Record of Dive-6

 

The day after Keket completed her first month with us JP left Mozambique for his fourth period in Qatar. It was a sad day, tormented by a grave wind. What a contrast with the summery Sunday we just had the day before! Winter here doesn’t happen gradually or suddenly. It comes through extreme variations that are both interesting and challenging. We never know what comes along with a new day.

 

Date of Dives: April 2009.

Dive Location: Mozambique.
Weather Conditions: changing winds.

 

Divers & Jobs: Andy’s emotional life is a mystery. We gave up to understand it. I think JP left disappointed with a few things. But then, isn’t disappointment a way to reach maturity? The room where JP sleeps when he doesn’t have anything better to do is empty again. Due to his periodical jobs it’s almost as if our lives have been following the patterns of seasonal work. TD’s life is about to change to a more mature scenario too. We have been trying to support JP, NB and Jo’s aspirations for more regular jobs by creating local a business. Yet, it’s not easy. I haven’t seen Vic for so long that I wouldn’t be surprised if someone said he is no longer living here. I forgot to ask JP if they have been in touch. Paul is still looking for an occupation to keep him busy through the winter and to give us some extra cash to make the difference between having a quiet average time and a few interesting programs ahead. As long as Keket is a crazy pup (as JP calls her) I am not free for big adventures. With a bit of luck, maybe I’ll be able to squeeze a visit to Marracuene and Macaneta.

Thoth is Getting Married While I Crave Sushi

 

Thoth, if you don’t know yet, is our dog. He was born on the 3rd of July 2006 and is an adult dog now with almost 3 years old. He came to us a little late to do a lot in terms of his growth, but he was well trained and displayed a nice personality from the start.

 

From January on I’ve been looking for a companion for him. I am glad I only had to say no once. The second one seems perfect and arrangements are now made. Well, the only thing left for us is to pick up the bride, this sweet black thing still unnamed, and introduce her to a very unaware groom.

 

While all this happens, Seabell is starting to feel a bit gourmand with the unexpected opportunity to celebrate with two or three sushi dinners.

 

We do have reasons to toast in bridal terms, even if with sake. Jo, who is JP’s friend and colleague, besides being one of my seven divers, married yesterday. Though we didn’t stayed long because of another compromise, I liked Jo’s wedding very much.

Knights

 

          Last summer, four divers at Inhaca island talking about spearfishing near
               Santa Maria for sure. From left: Andy, the backs of Vic, TD and JP. 

    

The day JP left our home, I started to write a blog for the first time. I had two good reasons to do it: concerns about JP’s new life and spare time for myself. JP is very demanding and I used to spend a great deal of time attending his requests. This happened in the middle of last May. While I was writing a daily post, JP proved that he is capable of living by himself.

 

Bit by bit, JP came back to us, sweet and mutterer as always. Within days he will fly to start a new job. When he left, he kissed tenderly my head.  That was the first time the word “knight” crossed my mind.

 

The next day, as if instinctively they knew the right thing to do, TD informed us of his arrival and Andy and friends were everywhere to be seen. I don’t even talk of other divers, and friends of divers.

 

When I started this blog, there was the possibility of a parallel with Snow White due to the “seven divers”, a “girl” and the word “tales”. Today I am convinced that if my space has something to do with narratives, it has to be the Knights of the Round Table. Besides being gallants, my knights are engaged in fabulous adventures and we do have a true quest to accomplish.

 

Good things happened since then. For instance, yesterday I had the best and worst possible moments. Monica, JP’s ex-girlfriend and his love from his 12 years to this date, stopped by and we had a nice chat. After several months apart, I talked with my sister again and we smoked the peace pipe! TD and girlfriend came for nice Italian dinner, desert of Swiss chocolates, huge migraine and tears with compliments of girlfriend Y and a few other facts of life.

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This morning I danced and my astral went UP. I think I am going to adhere to a dance movement on behalf of a love story. A friend of mine said to me that she would dance with every single human being for a moment with “him”. So I am in for her cause and I already have some followers: TD danced a little African style with me yesterday night, husband danced in the middle of a store to show me a particular step, and others have danced, even some that are very distant from us.

 

Don’t be ashamed to dance for such a good cause. Dance to express your love or her love. African or other style. Dance now, where you are, or dance later. It is contagious! I danced and danced, and started to rain outside. Could I have picked the wrong track?

       

See you on the other side

When I close my eyes

And I reach the light…

 

Stars come out to shine

Across the water line

I can feel you on the other side…

 

When I reach the light

I’ll see you on the other side

See you on the other side… 

PvD 

Harbors

 

The heavy sands project in Chibuto, near Xai-Xai, requires the construction of a new port. Four divers went to Xai-Xai, mainly to fix the jack up barge: supervisor divers JP and P, and divers Jo and Phy.

