the goddamn coconuts and scurried back inside (after making sure that there wasn't any chance of a tree falling on my hut and crushing me to death before my first lesson).
I could see the lightning between the bamboo sticks. Bangalore seemed very far away. I fell asleep wondering what on earth I was doing, living in a soulless city when experiences like this were to be had. Somewhere, vaguely, the shape of a coconut threatened to answer my thought.
But then Bangalore has coconut trees too.
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