Diving In: Maldive Adventure, Part 4

So M's birthday and the day of the birthday dinner finally arrived. Because we had been so helpful with the Ms. S problem at the Front Desk, the hotel staff was more than willing to help me surprise M with a birthday cake after dinner, so it was all arranged.

During the day, we took a short excursion to a neighboring island (I think it was Villingilivaru), but don't remember there being much there except for a small souvenir shop (it was, after all, some 30 years ago!). It was nice, however, to be on the sea and also on a different island, however briefly.

On returning, M was not feeling too well, and wanted to rest, and planned to skip dinner. But I had already arranged for the I's and the U's to join us, and for the kitchen to prepare a cake and everything, so I was a little panicky. I guess I must have insisted too strongly, because M got rather angry and said he was not going to dinner, so I went out. A couple of hours later, when the time came, I went to the restaurant.

When I got there, the others were waiting, and wanted to know where M was. I explained the problem, and Mr. I said that he would go and talk to M, so I told him our room number.  They came back together, and M looked rested and refreshed, and had changed into some nice clothes. I told him that I had asked the others from Japan to join us, as it was really our last dinner together in Biyaadhoo. He smiled and then sat down. But as soon as he did, he spotted Ms. S sitting all by herself, and felt sorry for her, so he went over and said something like "We're all having our dinner together tonight, being all the guests from Japan; we didn't see you during the day to invite you ahead of time, but please come and join us.!" She just looked up at him and coldly replied, "No thanks, I'm fine by myself." He was a little taken aback at her response, but rather than repeat the invitation, he just said, "Sorry I bothered you" and returned to our table, shaking his head.

Everyone wanted to know what happened, but he just said that she would rather sit alone. So we paid no further attention to her and enjoyed our wonderful dinner. M mentioned that the food seemed a little better than normal, and even looked different from what the others were eating.  I just said it was probably because they were serving us more family style, but he was right, The hotel was serving us different (= special = better!) food for the "special" birthday dinner, and it was even more delicious than usual. At around dessert time, the staff signaled to me that it was time, and as they dimmed the lights, we all started singing "Happy Birthday" as they brought out a cake.

It was a nice little chocolate cake (what other kind is there?), and I had brought a few small candles from home, so after it got to the table, I added the candles and lit them (only 3, as he became 33 on that day). He made a wish and blew them out, and then we all had a piece of the cake. He still felt bad about Ms. S, so he was wondering if we should ask the waiter bring her a small piece of cake. I thought that that was going far beyond the call of duty, and said, "She was adamant in telling us she wants to be alone, so maybe we should just give her what she wants." Strangely enough, it did not feel bad to say that,and everyone readily agreed, but we were sorry that she she had decided to exclude herself.

I had bought M a new watch as a gift and gave it to him at the table. When he opened it, he liked it so much that he took off his old one and put the new one on right away. In fact, when the waiter came over and said what a nice watch he had, M gave him the old one. He apologized for it being used, but hoped the young man could use it. The waiter was extremely appreciative, and expressed great gratitude. It fit him perfectly and looked really good on him, and his smile said it all. M's watch looked good on him, too, and he was also pleased.

So the evening was a great success. I thanked Mr. I for having gone to get M earlier, and he just winked and said, "No problem." We all finished with an after-dinner drink (some had brandy, some coffee, etc.) and then made our way back to our rooms to pack and get ready for the long trek back to Japan tomorrow. And that is such a bizarre tale that it deserves its own post. So, until next time. . . .

Diving In: Maldive Adventure, Part 3

When I got back from my diving experience, my partner and I had dinner with a couple we had met on the island—a Japanese photographer and his wife (Mr. & Mrs. I), and they had stories to tell about Ms. S, who was becoming rather (in)famous at Biyaadhoo Resort.  She was always sitting alone and when they invited her to sit with them for lunch, she rather abruptly declined and even moved further away. The resort staff were at their wits end trying to satisfy her, but to no avail.

That evening they were having a special Beach Barbecue for all the guests, and it was a nice outdoor feast. We were there with the photographer and his wife, as well as very young newlywed couple from Ichikawa, Japan (Mr. & Mrs. U), and we were all having a good time. Again, we invited her to come and join us, but she would have none of it. So at that point, unfortunately, we all gave up.

