Day 78- $831 For 21 Minutes Of Work. I Picked The Wrong Country To Visit A Doctor In.

With Monday morning and a whole week in Singapore laid out before us, Colleen and I had our sights set on getting out and about in one of Asia's most esteemed metropolises.  Not surprisingly my ear had other plans, as I was still in a large amount of discomfort from my presumed scuba diving accident.  I was not sure of the exact moment that I injured my ear as I was constantly having problems with my ears while diving (I assumed this was normal after talking to other divers).  That morning I awoke again with a large amount of ooze on my pillow and a "blocked" feeling in my ear. After some goading from Colleen and her mother who we spoke to on the phone that morning, I was convinced told that I had to go and make a visit to the nearest medical clinic.

I was afraid to go to the doctor's because I realized that everything in Singapore is extremely expensive and I'm sure their medical bills were no exception.  While I did have travel insurance, I would have to pay any expenses up front out of pocket and then hope that they reimbursed me.  On a more positive note there was a large medical facility located within walking distance of our hotel.  It looked to be quite classy and after filling out some initial paperwork I was whisked in to see a doctor who promptly told me that it appeared I had an ear infection.  For this he charged me $80 (literally a one minute consultation) and told me I would have to go and see a specialist to get further help.  All I could hear was the sound of a cash register going off in my head.  Once I settled up the tab for my initial consultation and explained to the secretary that I did not live in Singapore and therefore could not really wait to see the specialist I was eventually told that they could look at me right away.  Funny how that works.

Fearing the worst, Colleen and I headed over to the adjacent medical building and made our way over to the Head and Neck Specialists office.  We were greeted by four administrators/assistants, one doctor, and a patient count of exactly zero.  With that there was no discussion of price and I was quickly whisked away into the doctor's office and invited to sit in his big, comfy chair.  This was quickly followed by having cameras inserted up both my sinuses/nose and my ears.  As all this was going on, I was able to watch it all unfold on a flat screen TV right in front of me and I could only imagine what kind of bill I was going to be getting for this invasive procedure.  The doc concluded what I pretty well already knew: that I had an ear infection and had popped an ear drum.  He quickly wrote me up a prescription for three different types of medications and sent me on way.  Twenty minutes after first arriving it was all said and done and I was presented with a lovely bill of $750!  As the timid Chinese secretaries presented me with the bill I proclaimed something to the effect of "HOLY SHIT BALLS!!!" and I could tell I kind of embarrassed the staff members.  Immediately after this happened, one of the girls went back into the doctor's office and she came back out a minute later and told me that the doc had decided to give me a discount to $650.  I never intended to try and get a discount, but if that's all it takes to save a hundred bucks, I am going to have to try it more often.  With the bill paid I quickly scooped as many complimentary candies as I could fit into my pocket (got to get my monies worth) and we headed back to the hotel.  Colleen informed me that she was going to pay the bill for me as a surprise until she found out how much it was.  I think she was truly more upset about the whole ordeal then I was, but as Confucius once said, "shit happens".  I would call the insurance company the next day and work out the details.  We had more pressing issues to confront!

My wallet was now significantly lighter, so it only seemed appropriate that our feature destination that afternoon was the TigerBrewery.  I was in need of some sorrow drowning and I felt that a tour at the facility of one of Singapore's most famous exports would do just the trick.  The tour itself was pretty standard stuff (I've done a shit ton of brewery tours over the last ten years) and there was only Colleen, myself and three other people on the tour.  The highlight of the $16 tour was definitely the end where we were welcome to take a seat at the in-house bar and sample power drink for an hour.  After a couple of drinks we started to talk to the other people on our tour and it turned out that they were from Whitehorse in the Yukon Territory and were in Singapore visiting their friend who made like a gazillion dollars a year as a banker.  The world can sure seem to be a small place sometimes!  The tour was excellent value, as for the cost of one pint in a bar in Singapore we were able to not only get the tour but we each had five or six pints in an hour.  The downside of this was that we had planned to go to the Night Safari at the Singapore Zoo that evening.



Tough morning. Beer will most definitely cure my problems.



Tourist shot number one.



Tourist shot number two.





Good idea to let me operate the tap: not!



"Bus ride after this is gonna suck!"



