I left the island at 8am and headed to Male’ to join a fun dive. It was a warm, sunny morning, the last Sunday of 2019.
I reached the meeting point at 9:30am and as I waited for the instructor and other divers to arrive, the bright blue sky suddenly turned gray. The round swollen clouds are ready to spill anything on it at any given time. The wind blew hard. Continue reading “Year End Dive”
You wake up earlier than usual, thinking of the dream you just had. Not the worst, also not the best. Then you started thinking about work and other things. But you thought you’ll stop thinking and just lie on your bed, pull your blanket until your shoulders and watch the thin rays of light peeping through the curtains, giving light to the dark old room you are in. You let yourself indulge in that feeling of being in bed longer than you need to, for there were days you miss it, when you break your back sitting in the office for long hours.
Yesterday, I had a chance to visit Bandidhoo Island. It was my 2nd time to visit this island but on my first visit, I never got the chance to take pictures earlier so this time, I seized the opportunity.
A few days ago, I was in Velana International Airport for my flight to Manila. I arrived at the airport at 11:30am and my flight is, still, at 8:55pm.
I’m good at wasting spending time alone however, 9 hours is quite long for an airport as small as Velana Int’l Airport.
Continue reading “Finding Peace In Chaos: 9 Hours in Velana International Airport”
One of the perks of working here in the Maldives is that whenever you get stressed from your daily tasks or routine, you can just go out of your office and look at the stunning view and you’ll be so relaxed when you get back to the office.
And if the view is not enough, you can swim or snorkel or go for cruise or night fishing.
Yesterday, me and my colleagues went out for a fishing trip. The water was so still, the color combination of the sea and the sky and the sunset, oh, I just can’t put into words the magnificence of the view so I just took photos and you decide how you are going to describe these images.
I’ve read somewhere, that photography is not about taking photos of what everyone can see daily. It is about looking for angles that everyone fails to see, unless you point it out to them – by taking photos (these aren’t the exact words but, something along these lines).
I have mentioned several times here already that I live in a small island and you can walk around it for 15mins. Sometimes I ask myself what other angle of the island have I not taken photo of. The trees and the flowers and the beach have been there for the last 6months and though I am not a photographer, sometimes my hands itch to click the camera.
However, a few days ago, I have kept my camera close to me and tried to catch moments that are out of the ordinary (or as I thought so) and here are some of the photos.
I saw the recent post of Dionne on instagram and I was like, WOW ABS! I heard she is a swimmer, so I came up with an idea.
I went snorkeling for 2 days in a row thinking, if I would snorkel everyday, my abs can come a little bit closer to that of Dionne.
So yesterday was the start of I-wanna-have-abs-like-Dionne work out.
D, my snorkeling partner and I, decided to swim till the platform. The platform is a floating deck in the middle of the water, about 100 meters away from the shore, on top of approximately 6 meters deep water, where we can take some rest before heading back to the water again.
So from the shore to the platform and vice versa will be about 200 meters. Not bad for a workout, right?
Yesterday’s swim was really ok even though the weather was a bit bad as it was cloudy. But today, the sun was smiling to us, giving my already tanned skin an even nicer tan.
Though yesterday, D complained that she got wounded on her palm. She said that two huge fish were swimming along with her and hit her palm, though I didn’t really believe her as her wound looked more like a paper cut to me.
Today, as we were already halfway to the platform, I felt a sting somewhere below my right knee but I didn’t pay attention to it. We continued and as we reached the platform, we climbed up to take some rest. Then I saw the wound. And the blood. I tried not to panic.
Blood + Ocean = Shark
But still, I tried not to panic for we were 100 meters away from the shore. And if I panic, D will panic 100 times more.
I tried to figure out how I got this wound and couldn’t come up with a conclusion. I know for sure I didn’t get this from the corals and until now, this is still a mystery to me.
After taking a few minutes of rest on the platform, we headed back to the water.
I felt a sting below my right knee as we headed back to the salt water. I haven’t watched The Shallows and I guess I won’t watch it anytime while I’m here in the Maldives. Don’t get me wrong. Till date, no cases of shark attacks have been reported here in the Maldives as the common specie here is the Black Tip Reef Shark, a harmless type. It’s just me and not the Maldives.
Blood + Ocean = Shark
And honestly when we headed back to the water, I was shit scared.
D took the lead. I was swimming at a much slower pace because I was already tired. D was like an Energizer battery charged twice.
I was following D when I saw something on the ocean bed. A huge stingray. A huge f@^#*ng stingray.
I was panicking and I was breathing very fast, my goggles started to fog. I told myself, the stingray won’t think I’m a food right? But I was still freaking out. Then I saw D swimming like a car running on NLEX at 4 in the morning – 150kmph (as I assumed). D was about 10 f@^#*ng meters away from me, leaving me with this huge f@^#*ng sting ray and not to forget the wound below my knee.
After swimming for my life and I was really hoping that the huge f@^#*ng sting ray didn’t follow me, I was again shit scared when I swam across a school of tiny fish, don’t ask me what type of fish this is, I don’t have a clue.
They were peacefully swimming as a group when I suddenly swam across them creating chaos. These tiny creatures swam all over me (maybe thinking I’m hunting them?) and they actually hurt my skin. But what scared me the most is that it was feeding time already. Whenever I am at the beach in the afternoons, I would see these tiny creatures flying at the surface of the water (they almost looked like a smaller version of flying fish to me) as they were being chased by the huge ones.
With that in mind while I was swimming in the middle of these tiny ones, I almost had a heart attack.
And when D and I reached the shore, I was like, f@^#!
I like seeing these sea creatures from afar, not while I’m swimming especially when I don’t have a pro swimmer/diver with me.
Today’s experience was really freaking scary but I think, with a bit more exposure to these sea creatures, my fear will subside later on.
I will still snorkel, maybe after my mini trauma is gone. I still wanna have abs like Dionne though.
