SWIMMING WITH SHARKS.........

Sharks!!! I saw sharks!
Actually to be so much more specific (and of course so much more boastful!), I was swimming with sharks! About 10 of 'em!! Think they were called blacktip reef sharks? Was a little disappointed to hear that they were only about a metre to a metre and a half long, cos i swear the ones i saw, they were THIS BIG!!
Tee hee hee!
Seriously though, i'm almost embarrassed to say that i was equally excited about almost everything that happened that day. Keira's friends Ayesha and Tristan had arrived a few days previously, all divers of course, and after a really lovely few days lounging in the sun and chilling with a few beers, all were very keen to get into the water properly! My company was duly expected (and welcome i hope!), but i have to admit to a little reticence, seeing as i can't swim, never mind dive, been snorkelling once or twice alright but never out of my depth!, and here we were to get on hippo divers boat,(www.hippodivers.com) to go to Phi Phi Leh, 30 minutes away, to jump into the sea? Hmmmm....?
Was pretty sure i wasn't gonna drown, hardly possible surrounded by all those pros?, but it's a working ship and everybodys so busy, and Keirs and her friends were gonna want to hang out, not spend an hour coaxing me off the boat right? So, as i said...I was reticent!
Of course, and as always, it seems, I had nothing to worry about!
After everyone had completed their first dive (and i worked on my tan on the deck!), i was put in a half wetsuit, impossible to sink in! given my fins and my snorkel, and a 5 minute technique drill in the water and off we went! And i swear to God i don't know what i was more excited about! The fact that i was in the water? that i was so comfortable? that we were swimmimg through shoals and shoals of the most beautiful fish i have ever seen or perhaps that this is what a day can be like!
How am i ever gonna land myself back in the real world?
The marine life here is incredible, not just the fish but the water, the array of colours sweeping the sea bed create a kind of sensory overload. Out of the many fish we saw, those that stood out were Longfin Bannerfish, Damsel Fish, Needle Fish, a Porcupine Puffer Fish and the Sharks of course. As i was happily moving along i looked calmly to where keira was frantically pointing and oh my God there's a shark swimming about 2 metres below us! I just started laughing and of course nearly swallowed half the bay in the process! After composing myself and being reassured by K that there's nothing to fear, apparently they're more afraid of us etc. ( i've been told that about spiders too but somehow i'm more inclined to believe it about the sharks! go figure?) So on we went to discover another and then another until at one stage there were 6 directly below me and a few others in my sight! It was incredible.
I came out of the water wanting a cigarette it was that good!
Next on my list to see are Leopard Sharks, Turtles and Manta Rays! Not even sure if it's possible to see any of these whilst snorkelling, but hell if it is, i'm determined to!
I am so disappointed that i'm not allowed to dive, not even primarily for the experience, as i feel i have some kind of a window into that with snorkelling, but for the job opportunities it affords.
To have a job that allows you to spend so much time in waters like these is just such a privilege, though a hard earned one i know.
Speaking of the real world, i really need to get my head down now, get this T.E.F.L. course finished and get me a job!
It's so hard to even think about studying now when there's so many lovely things to do and to plan here. I can hardly believe it's been nearly two weeks already since i arrived. It feels as though i've hardly had the time to appreciate all that's happenning to me and around me. Is that even possible when really all i've had is time since i got here?.
I need to make a visa run, in about two weeks so i'm thinkin of headin back up north towards bankok and perhaps just alittle further to one of the old capitals, Sukhothai, one of the first parts of thailand to claim independance from Khmer rule,a really historic site that is not only the source of the first few letters of the modern Thai alphabet but also responsible for establishing Buddhism as the common faith. I hope then to cross the border by heading east to Angkor in Cambodia, the ancient capital of the Khmer empire, and apparently archaeologically grander than anything in Greece or Rome and unsurpassed by anything in Europe, Asia or Latin America. Can't fail to be impressed really!
I'm not really stuck for time but i hope to do it by land mostly, so i might give it a week to ten days. Both Sukhothai and Angkor Wat are famous for their ancient ruins and temples which are supposed to be magnificent, and i'm looking forward, if not a little apprehensively, to leaving this little coccon i've found and getting my hands dirty! so to speak. Though
I hope that the real treasures i find on this trip are a little less grand than those advertised on the pages of my guide books. I hope that i'm strong enough and smart enough to navigate my way safely. Naively i know, i'm looking forward to long train journeys and cramped buses, if for no other reason than to give you all a good laugh at watching me eat those words on the updates!
Thanks for the e-mails and texts, keeping me upto date on what's happening at home, it means so much to me here.
lotsa love from me to you!
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