 

During five days they have executed dives to mark anchors position, give support to the barge, fix the wave rider buoy and install new chains connected to the large anchors in order to fix new pendent wires. The barge is supposed to collect samples of sand to establish construction viability.

 

Here is daily routine at Xai-Xai, courtesy of JP: sea view wake up, organize material, approaching the barge, execute dives until the barge is secure to the bottom, P and Phy after a day work (this photo shows the reef barrier and the only pool where it is safe to swim without sharks), and the house where they stayed. At the end of the day, “big Jo” is always the one who cooks because he is a diver and also a qualified chef.

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Today it was a little sad because we had to say goodbye to the group of divers who stayed in Mozambique for almost three months. They will meet NB in Durban, arrived from the Gulf, while JP flies to Qatar and then to the Gulf. He is supposed to be back by the end of the year. They all promised to send me news, including “big Jo” who will stay in Durban for now. JP was busy preparing his underwater camera and other equipment until the last minute. The good news are: Will is still alive, the little black thing is mine and TD is coming soon to make me smile! 

Country Flowers

 

Two weekends ago, when we went to Marracuene, we were greeted near the ferryboat by six children, or even more, offering flowers. Some of them were really small, six years maximum, and they could already speak a few words in English:

 

“My offer to you!”

 

It was a nice gesture so I accepted the first flower, but the little one kept his hand insistently begging. I had to give him a couple of meticais. The next minute, more than ten children “offering” all kind of wild plants surrounded our car.

 

I tried to explain to a more insistent one that if we offer a present to someone we shouldn’t expect something in return.

 

“Do you understand?” I asked in my best emphatic Portuguese.

 

He replied to me with a yes, so I accepted the second flower. Well, you know already what happened: I had to give him more meticais or his little hand would never stop begging. Sometimes our best intentions are confronted by the inexorable reasoning of others.

 

If you are new in “welcome to Marracuene protocol”, my best advise is: do carry a reasonable amount of coins with you, or you will risk leaving the place empty hands in what concerns local flora!

Yesterday vs Today

  

Yesterday

My divers are on the move with new jobs and tasks. JP, Jo and a couple of South Africans went to Xai-Xai to help fixing a barge to the bottom of the sea. NB, who has been in Gulf of Mexico for the last months, is supposed to arrive in the first week of October. Vic used to be JP’s best underwater fishing companion, but now is working for a tourist operator in Malongane. During the weekend we must have a reason to celebrate… the boys promised us a ton of mussels from Xai-Xai!

 

As for the occasional divers: Paul is fine and TD arrived yesterday at Joburg coming from Cape, where he had a busy schedule. I hope he reads this post and comes back soon, because right now he will be the only one capable of cheer me up. Andy appeared after a long weekend, happy as a birdie because in two days he will fly 1^st class to Durban, from where he is going to drive the Rover he picked for our friend Ro.

 

I had to seat for a while with Andy’s friend KK in order to understand what was happening with our computer. It turn out I was so nervous that I made a mess with passwords that I use everyday without a single hesitation.

 

I have a couple of lady friends who need to cry at least twice a year. They call it therapeutic cry and explained me that this is a form to get rid of stress and worries. My life must have been a good one so far, because I can’t remember the last time I have cried. “Little Bell” cried once and for all those years, though she didn’t cried for herself. She cried reading a text in a language that she almost couldn’t understand, all she could feel was the deep emptiness wrapping all the things he touched and the words he wrote. She felt such incontrollable sympathy for the author and his fate that she simply couldn’t stop crying. Does love have to be tragic? For someone who sees it pleasant and satisfying, it is a chock to read that such feelings do exist. I really wish that one day he would be able to find peace and everything he wants.

 

Today

Who would have said that my addicted crying friends are right! Except for loosing a couple of eyelashes, I wake up this morning feeling fresh and ready to start. Perhaps it was my husband good disposition due to the newspapers talk about a book that interest us in particular, but during our usual morning talk I felt adventurous enough to suggest a trip to Europe. After some considerations, he accepted the possibility of going with Andy within 1 to 9 months. That means the possibility of including Germany and who knows what else!    

 

Finally, I would like to present to family and friends, specially to my friend F, the new object of my affection!

Hard Day

 

 

 

Yesterday it was a hard day for us because our old dog Will got sick. Although we are still waiting for the result of exams, thanks to a pill and an injection Will looks OK today.

