Shin Kushi-yucks

We've been having a month-long craving for kushiyaki since our very yummy Valentine's meal at Satsuma.

So a couple of nights back, we decided to try out some of the other famous kushiyaki places.

There were a few contenders - Shin Kushiya, Joo Joo, and of course, going back to Satsuma.

We decided that Joo Joo can't be all that good since it's all young and fun sounding, plus it doesn't even have a vaguely Japanese name. We contemplated going back to Satsuma, but Shin Kushiya won out because I read a review on it recently on a blog I stumbled upon - it made it sound like skewer heaven - and I tend to like to try out new places.

So off to Shin Kushiya we went.

I took pictures, but it's not even worth the effort uploading them because the simple conclusion is that the food was mediocre at best and overpriced.

Plus they don't serve chicken hearts, which according to Colin, is the mark of a good kushiyaki place.

Next time, it's back to Satsuma we go.

Certified Divers

Last weekend - not the one that's just gone by, the one before that - we went to Bintan for our Open Water course.

I'd like to say it all went well and I loved every second of it, but that's the version I smile and dish out to acquaintances. People I don't want to spend more than 2 minutes of my time story-telling to, because the full story is just too exhausting. There are dramatic hand gestures, lots of eyebrow-raising, and even a point where my voice gets all high and squeaky - even more so than it usually is. So you can see how the full monty can take its toll.

But I thought it best to capture the whole experience in truth, for posterity's sake. Not that I know what the word 'posterity' means, but I have a very fluid relationship with words and sometimes, I just know when things sound right.

Kind like with 'assasinator' - people who kill other people, and 'drawer' - someone who draws.

(I do know those aren't real words by the way)

Anyways, I'll start at the top.

The entire PADI Open Water Dive Course consists of three components:

(i) Pool session

(ii) 2 x theory classes and an exam

(iii) 4 x dives in the deep blue sea

THE POOL SESSION

We did the pool session one hot sunday at Outram Secondary School. It was the dirtiest pool I've ever been in, and I might or might not have peed in it - to be fair, I was wearing a LOT of equipment. So no judgement. Besides, I know for a fact I'm not the first, and nor will I be the last.

Seriously, dirtiest pool ever. When you go underwater with your mask, everything's magnified tenfold and you can see the dirt, algae and snot floating around.

But that is the one and only pool where all the dive schools hold their confined water session, so at least you can be safe in the knowledge that the travelling gunk will never make its way to your friendly neighbourhood swimming complex.

I felt gross even before we stepped into the pool because the rental equipment, well, lets just say they're a great marketing tool to entice newbies to buy their own gear. I found flies, algae and dried up salt caked into the rubber rims of my mask. That's how icky it was. The only consolation was the regulator, which was actually surprisingly clean.

After the pool session, my ear itched for days and I was convinced it was because of the dirty pool water. Had to be.

THEORY 1

After surviving the pool session, it was time for the classroom stuff.

First day of class, there were only three people. "Great!" I thought, we'll be able to finish early and go home to sleep. It was after all a work day.

I was sorely mistaken.

We seemed to have ended up in the same class as the dumbest guy on earth. Alright, that sounded mean. And I probably said it just for dramatic effect, but it doesn't sound half as funny if I said it some other way.

I can forgive dumb. But dumb and lazy just takes the cake.

Not only did he NOT pre-read his reading material, he seemed to have the comprehension skills of a gnat. And since the class can only progress as fast as it's slowest member, we were crawling. Didn't help that Colin and I were super competitive know-it-alls, the type who raises their hand enthusiastically in response to every question going "oOh ooh ooh, I know, pick me!". And I mean literally, it didn't help. The instructor still wanted to make sure Mr Slow Pants in the back was catching up.

After class on the first day, we did a bit of shopping. It started out with just wanting a pretty pink mask, and ended up with me going home with a pretty pink mask and a pretty pink snorkel.