The worst part of taking public transit after consuming large amounts of alcohol is definitely the lack of bathroom facilities.  To get to the Night Safari, we had to take a bus, then a subway, then another bus.  No doubt there were numerous bathroom breaks involved and some regret on my part for trying to maximize my drinking time at the brewery.  Colleen and I finally arrived at the world-renowned zoo around 9pm (a couple of hours after leaving the brewery) and before we knew it we were on a guided tram ride around the zoo to presumably see what it is that animals do after dark.  For the most part, it looked like they did same things as most people; you know surf the net, watch some telly,  eat dinner, take big craps, sniff each other's butts, the usual.  One thing I must say that was unique about the night safari/tram ride was that for most of the animal habitats they used moats instead of fences to keep the animals and humanoids separated.  This led Colleen to believe that something was going to attack her, but I assured her that most of the animals were not fans of white meat.  Since we arrived at the park a little later then we had originally intended to, we were in a mad scramble to do as much as we could in as little time possible.  Once we hopped off the tram, we rushed over to catch the last animal show of the night.  The highlight for me was seeing an otter that had been trained how to recycle.  Shit, I still haven't figured how to do that.  I also thoroughly enjoyed when one of the show hosts left some random dude on stage with a huge boa constrictor snake wrapped around his neck while he paraded through the audience - and right beside us - with some weird black creature on his shoulder (picture below, no idea what it is). Our last stop before the park closed was something called the "Wallaby Trail", where I ended up being used mostly as a human shield in case some of the bats decided to break out of their enclosure and entangle themselves in Colleen's hair.



Best part of the Night Safari? Oversized and overpriced jumbo slushies of course.



The otter is recycling. Mind blown.



Colleen approves of the Night Safari. What a tourist.

"Get away from us dude!"

Since we had arrived at the zoo so late, we ended up catching the last bus of the night back into the city, which was naturally packed to the point of near suffocation.  And to think I used to pay for this kind of environment at rock concerts in my youth.  Clearly judging by their calmness, the law-aiding citizens of Singapore were much more used to these types of crowds that Colleen and I who live in a town with a population roughly equal to that of the bus.

~Brentski~



Tough day not only for the wallet but the old lady as well.


Lineup for the bus. Noooooo!!!!!



Note: This was the first vacation in my life that I had ever purchased travel insurance for, and as I write this now, I am sure glad that I did.  Upon my return to Canada i  started to go through the process of retrieving the funds I had shelled out for my visit to the medical facilities.  It took a couple of months, a ton of paper work, phone calls, and emails, but in the end I was given the full amount of my expenses.  It was a big pain in the ass, so let this be a lesson people: don't go scuba diving if you have a history of ear problems!

Day 77- Belching, Even In Confined Spaces Is Apparently Acceptable In Chinese Culture. I Wish I Knew That Beforehand.

Since our accommodation budget had dramatically increased since we were no longer in Thailand, Colleen and I made sure to maximize our hotel dollars by sleeping in as long as humanly possible.  When I finally woke up around lunch time, I was greeted by a big wad of some waxy substance on my pillow that had been oozing out of my ear over the course of the night.  I had a (potentially) major ear problem in one of the most expensive countries in the world.  The logical thing to do would be to ignore it and hope it goes away on its own, so that is exactly what I did. 

Seeing as how Colleen and I had not done our research before coming to Singapore, we were ill-informed of the fact that they apparently have torrential rain storms nearly every day.  Thus, we waited out our first "Singapore storm" in our room before we ventured out into the great unknown.  Being residents of Inuvik, Northwest Territories we are fairly limited in our entertainment options, so the idea of being able to go to a movie together was a novel idea to us (we hadn't been to a theater together in over a year and a half).  Factor in that it was only $11 (most things here are far more expensive than Canada) to go the movies and they gave you the option of sweet or salty popcorn, and you my friend have yourself an afternoon date.  I had to play it safe with the salty.  While Singapore has a large population of Indian and Chinese descendants, the official language is actually English, which makes getting around (and going to the movies) quite easy for us Anglos.  With that in mind, we decided to go watch the Naomi Watts/Ewan McGregor film "The Impossible".  Without turning this into a movie blog I will just say it was a great film about a family who is caught in Thailand during the Indian Ocean tsunami in 2004, although it was a little eerie to be watching it as we were going to be returning to that part of Thailand within a couple of weeks. 



Super tourist!



 

Never one to pass up an opportunity at retail therapy, Colleen took advantage of her first foray into a Western style shopping center in a few weeks and promptly dropped a couple of hundred dollars that afternoon.  Me being the cheap asshole that I am kept reminding her that any clothes she bought she would have to carry along with her for the rest of the trip.  Well that, or she assured me that she could just pack them in my luggage.  Thanks babe.



The lights are so bright.



