EDA February 2006.indd - Emirates Diving Association

FIRST TIME DIVER IN SIPADANBy Natascia Radice, Film Directorafter he promised me that I would be ok, I was ready to takemy first underwater breath. It was weird at first, I could notremove my regulator and I was telling him I wanted to go upand out! He was excellent! Not only did he calm me down, buthe demonstrated to me how to remove the regulator so manytimes with endless patience until I was ready to do it! Before wewent in the pool he said, “remember there is no safer place thannext to me and if anything is wrong we’ll try to fix it underwaterfirst and get out as our last option”. Not only was he right, buthe made me feel very confident.“DON’T SHAKE THE SMALL THINGS”MACRO PARADISE ON MABUL AND KAPALAI ISLANDBy Kathleen Russell, Videographer, Al Masaood Marine and EngineeringEDA Abu Dhabi Committee CoordinatorNatascia RadiceI came to Sipadan as a water phobic film director from London,and I left a proud diver or at least with all the intentions ofbecoming one soon!There I was on the boat with all the divers, filming them jumpingin the water, adjusting their equipment and feeling somehowjealous. The big blue always made me nervous as much as thecreatures living in it. Since I was a kid, I attempted many timesto learn to swim and become confident and comfortable in thewater, but anything deeper than my height was just too scaryfor me. Everyone was in the water ready to go deep down withturtles and amazing species of fish. Looking on into the water, soclear, so beautiful and inviting, made me sad I was not a diver...Balquiss our Tourism Malaysia representative for the trip wason the boat too, she had not finished her PADI in time so shecould not dive. She looked at me and asked, “Do you want tosnorkel with me?”I had to think about this decision. The thought of being in openwater gives me palpitations, but I was privileged enough to be inone of the best diving destinations in the entire world.I looked at Balquiss and said, “Why not, I feel like it’s time for achallenge and I jumped in the water with her. She had to holdmy hand as I was so nervous. I was overcoming my fears whenall of a sudden I started focusing into the water. I felt like a littlekid completely overwhelmed and excited, no longer scared. Ialso forgot that my pale mozarella skin had no sunscreen onand got very burnt.That night I couldn’t sleep. I was too proud and too happy forwhat I had done and I didn’t know that a bigger challenge waswaiting for me.One of the EDA members, Ernst Van Der Poll, a Diving Instructorof the Pavilion Dive Centre in Dubai, asked me if I wanted todo a Discover Scuba experience in the resort pool to get afeel of what it is like to breathe underwater. I trusted him andScuba discovery done! Another tick for my challenge list! Ithought that was it. I was happy and proud but when you areout on an EDA trip pushing your limits, more comes your way.Ernst looked at me and said, “You did very well, are you readyto now go in the open water by the jetty? I will take you downto 12 metres to have a look at the small inhabitants of the sea.”I am sorry I don’t have a picture of my face when he said that,because I was anything but excited, however as proud as I am,I just looked back and said, “Of course I am ready. Lets go!” Ialmost fell with the first step I took because my knee was soshaky. I could hardly move.To cut the story short: I DID IT!!! I dived for almost 30 minutesand it was weird, beautiful, peaceful and extremely exciting!That was just the beginning. The following day, we were back atSipadan and after I finished filming our last day’s sequence, Ernstasked me if I wanted to dive around the drop off and take a lookat the real sea life!I swear that there are no words sufficient enough for a fullexplanatory description to the feeling of seeing 5 huge turtlesswimming so elegantly and so close to me! I saw so manydifferent species of fish my head was spinning for hours after Icame out of the water.That night I had the best dream ever. It was quiet and I wasdiving with all the turtles and I was confident and happy thatnothing would have happened to me!I am now signed up to do my PADI certificate in March and Ihave to hugely thank Ernst for his teaching, patience and for theconfidence he gave me, and also all the EDA divers that wereon this trip because they are an amazing bunch of people, and Ican’t wait to say that I am one of them!Thanks EDA!!!Kathleen RussellNot too long ago, scuba divers would enthuse and photographthe largest and most spectacular denizens of the sea like thewhale shark, the graceful movements of manta rays andschooling pelagic like barracudas, big eye jacks and bump headwrasses. Nowadays divers seek with the same enthusiasm themacro marine life known as macro diving or “muck diving.” It ishere the divers can discover the amazing colors, bizarre formsand even the most obscure of these macro critters. In northernBorneo, both Kapalai and Mabul Island are a macro diver’sparadise. Sometimes barely visible to the naked eye (bring thatmagnifying glass along), one can find the pygmy seahorse thesize of a single rice grain camouflaged in the sea fans. Otheramazing encounters are the colorful array of nudibranchs, smallcowries located on soft coral branches and multitude of tinyinvertebrate species.On this trip, sponsored by Tourism Malaysia and Emirates DivingAssociation, I was privileged to have similar finds. Just off theshallow waters of Mabul, our dive master, Jasni pointed outthe amazing rituals of the colorful mating mandarin fish hidingtimidly in the coral debris. Also well hidden are the harlequinshrimp and Holthius’ reef lobster, colorful whip coral shrimp,the tiniest 2cm blue ringed octopus, stumped-spine cuttlefish,a small school of shrimpfish, mushroom-coral pipefish, gardeneels and juvenile harlequin sweetlips. Other photogenic animalsinclude the family of frog fish known as angler fish, which areextremely well camouflaged and can mimic the color and shapeof their general perch. The list of macro critters is endless, as Ispend most of my bottom time exploring a small area of theshallow reef, dead coral rubble, swaying soft coral branches andthe undersides of other marine invertebrates like sea fans, barrelsponges, anemones and sea cucumbers. Next time you take aplunge, take a closer look at what seems like ordinary sandybottoms, marine debris or even simply muddy bottoms and withgreat amazement you will find a whole new macro world in thesea.Happy muck diving!FlatwormCowrie ShellAnemone ShrimpPhoto: Alistair Russell, PADI InstructorNudibranches (Green and Brown Sea Slugs)Mantis ShrimpFlambouyant CuttlefishBubble Coral ShrimpHermit Crab26 EMIRATES DIVING ASSOCIATION, FEBRUARY 2006 FEBRUARY 2006, EMIRATES DIVING ASSOCIATION 27