I have to say, my instructor gave me a super good deal on the two and I'm a true blue shopaholic at heart, which means I recognise a good deal when I see one. I nudged and urged Colin to get a mask and a snorkel too. But of course he had to go home and 'research' first - he's that kind of shopper, the one who always lets great deals and awesome things slide past because he needs time to think.

It's not a bad trait, and something I could use more of really - I'm Miss Instant Gratification, "now now now!!!" - but I think I'm getting better, and sometimes, when there's a good deal, you just got to DO IT NOW.

So anyways, he dawdled, and unfortunately when we went back the next day, it was a different guy at the shop. He still got a discount, but not at the awesome low levels that I did. Oh well.

I contemplated getting also booties, fins and a wet suit - all in a pretty shade of pink of course. But this is the part where his "let's wait and see" got to me. You'll see how this almost kills me later on.

THEORY 2

Back to class again. You would think after his dawdling on Day 1 that Mr Slow Pants would kick it up a notch, maybe do some reading before coming to class so he wouldn't continue to lag behind.

But no.

He did not.

We crawled through the remaining two chapters at a snail's pace before the final exam. Poo. After handing out the exam papers, our instructor told us we could complete this at our own pace and just holler when we were done.

I was done within half an hour. I don't like dawdling over exam questions. They give me the heebie jeebies. I just like to zip through them and be done. Of course, this attitude has more than once, cost me some careless mistakes. But I can't help it (actually no, of course I can help it, I just can't be bothered).

Anyway, I finished up and bounced out of the room to hand my paper to the instructor.

96% - yay! One careless mistake, and one which I happily accepted because it asked me for the difference between a DIN and YOKE valve - an entire section which I skipped past because I hate memorising differences between things. If they're differences I can understand and comprehend, sure. But the type that requires memorising? Not for me. These grey cells are reserved solely to memorise grudges against my boo and the latest Hollywood celeb gossip.

Anyway, shortly after I finished, Colin finished too.

Yay!

"Now we can go home!" Or so I thought.

Turns out, our instructor wanted us all to finish the paper - by all he means us THREE (2 down, 1 to go) - so we can run through the ones we got wrong.

Colin got 98%.

Which means that between the two of us, there were only 3 questions we had to go through.

We waited another 45 MINUTES for Mr Slow Pants to finally finish his paper.

And even then, he failed!

So first we had to wait for him to finish, and then go through ALL the questions he got wrong before we finally got to leave.

It was a painful wait. I spent most of it Whatsapp'ing the girls and playing Burger Queen.

BINTAN - DAY 1

We convened bright and early at the Tanah Merah Ferry Terminal to catch the Ferry to Bintan.

It was an alright 50minute ride - I slept through most of it.

But then started my horrid 48hour motion sickness extravangaza.

It was a bumpy, torturous hour-long bus ride to the resort. It was neither picturesque nor rustic. I was just grumpy and having a headache. So I decided to spend most of the ride stuffing my face with fish strips, dropping crumbs all over my jacket and looking out the window at vague things on the horizon.

Finally, we arrived. The resort was quite bare and rundown, but at least it had all the essentials like hot water and a clean bed.

After checking in, we were told we had 20minutes to rest before lunch.

I collapsed onto the bed whilst he spent a lot of time fussing around the room, and unpacking everything.

Lunch was Nasi Goreng with a fried egg, and the driest looking chicken wing I've ever seen. I don't like meat on bone, so I swapped him my unedible chicken wing for his egg. Clearly I was getting the better deal, but I flashed him one of my too-cute-for-school smiles to pull the wool over his head. Or maybe he knew, and gave it to me anyway out of love. Either way, I got the egg.

After lunch, it was time to check in at the deep blue sea.

Urks!

I gulped down a sea sickness pill and prayed to god I wouldn't die at sea.

We took an old chugchug boat out to a floating platform - where we remained for the better part of the day. I hate moving-anythings, and a floating platform is the worst kind. Solid ground, but not really.

Luckily, we were the first group to go down.

