The PADI Rescue Diver and Emergency First Response courses are quite possibly the single most strenuous, physically debilitating and exhausting things I have ever undertaken in my life. I feel like I’ve been beaten up and left for dead on the beach whilst a flock of starved seagulls viciously peck out my eyeballs and take chunks out of my gradually decaying corpse. Throughout the course I had to lift men, carry them out of the ocean on my back, give CPR, rescue unresponsive divers underwater and tow them to shore, swimming them back to the beach whilst administering rescue breaths and taking off all scuba equipment. Because the instructors here have to physically and mentally test me during this course, they were enacting emergency rescue scenarios constantly, all day, every day, at any time. I was on edge 24/7, wondering when the next 'emergency' would occur. The final scenario happened whilst I was sitting the final written exam. The instructor came in screaming "Help! Help! There are two missing divers in the ocean, we need to search for and rescue them!" To which my answer was "Oh... f@*!CK..." I had to come up with a search pattern and execute it underwater, leading a team to find the missing divers. Luckily I found them in the last minute - only just. The extreme current made it next to impossible to follow my search pattern. After finding the divers, I had to 'save their lives' by towing, providing rescue breaths, removing equipment, carry them out of the water to shore (bearing in mind these people were like, six foot tall men that were anywhere between three and four times my weight. In comparison I am a teeny five foot six little one weighing 98 pounds with about as much strength as a new born kitten.) Finally, I had to finish the exercise by giving CPR and emergency oxygen to bring them back to life. I thought I had failed due to physically struggling so much, but I was pleasantly surprised to have passed the whole thing, including the written exam, with 96%. CHUFFED IS NOT THE WORD!
A couple of weeks ago my friends found a tiny kitten on its own. It had to have been no more than a couple of days old. We thought it had been abandoned, so we readied ourselves to adopt it. But luckily, whilst we were deciding a name for him, his momma came back for him.
There has been no rain for over a week now. Hot, sunny, clear blue skies have been continuing for days, and consequently the evenings have been just as gloriously beautiful as the day. The other evening, I laid on the beach watching the moon over the sea for hours, whilst eating chocolate cake with my buddies and being feasted upon by the nation's chubbiest mosquitoes.
