Palau 11/26

            OMG--Today was quite the interesting day to say the least.  We got up at our usual time and had our breakfast and then headed across the street to the Drop Off.  Today Teri, Jeff, Eric and I got paired up with a new group of Chinese.  It is important to understand that a lot of Chinese divers buy their scuba certification and often times don’t even know how to swim much less know the first thing about diving. 

            First, we got a late start because we were waiting for them to get to the dive shop.  They are also notorious for being late.  Then, once they got in the dive shop it was like an angry swarm of bees.  They start running all around handling and looking at everything.  It is kind of like herding cats trying to get them to focus on the task at hand.  After they finally got all their paperwork and permits filled out, we were finally on our way, about 30 minutes late. 

            After they got them all down to the boat, they were told to unload their gear onto the boat and get it set up.  They did not seem like they had too much trouble setting their gear up, only a few issues such as putting the regulator on the tank backwards, etc., but that was just the beginning of what was to come.  So once they got their gear set up and we got enough weight for everyone, we set off to pick up Teri and Jeff at PPR. 

            After picking up Jeff and Teri we made way for the first dive site.  Luckily Edwin would be the guide for just Eric, Jeff, and Teri (I did not dive again today because I have a head cold—so just rode along).  The rest of the group of Chinese was being guided by Aki, the Japanese guide who works at the shop.  We dropped Eric, Jeff, and Teri off at Blue Corner for the first dive and then headed to Dexter’s wall as the first dive for the rest of the group as there is less current there and it is an easier dive. 

            This is where it started to get interesting.  It should only take a few minutes to get your gear on and get in the water, but for this group it took nearly 30 minutes or more.  It was quite the circus show watching them attempting to get their gear on properly and get ready to backroll into the water.  Half had to be reminded to put their weight belts on, one girl who was probably 100 pounds in body weight had on 20 pounds of weight, some of them tried to backroll in without masks or regulators.  Then, Logan saw one of them trying to work his pressure gauge to let the air out to drop down. 

            Logan, our boat driver, then took the boat over to shallower water to let the four non-divers snorkel around.  It quickly became obvious that these people had never snorkeled either.  They had all new equipment and had no idea how to even put the snorkel on their mask.  One girl asked me to help her put her snorkel and her mask strap on her head.  Then they proceeded to get their life jackets on and get in the water.  In addition, they had no fins and would not let go of the rope on the boat.  As soon as they got in the water all we heard was “no fish, no fish.”   

Shortly after they got in to snorkel, Logan noticed one of the Chinese divers that we had just dropped off popped to the surface coughing and hacking—obviously he took in water somehow.  Lord only knows what depth he was at before he shot to the surface.  So Logan told the snorkelers to get back on the boat so we could go collect this diver.  One of the four snorkelers in the group who spoke very good English (most, if not all, spoke very little English) informed us that this was that diver’s first dive.  So we gathered up the distressed diver and loaded him onto the boat—following which he proceeded to vomit over the edge of the boat—one of many episodes to come.  Needless to say he did not do any more dives today and looked like death for most of the rest of the day. 

By the time all of this commotion was over it was time to pick up Edwin’s group.  So we made our way back to their dive site to pick them up.  After getting them on the boat, then we headed back to pick up the remaining Chinese divers and their guide.  Needless to say they were not down long—the Chinese also tend to go through air fast.   

After getting them all back on the boat (after some instruction on what to take off first), we slowly made our way to the second dive site, New Drop off for Edwin’s group, and Coral Paradise for the Chinese group.  During the surface interval Logan offered to let the ladder down so that the snorkelers could snorkel, but it took them a little while to get motivated enough to get into the water and hang off the boat (not what I would consider snorkeling).  Then it was time to dive again, so they got back on the boat and we made our way to the dive site for Edwin’s group.

Of course it only took a couple minutes, if even that long, for Eric, Jeff, and Teri to get in with Edwin.  Then we made our way back to the shallower area at Coral Paradise to drop off the Chinese divers.  This time it did not take them quite as long to get in, except for a couple of them that seemed to take forever.  Finally they were all in the water and dropped down.   Prior to them getting in on this dive, Aki, their guide, gave them the briefing for the dive site and reminded them again to stay at the same depth as him and to stay together.  So I can only imagine what it was like underwater on the first dive—probably similar to the circus show above water. 

We sat and waited for Edwin’s group to surface after their dive and the Chinese group was not far behind, even though they gone in much later.  Amazingly everyone from the Chinese group surfaced alive.  After everyone was back on the boat we headed to a beach for a nice relaxing lunch.  Then we headed back to PPR to drop off Jeff and Teri and then Neco to drop everyone else off.  Today was our last diving day and we had beautiful sunny weather all day.

After we got back to the dive shop we talked with Fabio.  Today was his dry day as he had plans to fly to Tokyo to visit his girlfriend early morning tomorrow.  He was nice enough to invite us to his apartment for dinner.  He made us an amazing dinner of bruschetta, vegetarian pasta, and salad.  He is Italian, so he definitely knows how to make a good Italian meal.  After enjoying a good meal and some good conversation together, he dropped us back off at our apartment. 

Tomorrow is our dry day (also Thanksgiving Day) before we fly back home on the 28^th.  We leave at 5 a.m. Palau time on the 28^th.