Later that evening, we caught our hotel's complimentary shuttle over to the local shopping center (Novena Square Shopping Mall) where we hopped on the subway and headed into the core of the city.  Our destination that night was the Singapore Flyer, which is the world's largest observation wheel.  On the way over we strolled through the Marina Bay Sands area of the city where one bar was offering martinis on special at the two-for-one rate of $36!  That's one way to get me to curb my drinking habit.  Due to Colleen's extremely banged up feet, we weren't moving too quickly (and I was no doubt bitching at her), but we eventually made it the Flyer. It was not overly busy, as it was a Sunday night, so we each paid our $35 and away we went.  Before the actual ride on the jumbo Ferris wheel observation wheel, we had to walk through a bunch of exhibits and such so that they made us feel like we were getting our monies worth.  Having navigated all the exhibits, we finally arrived at the loading dock and were hurried into a "capsule" with two teenage girls and a middle-aged Chinese couple.  While there were only six of us in our capsule, they could reportedly fit up to 28 people in the  10 foot x 20 foot capsule, which I am sure they had no problem doing during peak tourist hours.  The ride itself was a total of about half an hour and provided beautiful views of the city.  We also got to see the nightly fireworks show put on by the local casino as we were suspended in our capsule.  We had intended to watch it after our ride, but due to our slow walking we were now watching it from the comfort of our capsule suspended 165 meters in the air.  The other highlight of the ride was the Chinese guy who kept awkwardly belching every couple of minutes and never once thought to excuse himself.  Colleen and I weren't sure whether to be disgusted or laugh are asses off, so we just ended up doing a little bit of both.



Our "pod" right before we jumped in.



That's one hell-of-a-view.



Overlooking the Marina Bay Sands complex.



Sadly, we had to leave Sir-Burps-A-Lot and his lady after our ride.  We ended up going for a late dinner at some Boston sports themed bar/restaurant at the base of the Singapore Flyer.  The place literally had hundreds of thousands of dollars of Boston sports memorabilia and really seemed out of place in Asia.  As with the martini pricing earlier, I noticed the alcohol "specials" to be ridiculous.  They were advertising a tower of Tiger beer for $75.  Again, I wish I had grown up here and I might not have had so many hangovers in my younger days (or public intoxication tickets for that matter).


Hungry little fella?



A Boston-themed sports bar in Singapore? Seems logical.

Having done our tourist excursion for the day, we headed back to the Novena Shopping Center.  Sadly we had missed the last shuttle of the day, but I was certain that I could retrace our route by foot.  In actuality I did not have a clue what the fuck I was doing and before I knew it we were completely lost.  Somehow we ended up walking down a highway that I had never seen before with my unimpressed girlfriend not far behind me (keeping in my mind her feet were in a lot of  pain, it was a dickhead move by me).  I carried this charade on for over half an hour before we finally hailed a taxi and I discovered that I had actually led Colleen and I in the complete opposite direction of our hotel.  What an idiot!  I figured a couple of ice cold beers from the gas station across from our hotel was just what the doctor ordered as far as the antidote for my weary feet.  But alas, I tried to purchase it at 12:01am, and since it was after midnight they would not sell me the beers.  Literally, one minute. One fucking minute!!! 



Mean mugging outside the Singapore Flyer.



 

The moral of the story men: listen to women, they're smarter than us.

~Brentski~

Day 76- Onwards To Singapore. But Only If I Can Sit Through An Episode Of "Murdoch Mysteries"

I can honestly think of only a select few moments in my life that were more joyous than the moment when our overnight boat journey came to a rest in the port city of Surat Thani at 5am.  In the true nature of Thailand though, this joy was short-lived as it was interrupted by people screaming everywhere for various bus companies that were looking to take weary travelers onto their next destination.  A couple of chaotic minutes later, we located our "bus wrangler dude" who seemed friendly enough at first.  His attitude quickly changed for the worse though as he loaded us into the back of a pickup truck with a ton of other travelers and piled our luggage on top of us (this was becoming a far too common occurrence for Colleen and I!).  We were crammed so tight that I was actually hanging over the tailgate of the truck with luggage piled on top of me as we careened through the morning streets en route to the shitty bus depot where we would have to wait a few hours for our connecting bus to the city of Krabi.

The bus depot was a poor excuse for a transportation hub, made even sadder by the presence of 30-odd people who had just gotten off the worst boat ride since Walt Disney decided that "It's A Small World" would be a suitable attraction for families.  We bided our time at the bus depot by doing our best to avoid paying to use their bathrooms or electrical outlets (ridiculous) and by watching the Canadian travesty known as  "Murdoch Mysteries"  (torturous) on the lone-fuzzy TV they had propped up.  Thankfully, our bus did eventually show up and three hours later we were in Krabi.  The only problem now was that the bus had dropped us off quite far from the airport, so we had to enlist the services of a taxi to get us to the airport. 

