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ISSUE 8 ARCHIVE - TRYING NOT TO BE THE TOSSER ON THE LIVEABOARDRob HuntThis is how you get to be a secret agent: you go to university, and whilst you're there, being a bit clever, operatives from MI5, or possibly MI6 (I forget the exact difference, but it's probably that MI6 is secreter, although not as secret as MI7, which I've just made up) make clandestine and complicated assessments of your suitableness for being a spy, probably using computers or something, and all being well, you're James Bond within a week of graduating.I was thinking about all this on the plane to Hurghada as it was my first proper dive holiday for probably six years and I was terrified of being buddied with someone that a) couldn't dive properly or breathed too much or b) wanted me to help identify a fish they'd seen on the last dive that was a yellowy, bluey, reddish colour and normal shaped, or c) thinks I'm a juvenile tosser. As such, it was imperative that nobody discover that a) I'm a dive instructor, b) I used to work as a dive guide in Sharm, or c) I write for a dive magazine. |
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About halfway through the flight and
my sixteenth beer, the couple next to
me who were far less socially inept than
I am, broke the ice and asked if I'd
dived in Egypt before: "Not since I
worked as a guide in Sharm," I replied,
"but this time I'm just on holiday really,
although... have you read London Diver
Magazine?". It transpired we were
destined for the same boat: they were
excited but slightly apprehensive as
one of them was fairly new to diving
and the other hadn't been in the water
for a while. "I'm an instructor. Stick with
me and you'll be fine", I slurred and
took advantage of the moment to pass
out on the table in front of me and
snore loudly.
I don't know why I wasn't selected for a spyhood at university: I'd have been awesome at it and being able to tell everyone you're a secret agent would be really cool. |
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In much the same way that Sheffield
Wednesday deliberately play terribly in
cup competitions every year in order to
concentrate on playing terribly in the
league, so I made myself agree that
I'd deliberately blown my cover so that
I could concentrate on not being the
Tosser on the Liveaboard. Particularly,
as regular readers will remember,
I wrote the manual for it.
Lamentably, this was to be more difficult
than I expected and not just because
I'm vegetarian (which makes me want
to hit myself in the face every time I
think about it), and not just because
I'm a tosser. The problem was revealed
to me much later by the boys and girls
on board from Caithness (believed by
scientists to be the northernmost point
on Earth: a 15 minute swim south from
the point where you fall off the edge at
the top of the world and plummet for
quite some time down the other side
before splatting messily in Australia).
At Hurghada airport I was quickly
earmarked by the kind of people who
look for such things (ie. divers) as the
person you'd least want to share a
boat with, staggering around, as I was,
in a bit of a stupor, trying to obtain a
cigarette from somebody, despite
having quit five months previously.
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Anyway, there was something to do
with diving... That's right, so, Hurghada
was the starting point for the Blue O2
"Simply The Best" itinerary, on the Blue
Horizon liveaboard, that over the course
of the week would take in The Brother
Islands, Daedalus reef and Elphinstone,
all of which I've wanted to dive since
before water was invented, but have
always been too tight to actually do.
The first thing you'll notice about the Blue Horizon is it's big, clean (thanks to the excellent stewardship of Amen – he claims this is how you spell his name, but I don't believe him – and the unfeasibly helpful crew), comfortable and all very professional. Professional to the point of being corporate, actually, with the boat and general dive briefing being done by DVD to the theme tune of The Exorcist. This was all particularly welcome to me since I was having a hard time coming to terms with the fact that I was back in Egypt after three years away and everything seemed so, well, Egyptian. I was very much fearful that the week ahead would remind me in all too certain terms of just what I'd given up by leaving, and my life as it manifests itself now could be found wanting. So, after unpacking, I popped into town to conduct an important scientific study designed to remind myself what Sakara tastes like. |
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Fortunately for any trip reports I might
end up writing for a dive magazine,
the underwater action began the next
day. I was buddied with my roommate,
Michael, who also found himself on
board without knowing anyone else.
Michael was Danish and, as it turned
out, one of the nicest people you could
ever hope to meet. If human beings
had turned out the way we were
probably supposed to, instead of
selfish, egotistical twats, everyone
would be like Michael: polite,
considerate, thoughtful and eager to
learn. Unfortunately, he was improving
his English by reading Dan Brown books
and as I'm a selfish, egotistical twat, I'm
going to have to take the the piss out of
him for it as it had a tendency to come
out in conversation.
