The Chef & The divers

The chef & The divers

Weather report: Rainy, windy and a bit cold for being Thailand. It has not been to much people going out with the boat. Which is perfect when Marcus arrived. Marcus and I worked at Västerås Golf club this summer. Marcus always told me that he was going to visit me and he did. So fun to get down a person who I been get to know and worked with the whole summer. We have become very good friends and I guess that we got even stronger band after this time with each other.
Marcus is actually a diver and I did the refresher with him. Marcus had not dive for a while and then it´s perfect to repeat some skills and knowledge.

After that he wanted to cook some dinner for the divers. Me and Marcus went to Lanta Market (Sweden's ICA) and bought most of the ingredients he needed, we also went for the Thai market to buy shrimp and a whole fish. That night Marcus did the most amazing “Thai taco night” It is nice how a good chef can create such a good meal from a simple and small thai kitchen. It went so quick and the food was done and everybody was enjoying the meal so much.

That night we decided to go to “Yang” the best restaurant on the island. I think Marcus really appreciated that we took him there, he wanted to try everything and that's what we did. You never get disappointed at Yangs, the people there are so good and the food is amazing. You also saw that on the “ Swedish chef´s” face when he was eating every bite. I recommend everyone who visit me in Koh Lanta to try Yangs out .

Since it been so rainy I have spent much time at home cleaning and also manage to get a guitar. Finally I can start playing and it working as a meditative way for me, to get my feelings out in song and music. I also pick up some reading and Ili and Steve invited us for some monopoly card game. I didn't win… But it was a great time

DSD & BBQ

Discover Scuba & BBQ

Koh Lanta is starting to become hot and sunny days are ahead. I’m very happy to be on the boat during this time to get some ocean breeze and diving sessions in to cool me down instead of being under the warm sun in the shop.

My friends from back home has now left but they really enjoyed Lanta, at least that’s what they told me…

They had never dived before and had little time to finish a whole course so they took the quickest alternative in order to get out to the tropical water. They attended the course “Discover scuba diving”. It lasted two days. It consists of one hour in the pool to learn some easy moves and the following day out in the blue water they go. Martin was more of a snorkel guy and he really liked what he saw. After he had his head under surface for a few minutes he looks up at me and says “Oscar this is so awesome, so many fish and variety of colors!” Eddie and Henrik was diving and I saw them from the surface on their first time under water. Eddie was doing some kind of “dog swim” and Henrik was a little bit too “floaty” – hilarious to see. I followed them the second dive and they were much better. Third dive me and Eddie was diving on our own and it was like diving with an already certified diver. Amazing how quick some people learn. All of them were so happy to see what I see every day. It makes me happy to show people this amazing world (that shouldn't be taken for granted) and to make them smile!

Some evenings, I’ve been invited to some nice BBQ parties. People around here like to host BBQ nights at their house and let friends gather. It´s birthdays, holidays or just a regular day when someone organize a big cook up. I really like when many friends are together. We have each other and we're really taking care of one another.

the boats you see in the background is Thai navy ships because the princess was visiting Koh Lanta  

Corals and Friends

Corals and friends

Last time I told you I was going to see a talk about coral conservation, this is my review of it:

How was the coral propagation presentation? It was very interesting and mind blowing learning about what we actually can do for our coral reefs. They guy who held the presentation knows so much about corals. He’s been traveling the world trying to teach people his way of planting corals. He has invented a natural glue which activates with salt water and keep the coral on the the rock until the coral has grown so much that it can survive by itself.

So Ocean Quest (the company) has teach people around the world to plant new corals without too much effort or money. The coral reefs that has been around for billions of years start to bleach, also dynamite fishing and trolling fishing destroys the reefs and the complex ecosystem. In the ocean and specially around reefs the organisms lives in symbiosis, which means that the organisms help each other to clean get food etc. If something gets sick or dies, it's very likely that the system collapses. If our corals die, the beautiful colors, life and incredible marine animals will just be a weak memory.

However I really appreciate people who try to do something about it.

Go in and check out ocean quest website or sea Shepherd to learn more about their work:

http://www.oceanquest.global

http://www.seashepherd.org

Some mornings while we're not diving we do some Yoga in the morning and then the most of us goes for breakfast together. It´s so nice to start your day with a Yoga session or on the other day an awesome dive.