Our hour-and-a-half flight to Singapore on Tiger Airways was pretty standard stuff, save for the fact that while we were airborne I started having large amounts of a gooey liquid pouring out of my ear.  I assumed that this was some sort of side effect from the scuba diving and I had hoped it would pass (more on that debacle in the coming days). 



We made it to Singapore. Definitely calls for a selfie....or whatever you would call this.



 

 

Touching down in Singapore, it was clear that we weren't in Thailand anymore.  Things just instantly seemed much more orderly and "first-world", although I am sure our wallets would feel the effect of this orderliness.  Thankfully at the airport we had a bit of Thai money left that we were able to change for Singaporean dollars as none of our four bank cards were working at the cash machines in the airport.  We luckily had just enough money to pay for a shuttle to our hotel, and alas our 20 hour journey from Koh Tao, Thailand to Singapore was complete.  Our journey, with prices per person for the crazy two days of travel was as follows:

Pickup at hotel in Koh Tao (included with boat ticket) > Night boat from Koh Tao to Suratthani ($20, 8.5 hours) >  Shuttle to bus depot (included with bus ticket) > Bus to Krabi ($5, 3 hours) > Taxi from Krabi bus terminal to airport ($7) > Flight from Krabi, Thailand to Singapore ($86, 1.5 hours) > Shuttle from airport to hotel ($9). TOTAL TRAVEL TIME OF 2O HOURS. TOTAL COST OF $127 PER PERSON.



Days Hotel, back to Colleen's preferred style of travel.



 

Our hotel in the super expensive city-state of Singapore was a fairly new property, the Days Hotel at Zhongshan Park.  Because of its relative newness and the fact that it was not right in the heart of the central business district, we were able to secure a fairly decent room rate by the city's standards. Our hotel room was beautiful and immaculate, a far cry from the $20 a night bungalow we were previously staying in that came complete with no TV, rolling blackouts, and dodgy hot water.  That night we were super exhausted so we didn't do too much, just lounged about and attempted to catch up on our sleep .  We went for dinner at the hotel restaurant, where our $70 meal sent us crashing back to earth and reminded us that we weren't in Thailand anymore.  Oh well, at least I wouldn't have to worry about ants carrying me away in my sleep.  Now I just had to worry about my constantly leaking ear that appeared to show no signs of slowing up on the oozing front.



The view from our hotel of the super-intensely populated Singapore.



~Brentski~

Day 75- And You Thought The Sleeping Conditions In Day Care Sucked...

Now that Colleen and I were officially advanced divers (unofficially I was still a pathetic excuse for a man when it came to diving), it was time for us to leave Koh Tao and travel onwards to everybody's favorite Asian city-state, Singapore.  We actually had to leave Koh Tao though because our 30 day Thai visas were up, and quite frankly Southeastern Asian jails scare the living shit out of me.  Colleen was quite sad to be leaving, as the island was most definitely her choice for best locale we had visited since leaving Canada five weeks earlier. 

In the name of cheapness and trying to save a few bucks, we I had booked the "night" boat out that evening.  With that in mind, we had a full day to kill.  I can think of no better way to start off what was sure  to be a long and agonizing day in the scorching heat than to have your power not working which in turn forced me to have the coldest shower of my fucking life.  Needless to say, my now inverted penis was not happy about this situation. Colleen and I ended up spending the better part of the day bouncing between various restaurants and internet cafes as we attempted to seek refuge from the crippling heat.  Factor in that both of us had feet that were heavily bandaged and blistered from a combination of scuba diving, cheap sandals, and a moped accident and you my friend have a couple who were cranky to say the least.  Rather pathetically the highlight of my afternoon was watching a cat catch and subsequently kill the same mouse numerous times while I drank a smoothie and pondered why my balls felt like they were crazy-glued to my inner thighs.  As the sun began to set we made our way over to Chopper's to watch some other newbie divers' videos and say goodbye to some of the fast friends we had made.  I could tell Colleen really wanted to stay, and she was already talking about coming back in a couple of weeks after our trip to Singapore, but alas it was time to move on. 

As the evening continued to creep up on us, it was time for us to gear up for the "night boat" trip.  We had heard a few horror stories that week from other travelers who had been foolish enough to travel to the mainland using the overnight budget option.  I tried to remain as positive as possible, but Colleen was already starting to expect the worst when our shuttle bus showed up to drive us to the pier.  What I mean by shuttle bus of course is a pickup truck with benches in the back where the driver crammed an ungodly amount of us into said back of truck and then proceeded to  pile all of our luggage directly on top of us.  Comfortable it was not.  Thankfully we made it to the pier without losing any souls along the way, although things weren't looking overly promising on the boat front.  Let's just say we weren't exactly staring at the five-and-a-half-star cruise ship we had enjoyed so much a couple of months prior.  There were hundreds of people everywhere, a combination of backpackers and locals looking to take advantage of the cheap overnight ferry.  The best way to describe the boarding process would be to compare it to how they round up cattle en masse.  I had a feeling it was going to be an interesting night. 



