THE NIGHTMARE OF TRAVELING THE WORLD (eBook)

Travel Stories You Won't See on Social Media

Rafael Schäfer (Autor)

eBook Download: EPUB

2023 | 1. Auflage
164 Seiten
tredition (Verlag)
9783347983267 (ISBN)

Infos

Near-death experiences while surfing, hiking with diarrhea, and scooter accidents are just a few of the negative experiences Rafael had during his trip. In a year and a half he traveled to 13 different countries and had to deal with all sorts of challenges. In 17 chapters that are sure to induce JOMO (Joy of Missing Out), the author candidly describes the dark sides of travel. These true stories are funny, interesting, and educational as well - at least in hindsight.

After the author had already published many reports of negative experiences when traveling on a blog, he decided to publish them in books. In addition to new projects, the author is currently working on finishing this sentence in order to reach the minimum number of characters...

Textauszug

Chapter 3 – Mexico: Diving Disasters

Chapter 3.1 – Dumb Ways to Dive

After my Italian companion returned to Miami, I decided to stay in Cancún a little longer. In the hostel I met a Mexican who turned out to be a self-employed diving instructor. He was not employed by a diving school but traveled himself. As a freelancer, he looked for his diving students himself and was able to take them on the dive boat with him for reduced rates at a local diving school. He explained to me that the diving schools would also benefit, since they could fill their boats with more people this way. They would go out to sea anyway. In addition, he would only have to pay a low fee for the rental of the diving gear. Although he was still taking a little commission, he claimed he could offer us dives at a bargain price. Two dives would only cost 70 dollars. With my very limited knowledge of diving prices, I could not assess whether this was really a bargain. However, the underwater world in Cancún would be one of the most beautiful in the world, he argued. Overall, his sales pitch was quite convincing, so I accepted the tempting offer.

He introduced me to another client, also from our hostel: a Dutch traveller who wanted to try scuba diving for the first time in his life. I objected that, to my knowledge, he would have to be part of an official diving course for that. An hour of practice in the pool would suffice, the diving instructor replied. On previous trips to Asia, I had already obtained a diving license that allowed me to dive up to 30 meters (100 ft) deep. Additionally, my last dive in Malaysia had only been half a year before. So I felt well prepared even without a refresher in the pool. In fact, my preparation – this time – shouldn't become an issue.

The next day we went to the diving school, which was based in a hotel on the beach. The Dutch guy would be my “dive buddy”. According to the rules, you normally dive in groups of two to pay attention to each other. He now learned the basics of diving in the two meter (6 ft 8 in) deep pool of the diving school in 45 minutes. In a normal diving course, you would actually spend half a day in the pool. He wouldn't have to learn everything yet since the teacher could also help underwater, I thought. Meanwhile I sat around bored.

Later we got on the boat and headed out to sea. With us on deck was another group from the diving school. The teachers seemingly conducted a real course with the protégés. From the start I sensed that our presence wasn't particularly welcome. The other diving instructors didn't seem too happy about the fact that the diving school had simply rented out the other places on the boat to some random diving instructor and his (partially) inexperienced students.

But that was only the beginning. Out of the blue our diving instructor told us that he had some issues with his ear. He had apparently been lured to a deserted stretch of beach the week before by his Tinder date, where he had been mugged. Moreover, the assailants had apparently hit him a few times, also on his ear. My sympathy was limited. Especially because he only now explained to us that he was hearing a whistling sound since then. He therefore wasn't sure whether he might have a small hole in his eardrum. That would mean that he couldn't dive because water would get into his ears. He probably wouldn't be able to properly equalize the pressure while diving down either. He had basically withheld the fact that he wasn't fit for his duties as a diving instructor at all. All of this wasn't quite according to the official diving rules. He would now try to put a crumple up piece of tissue in his ear. The other divers paid no attention to our problem at all.

I was glad that I already had some diving experience and wasn't fully dependent on a diving instructor. I was afraid for my partner who was supposed to do his first dive today. The current situation didn't seem to bother him much though. Since he had never done it before and it had worked so well in the pool, of course he had no way of knowing what was really in store for him in the ocean. The theoretical knowledge of diving and the associated dangers is dealt with in a normal diving course for a whole day.

The boat stopped because we had arrived at the dive site. Our instructor asked us to wait and jumped in the water to test the paper ball in his ear. It wasn't much of a surprise when he came out after a minute. His ear would still fill with water despite its ingenious design. He couldn't dive down because he couldn't equalize the pressure. He came up with another “genius” idea: We should both dive down to the bottom at about eight meters (26 ft) deep and he would stay up. He would swim along the surface and guide us that way. All we had to do was to keep looking up and swim after him.

