“Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god…”
We’re all pretty nervous when we arrive in the morning. Official examiners from the regional Andalusian government are going to be overseeing and grading the theoretical and practical part of the exam.
IDs and phones on the corner of the table, pencils and calculators ready. We have 1,5h for the theory part and then there’s an hour of problems to calculate and dives to tabulate.
I’ve spent most of the night trying to memorise parts of human anatomy in Spanish, dreading the physiology part. No physiology questions, “Me c*#o en la leche!”.
So far so good, the theory and calculation part of the day went well I think. It’s time to get in the water.
We will have to navigate our way to a point marked by a buoy and cut a piece of metal, ascend and show our work. Of course all the kit preparation, entry procedures and our demeanour on the surface and in the water is being judged. We will have to be perfectly co-ordinated and the examiners are watching our every move.
Ronan and I pair up. We’ve done most of the course together and it’s the natural choice.
“Prepare! Ready? Water!” We hit the water perfectly and our co-ordination and timing is spot on. We come up right next to each other and give the “OK” to the examiners. “SHIT!” I look over at Ronan, his mask is gone. He has a look of terror in his eyes. It fell off on the impact.
Toffy, deployed as safety diver quickly dives down into the mirky water and a split second later, Ronan has his mask back in his hand. He quickly puts it on and I can see in his eyes that he’s completely sure he has already failed the exam. We’re not supposed to talk in the water and as we swim over to where we’re sent, I stroke his arm to let him know “don’t worry, it’ll be ok”.
We’re safety divers for the first pair to complete the exercise and quietly wait on the surface, watching our colleagues bubbles. “Don’t worry” I whisper into my snorkel. “There’s still the whole rest of the exercise.”
It’s our turn to cut the piece of metal. We swim to the buoy, right next to each other, making sure we do absolutely everything perfectly. “Ok. Descend!” and we descend at the exact same time. Phew. Ok, we’re under water, the examiners can’t see us. Time to take a deep breath and calm ourselves a little. It’s a strange thing for me, and Ronan has told me the same. But the moment my head is under water and I hear that familiar “TSHHH – tsssss” coming from my regulator, there is a calmness that comes over that I can’t compare to anything and have a hard time describing.
We’re in our element now, this is the easy part. Cesar is already waiting for us with the saw and metal. We work away and everything goes smoothly. “Ok. Ascend!”
Our heads reach the surface at the exact same time as we ascend to show our work. We get the “OK” and get out of the water. Time for the next pair.
Ronan is freaked out and convinced that he failed. We all assure him that we don’t think so. After all we did the rest of the exercise perfectly.
Everyone’s done and we start cleaning all our equipment. We’re all still a little bit tense. No news yet on whether we passed the practical part. I glance over at the examiners, they’re huddled together, discussing our results. Tato is with them too.
I go back to cleaning my kit when suddenly from somewhere the message gets passed down the line. “Everyone passed the practical part!” YAY!
Ronan sighs a big sigh of relief and we all cheer. Everyone was nervous.
We head back to the school and as I pack up all my kit, I can’t believe that its really over.I’ll miss the guys and I’ll miss Tato, Teresa and their lovely daughters. I these five weeks of learning, studying and training together we’ve all grown quite close.
Before saying good-bye to everyone we all go out for a meal together, laughing, telling stories and reminiscing.
There’s lots of hugs and kisses as we say good-bye to Tato, Teresa, Toffy and Helena. They’ve been like a family to us this entire time and we’re all a little bit sad to have to leave them.
I hug the boys one by one, I’ve gained 8 brothers. We’ll see each other again sometime, somewhere, perhaps underwater.
Photographer: Helena, Camera: Smartphone