Loading up the night boat. This should be fun...



 

Chaos and human-cattle herding aside, we eventually found our way onto the ship and the first thought that popped into my mind was, "holy fuck, this is what I imagine a floating concentration camp to look like".  There were literally hundreds of people lying everywhere, packed shoulder-to-shoulder on flimsy mattresses that reminded me of those mats we used to use in gym class in public school.  The thing was these mattresses were (presumably) dirtier and less comfortable.  By this point Colleen was in full on panic mode and I am pretty sure she was pondering swimming to the main land instead of spending her entire night on this human rights travesty of a boat. 



The Koh Tao-Suratthani Night Boat. Jail would have been a step up.



 

With our boarding cards in our hands, we marched up to the second level of the boat to find our assigned beds floor space for the night.  Seeing as how things were going so well already for us, it was only natural that a group of dirty ass Spanish hippies had setup shop on our living quarters.  This is what my life had come to: arguing with greasy, non-showering, unemployable Spaniards about who was going to sleep on this poor excuse for a mat.  Eventually they thankfully fucked off, but by this point Colleen had started to notice that there was a trail of ants near the head of her mattress and giant mosquitoes circling overhead just waiting for her to pass out so she could donate some blood.  I argued with her and attempted to calm her down, but alas there was no way in hell that she was going to rest that night.  Factor in all the characters around us drinking hard liquor and smoking weed and you have a recipe for a long night if you were attempting to get some sleep.  All of this started to send Colleen over the edge and the final straw came a couple of minutes later when a giant red ant came sauntering across Colleen's bed.  With that, Colleen proclaimed there was no way she could sleep here (I admittedly was pissed with her, but looking back I can't blame her) and we packed up our stuff and made our way downstairs to a picnic table at the rear of the boat.  The two of us ended up sitting there with a rotating cast of other people who were presumably afraid of the bugs and/or people for the next seven-and-a-half hours, often slipping in and out of consciousness while my arms and legs kept also falling asleep from the weird and contorted shapes I was making.  There also happened to be a lady who spent almost the entire night in the bathroom that was located a few feet away from us as she was throwing up excessively and could barely stand up.  Literally it was the closest thing to death I had seen since that time we got a Llama drunk on wine byproducts (that's a whole other story!).  It goes without saying that we barely slept all night, but hey at least we weren't killed by ants!



Attempting to sleep on a picnic table at the back of the boat.



How much does Colleen love her life right now?

Having travelled on probably hundreds of different boats on four continents, I can easily say that this was the most memorable boat ride of my life.  While it was terrible at the time, when I look back on our Asian trip it was strangely one of the things I remember most.  Having said that, I DO NOT RECOMMEND IT!!!

~Brentski~

Day 74- Deep Sea Diving, A Ship Wreck, Night Diving, And A Swede In Search Of A Naked Pool Party.



Sinking to my certain death.

Throwing up peace signs like its 1996.

#Selfie. Yes, I just said that.

 Customary to our time on Koh Tao so far, we were up bright and early as we had a 45 minute boat ride out to Chumphon Pinnacle for our first dive of the morning.  You know what is the best way to ruin a lovely boat ride first thing in the morning?  Answer: seasickness.  Thanks to the choppy conditions on the water that morning I was not overly eager to jump in when we finally arrived at our destination.  As mentioned in my last post, we were partaking in the Advanced Adventurer course where we were practicing different skills.  This morning our first dive was to be a "deep dive", where we would descend to a depth of approximately 30 meters.  To add to the excitement for the day, Colleen had rented an underwater camera so that she could capture photographic evidence of us doing something cool (you know, for the future grandkids).



Shove a regulator in her mouth. That's one way to keep her quiet.



Chillin' on a ship wreck, no big deal.