Maldivian food revolves largely around fish (mas), in particular tuna (kandu mas), and derives much of its flavor from the Sri Lankan and south Indian, especially Keralan, tradition. Dishes are often hot, spicy, and flavored with coconut, but use very few vegetables.  Curries known as riha are also popular, and the rice is often supplemented with roshi, unleavened bread akin to Indian roti, and papadhu, the Maldivian version of crispy Indian poppadums. A traditional meal might consist of rice, a clear fish broth called garudhiya with side dishes of lime, chili, and onions, or a fish curry; roshi breads and papadhu; grilled fish; and sweet black tea. Some other common dishes include: mas huni — shredded smoked fish with grated coconut and onions: the most common Maldivian breakfast treat; fihunu mas — barbequed fish basted with chili, which is super-hot but wonderful; and 

bambukeylu hiti — breadfruit curry, which is really tasty and one of my favorites on the trip (it is also a refreshing change from more fish!).

Photo courtesy of Trip Advisor.

The beach barbecue  made a nice change from the restaurant and the food was fantastic. There were all kinds of barbecued seafood dishes, Maldivian fish curry, barbecued meats, lots of salads and tons of fruits. It was a very enjoyable evening! And the food was yummy!!!  A few of the Japanese guests did not like the fish, as, being tropical (as opposed to cold water) fish, the flesh was not very firm and it was rather dry. For some, the meats were too overcooked, too, but I made sure that I got pieces that were cooked the way I like them. Overall, it was a fun experience and gave us something other to do than just sit in the restaurant and eat rather similar foods. There is only one restaurant at the resort, and it offers Maldivian and international cuisine with fresh salads, and home-made soups for starters; curries, pasta, meats, and veggies for mains; and fruits and cakes for desserts. The food is not great (as in Wolfgang Puck level), but it is certainly very palatable and quite tasty. The bar is great with all inclusive drinks continually getting topped up as the staff keep coming around and checking your drink. It was highly recommended that we ask for Bombay mix after 5 pm—and that was a great suggestion. It somehow made the segue into dinner a lot easier. . . .

Wildlife on the island is plentiful, and we were surprised with herons walking around, hermit crabs, bats, and of course the fish. We snorkeled and swam with 2 turtles less than 2 feet away from us: they were so majestic in the water. The coral is great and colorful. We just had to remember we were in the tropics, but fortunately we had taken plenty of sunscreen and mosquito repellent with us.

The day after, my partner (M) and I, went snorkeling, and  we had a great time, with all the fish, turtles, and even some rays. The island, as I said in an earlier post, is like a long pencil rising from the seabed. The top of the eraser is like a table reef, in the middle of which is a little island. That means that basically, if you swim beyond the edge of the table reef, you suddenly find yourself in open water about a mile deep. Well, we were having a great time, basically snorkeling our way around the island (it takes about an hour with stops). M was having lots of fun and I noticed that he was near the edge of the reef but did not think anything of it.

Fish seen snorkeling around Biyaadhoo

All of a sudden, I looked over at him and he sank like a stone. At first I was frozen, not knowing what was going on, but after a split second I took a deep breath and dove in after him. I had to go down about 5 or 6 meters quickly and grab him and bring him back to the table reef. Even there at the edge, the water was shallow enough that we could stand as it only came up to our chests. After he caught his breath, I asked him what the problem was. "Weren't you on the swimming team in college???" —"Yeah, but that was in a pool that was at the most 2 m deep and I could easily see the white bottom. This is jet black and bottomless and seemed to go on forever and I just panicked and started sinking like a stone. Thank goodness you came to get me!" I didn't know what to say. I had never met anyone who was a good swimmer in a pool but a stone in the open water, so thank my lucky stars that I dove in and retrieved him, or he probably would have kept sinking till he hit the bottom!

I was telling the I's about it, and the husband laughed, saying, "Next time, let me know. I'd love to photograph him sinking!" We all got a chuckle out of that. Then, when my partner went to the restroom, I said to the I's and the U's, "Tomorrow is M's 33rd birthday, and I am going to have the hotel bake him a cake, so please join us for dinner; but it's a secret, so don't mention it!" They all agreed and after M came back we all said good night and made it back to our comfy rooms.

Diving In: Maldive Adventure, Part 2

So, after the interruption and some good sleep, we got up and had a late breakfast and went to the beach. While lying in the sun, I asked my partner if he wanted to do an experiential dive with the PADI school on the island. When he asked why I asked, I said that after Ms. S came and asked us if we wanted to go diving, I realized that I had always wanted to try Scuba diving and had never had the opportunity, but now we were here on this island paradise, surrounded by the ocean, and the chance to give it a try. He said, "Hell, no. I am definitely not interested in going underwater to meet the sharks!" I tried to tell him the only sharks inside the atoll were the little reef sharks, which are essentially harmless, but he still refused. So I went by myself to the diving school and and arranged to give it a try, while he decided to have a wind-surfing lesson, instead, as he much preferred to be on the water rather than in it.

