PADI Man

Woke up with a bit of a sniffle - last night was quite worried as it seemed that I was getting something of a cold. In actuality, it's not that bad -- it just feels worse because my ears are a bit messed up from the diving. Anyway - another early start and another very nice breakfast from the Cheers Café of vietnamese coffee, morning bread with jam and the best fruit salad I can remember eating - and I was on my way to my final day of the open water course. Explained my predicament to Mr Giap and he seemed to think that it would be fine - we'd go slowly and we probably wouldn't do the full 18 metres today. If he was happy then I was happy. Had a few problems with my sinuses on the way down - a line of pain across my left forehead recurred a few times but by blowing my nose underwater (a little bit disgusting but necessary) I managed okay. Saw some more coral and fishes etc ... Not a hell of a lot that I didn't see the day before but it's the experience of being underwater that is what I was there for - and it was still infinitely better than seeing said fishes on tv. Second dive there was a moray eel (when you're swimming in the creek, and an eel bits your cheek, that's a moray ....) which I didn't see. Very fun - but very tiring day. My cold seemed a little bit better afterwards but my ears ar still completely crap - can't hear much at all, I think it's more than just the pressure because when I dug around in there (had to be done) I found a lot of very gooey wax. When I thought about it that would be the longest my head had ever been completely submerged ... It's quite likely that the act of immersion is going to mess around with them as well. Anywy - the advantage is that with my ear completely f**keds I might be able to get to sleep better in the evening when i'm on the overnight bus to Saigon tonight.
The other thing is that floating underwater for so long completely ruins my hair - i'm sure it looks beautiiful when it's under, waving around like the fronds of an anemone (and with fronds like these who needs them) but while their gracefully waving around they're also getting encrused with salt and they're twisting themselves around each other in some kind of knot unknown to any sailor - agonising to get out - my scalp was already scraped raw from the brush from yesterday - and is much worse today. Anyway - got back and had lunch at the dive shop (the same lunch three days in a row ... Quite nice but I don't know how the staff cope with the monotony) and did my exam. Didn't pass the theory with flying colours but good enough to get my certification - so now i'm an open water diver - hurrah!!!!