We saw nothing. Just bubbles and swirls of dirty water. But even that dirty water was cleaner than the water at Outram. Or maybe it's just because the salt water is a natural antiseptic.

When we surfaced after the first dive, I had a cut on my hand which was bleeding out. I don't know how it happened, but it didn't hurt till someone pointed it out - at which point I shoved it in Colin's face and put on my saddest look.

Truth be told it didn't hurt, but I milked it for all it was worth. Using it as an excuse to get out of changing my tank and keeping my equipment - I was on a floating platform!!! If I moved to do all that, I would have hurled all over the equipment and everyone would have hated me. It was just better that I didn't get near them.

We did a second dive, and then it was time to chug back to the resort.

Yay, dinner!

It was absolutely awesome.

They had the best sambal belacan ever! Loved all the dishes.

Went for a Thai massage on the beach after dinner. Was seranaded by a Thai and a Malaysian dude who were taking turns massacring the free karaoke machine - I think at some point they even did a duet. And in between the karaoke, there were shots of fireworks. It was kind of nice actually.

When you stay in fancier resorts, people seldom leave their rooms to do communal type things. But when you stay in a budget resort, you have no choice but to want to leave your room.

We took a slow walk back after my massage, and stopped by the cafe for a glass of ice milo - for him - before going back to sleep.

BINTAN - DAY 2

Woke up bright and early. Had a huge breakfast, before we chugged out to the platform again.

Our first dive of the day was spent practising yet more skills. We also swam around for a bit, and I saw a sea urchin!

Our second dive of the day is when it all gets dramatic.

A boat chugged us away from the platform to another dive site. It was quite dramatic for us because up till then, we had been diving off the platform. So this was our first time diving off a boat - we went in backwards, which I thought I would have hated, but actually turned out to be alright.

As soon as we got in the water I knew it was going to be bad.

The waves were horrid and just swishing me all over the place.

I felt so helpless. But I held on to the side of the boat and waited for everyone to get in.

It only got worse.

The waves kept on coming, taking us further and further away from the boat.

I thought it would get better when we descended, because you don't tend to feel the surge as much when you're 6 feet under - literally, no pun intended.

But we never got to go down. Our fins were grazing corals that were barely 2 metres beneath us, and before we knew it, were all knee deep in the middle of nowhere, with the waves continuing to push us over.

Didn't help that the equipment was really heavy.

I started getting pushed over by the waves every two steps and ended up with coral cuts on my hands and legs.

It wasn't pleasant.

That's when I realised we were kinda in a shitty situation.

Thankfully our dive master was a sea of calm. He immediately took charge of the situation, and told us all what to do - he really was awesome. He told me to take off my equipment and just concentrate on walking. He held my hand in one so I wouldn't fall, and my equipment in another, no easy feat!

You think it doesn't sound very hard, but try walking in fins, over corals, with waves pushing you over. That's no easy feat.

Luckily for me, and him, I was the only girl in the group, so the rest of the guys could all manage with carrying their equipment.

At that point, I wish I had bought that pretty pink full-body wet suit so I wouldn't have all those coral cuts on my knees. And the gloves. And booties, so I could take off the fins and walk properly. !!

After close to 45minutes of walking, we finally made it to a side where it was deep enough for us to swim. The waves were still horrid. But the amazing boat guy jumped into the water with just a mask and swam towards me. He told me to lie on my tank, and dragged me all the way back to the boat - all the whilst, swimming against the huge currents.

When we got back to dry land, we wanted to give him a big tip because he really risked his life jumping in to tow us all back.

But we were told the standard from everyone in the group was only 5SGD, and that if we wanted to give anything extra, we should give it to him personally. Sadly, he had already gone back by then, so we weren't able to thank him properly.

So that rounded off our Open Water course.

Wanted to upload pictures, but it's getting late and I need to shower.

Next up, Dayang!

And hopefully this time we see some proper deep blue aquatic life. The pretty kind.