For instance, he turned out to be the perfect dive buddy as he seemed to use exactly the same amount of air and was largely happy to do the same kind of dive as me. The only time he came close to complaining about anything was with the words: "it was a long dive". Someone with less exposure to terrible writers of pseudo-scientific thrillers might instead have said: "Do we really have to stay underwater for 65 minutes on every dive just for the sake of it, even though there's nothing to see, you selfish bastard?" |
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Michael also had an utterly disarming
way of asking you the precise definition
of words eg.: "What do you call this?" "Pasta." "But what is this particular shape?" "We use the Italian word: penne." "But is it a tube or a pipe?" "Erm, a tube, I suppose..." "So, when is a tube a pipe?" "On Wednesdays." This kind of conversation, it has to be said, was easier over dinner than when, in what to me is typically Scandinavian fashion, he would come naked out of the shower and ask you whether the object he was slowly removing his underwear from was a wardrobe or cupboard. Fair play to him for sticking with me after the first dive though when, immediately upon hitting the water, I became aware of three problems: firstly, I was two or three kilos underweight (easily resolved of course, the crew were clearly very experienced in the ways of check dives and were immediately on hand with the extra weights. They also, though I hate to admit it, were straight onto my case when I attempted to don my BCD without a weightbelt. Tosser). Secondly, I'd overestimated the water temperature by a good 4 degrees and was instantly freezing. Thirdly, there seemed to be something wrong with my mask. As I was about to find out, the something was that it was broken and let in water about as quickly as you might expect something to let water in under three atmospheres of pressure. This kind of thing is what check dives are for, of course, but I came out bright blue and sneezing salt water. |
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"It was a cold dive", said Michael.
Next up was the Salem Express, as we
were in the rare position of having a
crew with no one who'd lost a relative
on it when it sank. You're supposed to
feel moved and spiritual on this dive,
and the concept is, of course,
extremely sad, but in practice I was
distracted from any great profundity of
spirit by the profundity of divers on the
wreck. For me, this is the only drawback
to diving from a boat like the Blue
Horizon: it is excellent, but with 14
double-berthed cabins, it can also be
very busy: by day four I was still spotting
people on board that I swear I hadn't
seen before, and it's a testament to the
dive guides that wherever possible they
were able to keep us from diving in our
own lemonade.
The guides were foreign, and at this point, only a tosser would revert to stereotypes: Elke was (and probably still is) German and extremely efficient, Dray was Dutch, very laid back, and provided me with drugs. This was when I was at my lowest ebb, having missed two excellent dives on the Brother islands due to a cold. I suspect the drugs were heavily pseudo-ephedrine based as I remember someone asking me beforehand whether I could equalise: "I dunno", I replied, "but I feel f***ing excellent". |
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This dive was on the Numidia, one of
the Red Sea's famous late 19th, early
20th century steamers. There are five,
as far as I'm aware, and I used to dive
all of the other four every week
(weather permitting) when I worked out
of Sharm, so I was like a kid collecting
football stickers. With stickers you
quickly amass a large pile of "swaps",
which were to be taken to school and
flipped through whilst your classmates
surrounded you saying: "Got, got, got,
got, got, got, got, need, got, got", and
at some point, breathlessly "Need!
Need badly for the whole team!" Well,
I needed the Numidia badly and I
made everyone on board the RIB agree
to descend slowly so I could make it
down. Sadly, as soon as I hit a metre
and successfully equalised, I
abandoned everyone else and
immediately plummeted down to 30
metres, equalising merrily, manically,
and at one point, I think, through my
left eye. Unlike my buddies, I was
delighted and thanks to the miracle
of pseudo-ephedrine, made every dive
for the rest of the trip. Thank you, Dray.
Oh, and the wreck is beautiful.
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Days two and three were at the
Brothers, and days four and five on
Daedalus reef, all of which were very
special for me due to my slight
obsession with oceanic whitetip sharks,
which came to hang out underneath
our boat and the other liveaboards on
all four days. The reason I have a thing
for this particular species is that they're
more interactive than other sharks,
which will generally piss off as soon
as they see you, whereas the oceanic
whitetip likes to come over for a cuddle.
A bizarre stroke of luck was that Elke
turned out to be a marine biologist
and is doing a study of these very same
sharks (if you have a picture of one in
the Red Sea, she might like to hear from
you). Good times, shark
lovers: on one morning, within 90
minutes, we'd seen a grey reef shark,
a hammerhead and an oceanic. In
fact, several oceanics, and I came out
of the water fizzing with elation. "Good
dive?", asked Dray.
"We saw a shark", replied Michael. By the end of the week I was fully back into liveaboard mode, just like in the old days, which mostly means I was wandering around chain-smoking and in danger of getting a tan. Mostly. But I was finding it difficult not being the guide, and it reminded me so much of what I'd left behind, that I was a bit distraught to leave, not just because of the great time, but because, just as I'd feared, I really do wonder if the gains outweigh the losses. I still feel it, a couple of weeks later as I've finally gotten around to writing this report and to be honest, now that my cover as a diver (and a tosser) is blown, I don't know where I'll be when it's published (although you'll be able to find out on the blog). |
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I was also sad to see Michael leave
(he had an earlier flight than me), as
he was a thoroughly excellent bloke
and had proven my fears of having a
crap buddy utterly groundless, all of
which I told him in an overly emotional
way as he left.
"Yes, goodbye", replied Michael, and closed the door. |
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