Once my stomach settled down, our group of five divers hit the water and started our descent to the ocean floor.  Unfortunately, the visibility was piss poor, which naturally had to occur on the day that we decided to rent the camera.  Once we reached the bottom of the ocean (32m/100 ft), our instructor Amber pulled out an egg (guessing she just casually carries them with her everywhere) and proceeded to take the shell off.  Due to the intense pressure at such depths, the raw egg was able to maintain its shape as we ping-ponged the shell-less food item back and forth.  I had to go and ruin the fun for everyone when I swatted the egg a little too hard and thus proved that muscle trumps science every time!  The low visibility made it hard for us to keep track of one another, and as we were swimming near some huge coral walls I suddenly realized that Colleen was nowhere to be seen.  There were other groups of divers in the area, so I assumed she had gotten mixed up with some of them, but nonetheless I instantly started to panic.  Because one panic attack under the water that week apparently wasn't enough for me.  Eventually, everyone else in our small group caught on that Colleen was missing and we all started looking for her.  Thankfully, she reemerged seemingly out of nowhere within a couple of minutes and was wondering what everyone was doing.  I guess she could see us, but none of us could see her.  Oh well, nothing like a near heart attack to start the morning off!  Thanks to my heavy oxygen intake, Colleen and I had to surface early, which sucked because as soon as we left they saw some cobias, which neither of us had seen yet.  Oh well, I guess I should just be happy I found my girlfriend alive. Meh.



Amber looks significantly cooler under water than Colleen and I.



Two tickets to the gun show.



For our second dive of the day, we would be diving a shipwreck site.  Sadly, it was not some cool pirate ship from a billion years ago, but was in fact a ship that was intentionally sunk for divers a few years earlier.  While the underwater visibility still wasn't the greatest, we were able to capture some pretty cool photos.  Colleen and I actually both cut ourselves on various parts of the ship as we were maneuvering in and out of the entrance ways and such.  It was definitely a much more bad ass "cuts and bruises" story then the story I was currently rocking entitled: I'm wearing socks with my fins because the plastic  is cutting up my ankle! As if scraping her arm on a sunken ship and wearing Fruit of the Loom socks in the ocean weren't enough, Colleen managed to bump her head pretty good going through one of the ship's doorways.  That was our cue to surface.  On the way to the surface, Colleen got our instructor-in-training, Martin, to take a picture of us kissing.  The first attempt was straight out of the junior prom yearbook as "Awkward Colleen" knocked my scuba mask off.  On the second try we got the picture she so dearly wanted, but I ran out of air immediately thereafter and had to surface faster than a teenage boner. 



Cowabunga dude!



Walking on sunshine.

Having survived just about everything that can go wrong underwater, Colleen and I rested up that afternoon for our final dive that night.  I believe we also cleared the local 7/11 out of their entire stock of band-aids, as both of us had ankles that were a complete mess.  I guess, we've got sensitive skin!  With our ankles heavily plasticized, we rested up as that night we had our final dive before we were scheduled to leave the island the following day.



Group shot on a cannon. That's a first.



Hot make-out session under the water.



As the sun began to set, Colleen, Amber, Jon, Martin, and myself set sail with some beautiful weather and the entire boat to ourselves.  Out on the boat we were given our briefing on what we would be doing and we were all given torches/flashlights.  There were no other boats out on the bay that night, so we had the water entirely to ourselves.  As we made our way into the water and the sun started to set, Colleen's fear of the dark started to creep in.  The dark, spiders, and cracks between couch pillows.  These three things will be the death of her.  Colleen would not swim near the bottom of the ocean, although in all fairness she was not that far above us.  We got to see some pretty cool stuff, including glowing plankton and a couple of spotted stingrays.  We were told that many of the fish were already asleep, as they were apparently resting up to harass stupid tourists the following morning.  Due to my ongoing problem of consuming oxygen at an extremely rapid rate, I was forced to vacate the dive earlier then I would have liked.  Martin came back to the ship with me, while Colleen, Amber, and Jon continued diving.  As my shitty luck would have it, they ended up seeing a family of puffer fish.  All I got was a beautiful view of the stars as I laid on my back in the bay and admired the beauty before me.  Such a rough life, I know.



I love the air... clearly.



#Selfie...again!

Having completed our five dives in the last two days, we were now Advanced Divers (at least on paper!).  We celebrated by taking out Colleen's dreads/hair monstrosity as we had no swimming engagements in the immediate future.  With my girlfriend now looking more like a woman and less like Madeline Brewer in "Orange Is The New Black", we headed out for the evening to meet our newfound photographer buddy, Prat.  After meeting up at Chopper's yet again, we had a few drinks before moving onto another venue.  Foolishly, Colleen left me there as she wanted to go back to the bungalow to rest her severely mangled foot.  Naturally I fed her my famous line of  "I'm just going to have one drink", which is Brent code for see you in a couple hours.  Prat and I ended up hanging out and drinking far beyond my one beer allowance. 



Socks and flippers. It's a new thing I'm trying.



We survived!