Three friends from Sweden arrived today so I will show them around the island today on my day off!!

Until next time xx

Spotting my First Whale Shark

Spotting a Whale shark

I have finally witnessed one of the oceans most beautiful creatures. People who have dived a lot more than I, haven't seen it yet. But I, with approximately 230 dives, finally saw it. I was diving in Koh Haa with four other people and when I was heading up against the safety stop at five o’clock, I looked up and saw this huge whale shark cruising by. I just looked at it for a few seconds before calling everyone else around me, and soon everyone around had seen it. It's rare to see them around but at the moment it seems to be something in particular that the whales like around Koh Haa.

When I got on the boat again it turned out that we were the only group from Angry Bird (the boat) who had seen it. I saw it swimming away against island number five, so I told the boatmaster to do the next dive around the caves – it was a bet but it turned out to be just right.

After 30 minutes into the dive the whale shark was passing by us again. And now everyone saw it and we were just cheering and laughing the whole day after that.

The next day we went for Koh Haa again and I told my group that I saw a whale shark the other day and so we all had our hopes up. Luckily a whale shark visited us again on the second dive! This one was even bigger – around 8 meters (the one the day before was about 3-4). So lucky to see whale shark two days in a row!

Lucy, the photographer, took some nice pictures:

Instagram: @lantalucy

I will dive again at Koh Haa again tomorrow. I don't expect anything better, but we will see and keep our fingers crossed.

Later this evening I will listen to this coral conservation talk on a resort on the island. These guys are actually planting corals around Koh Lanta and I think that it's very interesting. I hope to learn from it and in the future hopefully help them to plant some corals. I'm planning to tell you guys some facts about corals in the next post. See you later!

What does it cost to be in Thailand for me

What does it cost

Of course is enough with just spending the time in the Ocean. Where it´s life everywhere and beautiful colors. But how much does it cost to actually be on the road for a couple of months.

You need to eat have a place to stay at and have money for some activities you do. 
So how much money do I actually spend. Well my rent is on 5000 baht a month + electricity and water bill which we share on four houses and just split that bill. So I haven´t paid that bill yet so not sure what it will actually cost but around 500-900 baht each I will guess.

Calculation:
Rent: around 5600 baht / month
Food and drink :   300 / day 
Things for the house: 1000 Bhat/ month 

While I´m diving a lot there is not much cost on breakfast and lunch. Just dinner and usually beer. Beer I guess is the biggest daily cost. I agreed to myself that it will not be that much beer as last year and it working out pretty good, I can of course get better on decreasing it.... 

At Amantra they have this awesome Yoga class that divers can join if they want. I had a "dry day" so I went on this yoga class and it was so great to be with others and practicing yoga. I usually do it myself but it was another dimension to to it in a group. 

It has been many days on the boat but I don´t have any against it. I mean I have now been down two weeks and I´m still as a kid on Christmas night before a day of diving. You know how you can´t sleep because you are to exited but really want to fall asleep because the next day you will be diving. 

Angry Bird

Angry Bird 

One week has passed and I´m just enjoining it even more to be here and in the water.
I had my first costumers for the season, a german couple who was very nice people and good divers. We went to Koh Haa and spotted for example a reef octopus and a turtle. I´m so happy to finally being back in the water and se all this amazing things 

It have not been that much of Halloween celebration, but the bartender of old penny had dressed up last night.  It was just me in the bar so I think he had expected more people there. When I asked him about it he told me that he was doing it more for himself ....

Anti gravity´s boat, Angry Bird  os finally up running and we went on it yesterday. The boat is repainted and looks very nice. To be on our own boat takes more planning with food gear and responsibility, but it is the best thing to actually be on our own boat while diving .

When I was heading to the beach one day it was a stop in  traffic. When I was coming closer I saw what the cause was.
 It was a person who was lying on the road beside his crashed bike and had scratched up his whole left leg, The ambulance was called and he was luckily alive. It´s always a risk to take yourself out in traffic we all need to be very careful and hope that nothing bad happens. That´s way I always wearing an helmet when driving in traffic.

Today more staff will arrive, it´s Steve and Ili who getting back. Will be fun to see them again, it has been awhile since. Going to be fun to catch up.

Next blog I´m planing to write a little bit of how I work and how it works around the dive shop more closely.