I never saw myself as a diver. I always thought it was quite dangerous and extremely expensive and you can spend your money in a much wiser way. My boyfriend Roel, however, had his PADI certification for some time and really wanted to share the experience with me. So during our Thailand trip in 2016, when we planned to stay a couple of days at the diver's paradise Koh Tao, it was a done deal for Roel that I need to try diving. I didn't have too many expectations; I think a part of me wanted to try it to get Roel off my back, and it would be easier for him to understand I don't want to dive once I have actually tried it. 

Immediately after getting our rental car in Stone Town, we set off on an approximately 2-hour-long journey to the other side of the island—the peaceful city of Matemwe. We planned to first make a quick stop at the Oce Ocean diving school (which I chose based on the immensely positive feedback they have received online) but due to getting lost on the way (never trust Google maps in underdeveloped parts of the world!) we arrived only a minute before closing. The staff were so nice that they stayed open and discussed the details of my skill training in the pool the next day. I must admit, I did feel a little nervous then, but the instructors at One Ocean made me feel much more relaxed. I felt I was in good hands.

The nerves came back the next day as soon as I woke up. I became a little restless and that feeling didn't stop until the training was over. First thing in the morning, I walked to my diving school to be transported to a resort in Kiwengwa about half an hour away, where I would be joining two other people for my scuba equipment. It turned out to be a Swiss couple approximately my age and we were trained by a Finnish instructor. We first had to have our fins, BCDs, and wetsuits fitted and then proceeded to gather everything else, such as masks and snorkels. The biggest challenge of the training turned out to be putting on the wetsuit. As the water can get cold, a wetsuit needs to fit very snugly so that water will not get underneath and make you cold. And so putting it on turned out to be a real pickle. Both I and the other girl were struggling to put it on for a good 20 minutes, after which my hands had visible scratches and little abrasive wounds from how aggressively I had to tug it. Finally, I picked up my scuba equipment and carried it all the way to the pool, still with a little tremor in my legs (also because it was so heavy) and a faster-than-usual heartbeat.

The rest of the day seemed easy compared to the horror of putting on a wetsuit. We started the training very relaxed, as we had to prove that we can swim for five lengths of the pool without stopping and afterward that we can float on the water for 10 full minutes. Our instructor wasn't kidding; she took the training so seriously that we had to complete each skill to the T. The whole group did quite well on all of the skills, but there were a few that we had to repeat a couple of times, such as the emergency ascent when you need to swim for 5 meters without any oxygen. For me personally, buoyancy (how much you float up and down while underwater) posed the biggest challenge, which is rather unfortunate as it is one of the most important skills to master as a diver. No matter what I did underwater, I couldn't stay still without moving my arms or legs and would always tip over to the side or on my back as soon as I stopped moving. After a long time and a lot of frustration from all sides, we figured out that the problem lied in the very heavy cylinder for my small upper body and the bad distribution of weights.

In the end, and even though we really didn't waste too much time repeating skills, we ended up in the pool for a good 6 hours with just one 15-minute break to change into a full-body wetsuit as we were all freezing half-way through the training. At 14.30 when we finally left the pool, we were all tired, cold, and extremely hungry. And perhaps a little hangry.

The fun part really started on day two, when we were about to conquer the ocean and do two dives to the depth of up to 12 meters. I was perhaps even more stressed about the actual dives—in the end, you never know what can happen in an ocean, especially with the added danger from fish and the fact that you're so far below the surface.

As I walked to the diving school that morning, all of these thoughts were running through my mind. But as soon as I met my instructor for the dives, I felt relieved. Nick was a very laid back and nice South African guy whose some of the first words out of his mouth were "we will keep everything chill because otherwise I get stressed, and that's not good." Nick—or Nicki how I started calling him—said exactly I needed to hear. If you're already stressed yourself, you don't need a strict instructor who's gonna stress you out even more. You need a friend, who's going to tell you it's all okay and that you're able to do it. You need yourself a Nick.

Day two started off by us being transported some 20 minutes further to the north of Zanzibar to be closer to the Mnemba Atoll. We were picked up by a bus and later transported to our diving location with a little speed boat. On the way there we saw a bunch of dolphins swimming along the boat and all got very excited that we might be able to see them underwater. We first let all the more experienced divers do their thing, because as Nick sassily said, "I don't need to get in the middle of this chaos". We let them all jump off the boat and we started putting on our equipment in peace.

I must admit the first dive (this time I was joined by a different couple from Germany, with the boyfriend already certified and only joining on a fun dive) wasn't so memorable. It was also not supposed to be; we started the dive with a leading line like a bunch of animals on a leash and we also ascended using it. When we were down there, I didn't have much time to enjoy the surroundings: we had several skills that we needed to perform (such as removing water from a partially flooded mask) and I also had to get used to controlling my buoyancy with the new wetsuit, new cylinder, and more weights. The fact that Nick started telling us about the divers that choose to dive to depths of 150 meters and have a higher chance of dying than surviving (including personal stories of deceased extreme divers), definitely didn't help calm our nerves and left me extra alert to everything scuba-related.

The second dive was a little more enjoyable, but with the skills to perform and the still somewhat unconfidence in one's abilities, I didn't pay much attention to the sea life. Indeed, after we surfaced and got on the boat, Nick told us that at some point he saw a very rare fish and wanted to show us, but none of us saw him signaling to us as "the sand seemed so interesting." We were just trying not to drown. A big disappointment was that due to my shitty foggy mask, I couldn't see the couple of dolphins that swiftly swam around us in distance. Even though trying to find dolphins again underwater became task number one, we didn't spot them again.


Nick, Roel and I were left alone and with no more skills to practice. And so halfway through my third dive, I only had fun dives in front of me when I could fully enjoy the sea life around me and diving as such. On the last dive of the course, we went to a place called the Aquarium and this was truly the place where sights were breathtaking. We dove all the way down to 18 meters, and even though I thought that it's still a pretty safe depth, Nick later told me that a lot can go wrong at 18m that you might not so easily recover from. Despite the no-show from dolphins, just minutes after returning down there, we saw a huge wall of dozens of barracudas and later a similar wall of other fish. Both times when I saw them, I got so excited I almost breathed in some water. We saw amazing coral, almost all of the Finding Nemo cast, and a couple of rare morays and stingrays. In fact, at some point a stingray that had been hiding under Nick panicked and swam away so abruptly and quickly it was out of sight in a second. Later on the boat, Nick told us he almost peed his pants as he didn't know if it was coming after him. One sting and he'd be dead.

When we returned to the boat for the last time, it was official: Nick told me I am getting PADI certified. I jokingly said that he should revoke Roel's certification as the first time we made a descent, he forgot to put his mouthpiece in. (Good luck diving without oxygen.) And Nick agreed.

On the way back on the boat, which took us all the way to Matemwe on a half an hour journey, Roel told me that we are going to the Philippines next to get out PADI advanced. Let's see.