 After saying my goodbyes to Prat, I started to stumble on back to the accommodations where my lovely girlfriend was waiting.  On the way I happened into some Swedish guy who was asking me if I knew where the pool party with all the naked chicks was.  I assured him, that I had only ever seen such things on the internet, but he was hell-bent certain that he was on the right path to this party.  I wonder if he ever did find it?  While I may not be sure what that Swedish guy found after he left me, I can assure that all Colleen found was her boyfriend in a slightly inebriated state.  She assures me of this because I kept asking her to quiz me on my multiplication tables, which I always do in an attempt to prove my soberness.  I mean, shit, if you know the answer to 8x7, there is no possible way you could be drunk. Is there?

~Brentski~

Day 73- Buoyancy. Like "Coccyx" It's Not Nearly As Dirty As It Sounds.

Following three straight days of having to wake up early for diving school, we were finally afforded the opportunity to sleep in as Colleen and I were not scheduled to start our Advanced Adventurer Diver Course until after lunch.   Sadly though, I could not sleep in as my "real world" habits of an internal alarm clock and such were starting to creep back into my system.  If there's one thing I don't like, it's the real world.

Sadly, my attempt to sleep in failed, but things could only improve.  Unless I intended to commit suicide 50 feet below the ocean's surface as I had attempted to do the previous day, it was inherently going to be a step in the right direction.  For our Advanced Adventurer course, there was no classroom work.  It was strictly diving.  To receive our credentials we would have to complete a series of five different underwater dives, each highlighting a different skill set.  We settled on navigation, buoyancy, a wreck dive, deep water dive, and night dive.  Unlike when we did our beginner's course, Colleen and I were not alone this time.  In addition to our instructor Amber, we had another student, Jon, and Martin who was in training to become an instructor.



Our Advanced Adventurer crew. Jon, Colleen, Amber, Myself, and Jon (left to right).



For our first dive of the afternoon, we headed over to a shallow dive spot where we were set to practice our navigation skills.  Jon, Colleen, and I were given compasses and had to navigate our way to certain spots under the water.  Thankfully, Jon was a much more experienced diver than Colleen and I, so we just kind of followed him  and pretended to look at our compasses as if we actually had a clue as to what the hell we were doing.  Jon was definitely an alpha male type of guy, while Colleen and I were just fish in his school.  I apologize for the shitty pun.

For our second dive of the afternoon, we boated over to a spot known as "buoyancy world".  I'll let you guess what skills we practiced here.  There were a wide assortment of obstacles, hoops, and other related crap under the water that we had to float through in an attempt to master the ever important skill of buoyancy.  Mostly though, I just like using the word buoyancy. Buoyancy. Buoyancy.  By far the most exciting part of the afternoon was when Jon was almost attacked by a triggerfish.  They are hyper-territorial fish that do not like it when people swim into their areas.  Needless to say Jon made that mistake and provided all of us with some free entertainment.  While we made it through both of the days skill tests unscathed, the one problem I was still suffering from was the fact that I was going through my oxygen supply at a far greater rate of speed than anyone else.  This in turn meant shorter dives for me, and less of a chance of seeing something of note under the water.

Divers' worst nightmare...the triggerfish. *Not an original photo

That evening was slightly more low key than the previous evening's affairs.  We hit up Chopper's again for dinner before retiring to our abode.  Colleen and I were both pretty banged up on our legs and our ankles were totally mashed up from the friction caused by the fins.  The ocean was trying to defeat us, but we were determined not to let it win!

~Brentski~

Day 72- Brent Has A Panic Attack 18 Meters Below The Surface. (What Not To Do When Scuba DIving)

Feeling flush with confidence after making it through the previous days' dives with relatively few problems, Colleen and I made our way to the Roctopus shop for the ungodly (at least on vacation) time of 7am.  This morning we were to complete our final two dives of our Open Water Certification course.  Not even two weeks earlier I would have thought this to be an impossible goal as Colleen was adamantly against ever trying scuba diving.  Thanks to a chance encounter with some strangers and the conversation that ensued, here we were on the Gulf of Thailand about to feed ourselves to Poseidon and all of his creatures.  The best part is that Colleen was loving diving, and admittedly better at it than me.  Funny how things work sometimes. 

With her new found love for diving, we loaded up the gear and got ready for our big morning.  Our instructor Amber, Colleen, and I were going to be joined on our dives by a videographer by the name of Prat.  Prat was a laidback Indian dude, who had actually spent time living in Vancouver and had even been to Churchill, Manitoba.  I'm not sure, what percentage of the population of India has been to Churchill, Manitoba, but if I had to bang out a guess, I would peg it at under 0.000000001%. And that's probably being generous.  Prat was there to film Colleen and I for a DVD that he would edit. If we wanted to purchase it, we would be given the option later that evening.  But let's be real, I'm dating Colleen.  That DVD was as good as sold before he even started shooting.