 

On the other hand, JP and Jo are happy with the end of the port job. It was a good challenge for all, but it is a relief that it is over now.

 

The shutter arrives.

 

           It is raised to the right place.

 

 

                    Divers’ working base: a jack up barge.

Well Done

 

A clumsy pilot crushed his boat against the harbour, leaving behind an important part of it completely destroyed. Could he be drunk, as someone told me? Well, today I have the pleasure to announce that the repair job is almost done. A friend told us that the team is now finishing what seems to be a well orchestrated effort.

 

The first images show the 12m high shutter used to support that part of the damaged wall, before pouring the concrete. In the final image, you can see how it will look when the job is finished.

 

    

Risky Adventure

 

 

 

Early on a Saturday morning, last June, Andy sat down and watched a little TV while waiting for two German friends to pick him up to go on a sport fishing trip. Andy and two German friends (one of them can’t swim) left at dawn for what should have been a fantastic fishing session. The plan was to return early, they all wanted to be back by 4pm to watch Germany play Sweden in the World Cup.

Shortly after 7am, while they tried to make the zigzag to skirt the waves, a necessary maneuver to leave the bay and to enter the open ocean, a very strong wave turned the boat upside down. Andy and one of his friends surfaced and saw that the boat was upside down and being dragged to the high-sea.

The other German was nowhere to be seen. Remembering that he could not swim, they started to cry out his name. After a while they discovered him unharmed and very scared, underneath the boat, holding on to an iron and breathing the air that was trapped under the boat.

It was hard to rescue him from under the boat and equally hard to place him in security on the keel of the turned boat, from where it was easy to slide. The panic was constant. Andy could only salvage some objects floating nearby, many of them were saved in the air balloon formed underneath the boat. Rods, cell phones, digital cameras, etc, were gone or damaged.

Despite being a semi-rigid, the boat was still large and heavy, with capacity for twelve people. Just one engine weights two hundred kilos, therefore it was not possible to try to turn it. Two hours later the three friends were still on the turned keel, arguing what measures to take.

The fact that two boats had passed without reaction to the requests for help, only contributed to increase their despair. One of the boats come closer and gave some turns around them, from a position where they could clearly see the distressing situation, but when Andy with gestures indicated that he intended to throw a rope to be towed, the boat pulled out and disappeared for good.

It was after 10am, when Andy concluded that the tide was moving the boat away from visible land, and that it was necessary to act. He dived, removed the best fins and one life-vest from one of the bilges of the boat, and started to swim to the beach. The two Germans didn’t want him to go, because the coast line looked to be very distant and the water was really cold, not to mention the sharks that infest the area.

Andy, 28 years old and a fit man, described what it is to swim until no longer feeling his legs and also the unreal sensation to see the beach coming closer and closer. The beach where he arrived was rocky. He immediately abandoned the fins and the vest, starting to run on the beach in the direction where he knew a lighthouse would be found. Along the way he met two fishermen children, whom he insistently asked not to lose sight of the point in the sea where the turned boat could be found.

He ran for about two hours until he found a fisherman from whom he borrowed a canoe that he used to cross the channel. After another couple of hours, he arrived ar an isolated house on the other side of the channel, where fortunately he found some friends who helped him to return to the boat in distress.

When he reached his two German friends it was already around 4pm. With the aid of ropes and the tow force of another boat, the semi-rigid was returned to the right position. This operation was followed by an helicopter that meanwhile arrived and only left the site when the boat was turned back and everybody was in security. It is possible that the helicopter was alerted by one of the boats they sighted in the morning.

Nonetheless, Andy’s swim to find help was needed because they had no guarantee of aid and if the night arrived the boat could disappear in the horizon and be dragged far away. The boat with the three adventurers was towed and arrived at night in the same club they had left early in the morning. They suffered small injuries and explained to us that the experience was very similar to a car accident. All these events happened near Inhaca, an island located in front of Maputo, in Mozambique.

That same day, Germany won against Sweden by 2 goals in the 2006 World Cup. It was a lucky day for Germany and for those two Germans!

Exciting and Tragic

 

I have just watched “Lost off Mozambique” in my computer for the second time. The first time was ages ago, but I believed it was lost until recently. Indeed very exciting. The film shows the findings of some divers we know, lead by a German count. They have already discovered two “treasures” near the island where they are based, one of Ming porcelain and other of silver coins. This is the exciting part.

 

The tragic note is the impossibility of watching a diving film without the words “dedicated to the memory of…” As soon as I could, I googled for the name in question in vain. Perhaps only in the German Google. The way I see it, he was just another diver who crossed the line. And this brings back Steve Irwin. Crikey!