One other reason I wanted to try diving was that on the flights on the way to the island, we found ourselves traveling together with a famous Japanese actor, NT, a very handsome man about my age, who was traveling with his own diving instructor, Mr. S. They had told me how wonderful the diving in the Maldives is, and my curiosity was piqued. . . .

When the time came, I went to the school for our pre-diving instruction. They had already warned me not to drink any carbonated beverages or gas-producing foods before the dive, so I was well warned. We were given instruction on safety measures, told what to do and what not to do, and shown how to use the equipment, etc. When we had finished all the preliminaries,  they helped get on all our gear, and we entered the sea at a shallow beach and just had a test dive to see if everything was OK. While "diving" in the shallows (it was really like deep snorkeling, as we were just getting used to everything), I saw a beautiful cone shell that I picked up to look at. The dive master saw me and immediately told me to drop it, which I did. When we got to the top, he said, "When I said don't touch or pick up anything, I meant it. The shell you picked up fires poisonous darts at predators, and you are mighty lucky that you did not get hit with one." He went on to stress very strongly that the prettier something in the sea looks, the greater the chance that it is very dangerous.  We all got the message. Then we did our real dive, along a wall reef.

The Biyaadhoo Wall

Scuba diving is done at a leisurely drift pace as the Indian Monsoon Current sweeps through the island atolls, moving nutrients and divers along. This nutrient-rich water flows up along the walls, feeding the beautiful sponges and soft corals clinging to the rock sides. This leisurely wall dive was fairly easy, with a light current. The instructor had told us to stay close to him, since, when faced with a wall in a deep place, people tend to forget how deep they are and wind up going way beyond the 30 m limit. So I was conscious enough to stay nearby. The island itself is like a pencil that rises up from about a mile deep, so the wall continues down forever. There was much vegetation, abundant coral, and lots of fish—the waters around Biyaadhoo are filled with numerous types of aquatic life. You can see clownfish, blue-stripe snappers, groupers, butterfly fish of several colors, sea turtles, and tunas. I also saw plenty of sea life, including a group of golden angel fish, a big napoleon wrasse, a moray eel, a colorful lionfish, and white tipped reef sharks. Some people said they saw some spotted mantas and some eagle rays. Sometimes we were surrounded by dozens of blue-and-yellow palette surgeonfish, or by colorful parrotfish, and we were all amazed by the lushness and brightness of the colors as well as by the enormous quantity of fish. The number of colors and varieties of both the corals and other marine life was so amazing that I just wanted to stay there and look at it all forever. It was so beautiful, it opened my heart with deep love for the Earth and the treasures of her seas.

Friendly Surgeonfish

While floating almost effortlessly in the water, another member of our group, an Italian guy (?) got too close and accidentally yanked the regulator right out of my mouth. The instructor later told me that he was amazed at how casually I just reached for it and put it back in, not really phased at all. I had really taken to heart his dictum that "panic underwater = disaster." That was really all it was—I was determined not to breathe in water or panic. He praised me for my cool thinking and quick action, and recommended that I go on to get my PADI certification. We did not stay long enough for me to do that, but as we were again on the same flight with NT and Mr. S on the trip back to Japan, I arranged to get my C Card from Mr. S a couple of weeks later in Tokyo.

Diving in the Maldives is amazing—it must be one of the top spots in the world. The water is so clear you can see for 20 m easily. It is like diving in an enormous aquarium, except that the water seems even cleaner and goes on forever. The Maldives are an underwater photographer’s dream come true, so it is a great place to take the PADI Digital Underwater Photographer course. In addition, because of the gentle drift current, the PADI Drift Diver course will prepare you for the drift dives through the channels. These days, enriched air (nitrox) is also available, so the PADI Enriched Air Diver course is a good idea for those of you who want to extend their underwater time on shallow dives.

It was an incredible adventure, and ever since then, whenever I travel anywhere where the diving is good, I always try to manage to get in a few dives. The best so far have entailed being kissed by a Manta (off Kona, Hawai'i); swimming with a whale shark (Maldives and Bali); playing with the dolphins and being visited by a pod of humpback whales (also off Kona, Hawai'i); and meeting Mustafa, the guardian barracuda of the "Liberty" wreck in Tulamben (Bali); and being visited by eagle rays in the Red Sea (off Sharm el-Sheikh, the Sinai peninsula).

After the dive, I made my way back to my room (on the second floor) and rested before dinner, but  before that I had heard the next chapter in the story of Ms. S. . . .