On our first of two dives that morning we were fortunate to have amazing visibility and saw a ton of fish.  We were also lucky enough to have a huge school of barracuda, numbering in the thousands, that was present for most of our dive and seemed to follow us wherever we went.  Colleen was in love and knowing how much she could care about most sports (see: not at all), it was great to see her enjoying herself.  But alas, I had to go and ruin the fun on our second dive.  Yup, Brent just had to go on trying to die!



Come back land, I need you!!!!



 

While the first dive went smooth as can be, things quickly turned bad for myself on what was to be our final dive before receiving our certification.  While Colleen, Prat, Amber, and I were descending to the bottom of the ocean to practice some skills on the ocean floor I started to experience some problems with water leaking into my face mask.  At the time I did not realize it, but the side flap on my mask was folded over and was thus allowing water to get in.  Warning: DO NOT EVER DO WHAT I AM ABOUT TO DO IN THIS STORY UNLESS YOU WANT TO DIE.  So, as we were descending, I started to freak out as my eyes were getting super irritated.  For some reason (it all happened so fast), I then proceeded to take my mask off and spit my regulator out of my mouth.  By this time, Amber has now thankfully seen what is going on.  I am in full on panic mode at a depth of 18 meters (over 50 feet) and am trying to semi-consciously swim to the surface as fast as I can.  At this point I was inhaling massive amounts of water into my lungs and was almost certain I was going to die.  Thankfully, Amber was there and as I was trying to swim away to my frantic and certain death she kept holding onto my vest and trying to jam my regulator back in my mouth.  I responded by trying to push her away and swim to the surface as my heart was now beating out of my chest and my instinct to surface was taking over.  Believe me, am I ever thankful that she was there to save my ass, cause the likelihood of me making it to the surface were slim to none! Eventually, after a ton of flailing around and me assaulting her semi-consciously, Amber was able to jam the regulator into my mouth and calm was somewhat restored.  Not to be forgotten is the fact that Colleen was watching this whole incident play out and was having a freak out of her own as she watched me.  Oh, and Prat was filming the whole damn thing!  I'm sure it would make great footage if he ever had to teach an underwater rescue course! Somehow, despite all the chaos I had inflicted on everyone, and all the salt water I had ingested, we managed to finish completing our exercises at the bottom of the ocean and we even completed an underwater kiss for the camera! On a positive note, I think I achieved my desired sodium intake for the day.



Roctopus saved my life.  Literally, its employee, saved my life!



Seeing as how we couldn't talk underwater, upon surfacing I could just tell that everyone was like "what the fuck just happened!?".  I explained the situation with my mask and that one thing led to another and before I knew it I was in the throes of a full on panic attack.  I was not sure if Amber was going to pass me, and I was suddenly having flashbacks to when I was 16 years old and ran a red light due to nervousness while taking my final Young Drivers of Canada exam.  I am pretty sure I was the only student to ever fail driving school (Sidenote: I passed all three of my government driving tests on the first try).  Thankfully, not only did Amber save my life, but she also passed me after I promised her I had learned my lesson.  I like to think that it was good for her as an instructor, as she had never had anyone pull a stunt like that on her before.  Yup, I was a real life First Aid Course.  Despite my brush with death, Colleen was not deterred and before I could say "drowning" she had enrolled us for the Advanced Adventurer diving course that was starting the next day.  Yup, looks like my diving days weren't behind me quite yet.



Captain's cool. He don't give a fuck about no drowning white boys.



With our newly minted status as "Open Water Divers", Colleen and I headed back to our bungalow to rest before sauntering over to one of the local bars, Chopper's, to meet up with Amber, Prat, and a bunch of other people who had been out diving with Roctopus that day.  As is customary with people who finish their course, they played Prat's video of Colleen and I on the big screen in the bar for all to see.  Sadly, the footage of me going all Helen Keller was left on the floor of the editing room, but the video was awesome nonetheless.  Of note in the video was the fact that Colleen and I both like to flap our arms under the water which made us both look like a couple of newbies tools.  Aside from that, the video was awesome and Colleen most definitely bought a copy.  To further celebrate the successful completion of our course, and me still being alive, we indulged in some drop shots and a few rounds of beverages before heading over to some other "diver's bar".   At bar number two we were fortunate enough to introduce some of the others to the fine world of Canadian culinary delights aka poutine.  Throw in witnessing a lesbo make-out session  between a newlywed (we'll just call her bi-curious) and her friend, and you my friends have the recipe for a perfect night.  French fries, gravy, cheese, and girl-on-girl.  What more could a guy who stared down death that day ask for?  Heaven.

~Brentski~