Even people who have never dived can probably imagine that doing so would break countless diving rules. There were so many red flags. As an experienced diver, I should probably have stopped at this point, prioritizing the safety of me and my completely inexperienced dive buddy. But we had already paid. We certainly wouldn't get a refund from a guy like that. After all, he had already paid the diving school for the rental of the equipment as well as the boat ride. My dive buddy didn't want to quit either. So we entered the water. A reminder for everyone: don't try this at home! (Well, in case you happen to have a diveable body of water at home.) This stunt was performed by professional divers two fools who would rather put themselves at unnecessary risk than waste 70 dollars.

So we slowly dived down to the bottom of the sea. To my astonishment, my Dutch partner pulled it off well. He didn't seem to have any trouble with the steady equalization of pressure as he descended. Even arriving at eight meters (26 ft) deep, he seemed calm without any sign of discomfort. He had apparently memorized the few important gestures for communicating underwater, such as “Okay” (making a circle by touching the tips of your thumb and index finger) or indicating the remaining oxygen volume. For the first time he did very well. The other dive group of our boat dived down a few meters next to us. They still didn't seem to care that two divers were supposed to dive here without an instructor or guide. We saw the instructor on the surface and swam after him as agreed. So far so good. It was amazing to feel the weightlessness of being underwater again.

However, this positivity did not last long: After a few minutes, the diving instructor suddenly disappeared. It was a moment where I wouldn't have been suprised about the existence of a hidden camera like in a prank show. I searched the surface of the water in all directions, but there was no longer a silhouette to be seen. My dive buddy also made helpless gestures. With exaggerated but perhaps Oscar-worthy facial expressions and gestures, I asked my partner if he wanted to surface or to continue the dive. He didn't seem scared and didn't want to leave the underwater world that he had entered for the first time only a few minutes ago.

Since underwater visibility is not very far, you usually need at least one guide to take you to the nice spots and make sure you end up near your boat. You can really “get lost” in the water without a guide. So we had no choice but to swim after the other group from our boat. After all, we wanted to see something too, not just the sandy bottom that was below us at the moment. The goal was the so-called underwater museum, which we reached after a few minutes. It consists of over 500 underwater sculptures that also serve as a home for marine life. These stone formations were admired by other diving groups from other boats at the same time. Therefore, some black diver silhouettes were visible above, between and beside the statues.

We enjoyed looking at the different statues from all sides. The highlight was a stone VW Beetle with some fish living inside. Of course I kept an eye on my dive buddy because I didn't want to lose him too. Mainly for his sake. I kept inquiring about the remaining air in his tank, so that we would still have enough time to surface.

After a while we followed the group again. After two minutes of swimming in one direction only, a nasty surprise followed. The fins of the group in front of us had different colors than before… I got a queasy feeling. We probably had been so fascinated by the statues that we mistakenly followed another diving group afterwards. Underwater you can hardly see the faces under the masks. The black diving suits and silver bottles of all divers also look confusingly similar. Therefore, our mistake had almost been inevitable in this hustle and bustle of diving groups and stone statues.

Somehow I managed to use gestures (or telepathy?) to convince my dive buddy that this was the wrong group. Normally you should surface at the same spot where you descended. Normally. We didn't know where that spot was though. We couldn't see our boat's divers anymore either. In addition, the flat sandy bottom offered no orientation. Since my dive buddy would be running out of air soon anyway, we decided to surface at this exact spot.

We ascended slowly. At a depth of five meters (16 ft) I then held my dive buddy for the “decompression stop” prescribed for safety. He had wanted to keep diving upwards. Remaining for three minutes at this depth is particularly important so that the nitrogen concentration in the blood can be balanced again. Of course, I couldn't judge whether we were really at the depth of five meters (16 ft). It was just an estimate....

Produkt-Details

• Erscheint lt. Verlag: 19.7.2023
• Verlagsort: Ahrensburg
• Sprache: englisch
• Themenwelt: Reisen ► Reiseberichte
• Schlagworte: Adventure • America • Belize • Central America • Colombia • Costa Rica • dark side • Diary • disadvantage • Dream • Ecuador • El Salvador • Expedition • fail • Guatemala • Honduras • Ireland • JOMO • journey • joy of missing out • Latin • Latin America • latin culture • Latino • Mexico • Miami • Nicaragua • Nightmare • Panama • Peru • Schadenfreude • South America • Travel • travel fails • Traveling • USA • World • world travel
• ISBN-13: 9783347983267 / 9783347983267