It seems that after we shunned her, Ms. S managed to get taken out on a boat bringing out a group of divers to a good dive spot, but then she used someone else's air (as she has not reserved her own ahead of time, there were no extra tanks on board for her to use); without even asking, she just took it and attached her gear and went diving. When told of her mistake, she did not think she had done anything wrong and  was not willing to make any recompense, thinking the air was there for whoever used it first. So the person who had paid for the air and the dives was not able to dive. And as if that had not been enough, she even broke the guage on that other guest's tank! If it had been me, I'd would have pushed her overboard and quoted Paul Lynde when asked what someone says instead of "Man overboard" when it is a woman: "Full steam ahead!" The head of the diving center was livid, and had been complaining when my group got back from our dive. I told M all about it and he said that we should have nothing more to do with her during our time on Biyaadhoo. I thoroughly agreed, and we shook our heads and laughed at how self-centered and inconsiderate some people can be. . . .

Diving In: Maldive Adventure, Part 1

Well, I have finally emerged from the Dark Ages and have started my own blog. I feel like some ancient eremite who has just left his mountain-cave hermitage and entered a bustling city in the 21st century! However will I survive? It feels like a photo I saw the other day of people waking around in bio-hazard suits just to be able to walk through Walmart! Indeed!

So, with that as an impromptu preamble, here goes. . . .

Blogging is something that I thought I would never do, but here I am writing these words on my blog generating page, and if you are reading them then I was successful in posting them.

Diving into the Internet is a little scary, like diving into the sea, so let's talk about that for my first post.

In 1986, I had the good fortune to visit the Maldives with my partner, M. We stayed on a little island in the south atoll called Biyaadhoo, and our hotel was basically the only large structure on the island. It was like being in Paradise. It is a very small island, and one can walk around the whole thing in about 20 minutes.  But getting there from Japan was a bit of a trek.

We flew on Air Lanka, and flew first from Tokyo to Bangkok, and then continued on to Colombo, Sri Lanka, where we had a short stopover. I don't remember changing planes, but they came and checked our planes and we had to point out which bag was ours before they would put it back on the plane. From Colombo we flew to  Malé, the small skinny island in the south of the north atoll that serves as the international airport for the Maldives. The runway is just barely long enough, and it looked like we might overshoot it and slide right into the Indian Ocean, but stop we did. On arriving, we got our bags and made our way to the boat that was the carry us to the south atoll to our own private resort island. Wow!

The voyage was uneventful and we arrived smoothly and on time. After we were all checked in and settled in our room, however, there was a slight problem. There was a phone call from the Front Desk, and they wanted some help with a Japanese tourist who did not understand any English so no one could understand her and she couldn't understand them. They asked if we could possibly help them , and of course M and I went right down.  A young girl, Ms. S, had gotten on our boat by mistake and had no reservation. She also had no way of getting anywhere else, as the boat comes only once a week and had already gone. She spoke nothing but Japanese and the Manager was really having a hard time. When he realized I could speak Japanese, he called my room and asked if I would be willing to help him, so I said, "Of course," and promptly went to the Front Desk.  There was this young Japanese girl in her mid-twenties looking lost and bewildered and not understanding a thing the hotel was trying to tell. She was shouting that she had reserved a room and wanted to check in. I asked the hotel what the problem was and interpreted for them, explaining her tale to the hotel. It was at this point that we all figured out that she had taken the wrong boat and come to the wrong resort. The hotel said that they could not honor her voucher for another property, but they did have a room she could use, but she would have to pay for it. They did offer her a discount, given the situation, and, although she was very displeased and unhappy, she finally accepted, perhaps gratefully, but not very gracefully. (She actually had no choice, as there was no way she could go anywhere else, except perhaps the nearby Villingilivaru, but it would not have been any different there, and I don't even remember there being a resort on that island in those days. And, as is turns out, the company she had purchased the tour from finally agreed to forward her payment to this resort instead of the one she had actually made a reservation at; but, if I recall, she did have to pay a slight difference.) We eventually got everything sorted out, and, rather unwillingly, it seemed, she thanked us, the hotel thanked us, and then my partner and I retired to our rooms to clam down a rest. A few hours later we had a very quick dinner, after which we fell into our beds, it having taken about 24 hours just to get there. We hoped to sleep till about noon!

Imagine our shock and surprise when there was loud pounding on the door at about 7 AM the next morning. I groggily got out of bed, threw a pair of shorts on, and answered the door. It was Ms. S. and she wanted to know if one of us would go diving with her today. She came to the Maldives to dive and needed a buddy, and wondered if either of us wanted to go with her. I looked at her and said something like, "Sorry, but we don't dive. What I really want to do is go back to sleep!"  She looked quite annoyed and a little angry, so I quickly said, "Sorry!" once again and shut the door. She stormed off and we dove back into our beds and swiftly went back to sleep.

I was astonished at how uncaring and rude she was. She had been rude with the hotel staff and now with us, and we decided we didn't want to have anything else to do with her while staying there.

But the adventure continued. . . .