Nature and nitrogen narcosis
You know the saying: “time flies when you’re having fun”? Well, here at Pez Maya time goes at the speed of light.
Its already Friday 21st October. Again, I am writing this as I man the radio. So much has happened since that rainy Saturday.
In the last 6 days I have:
- Completed my Advanced Open Water (AOW)
- Spotted an eagle ray as it glided over us
- Experienced nitrogen narcosis at 30 metres
- Started diving twice a day
- Overcome my fears of the compressor
- Witnessed a snake eat a gecko
- Excavated another turtle nest
Sunday consisted of a trip into town, which meant internet and meat. I don’t pride myself on my carnivorous tendencies but I have come to appreciate a bit of animal protein after three weeks vegetarian diet. If I am completely honest though, I actually prefer a diet with no meat, after all most of the world eats a completely vegetarian diet.
To mark the end of the storms the mangroves have churned out a lot of silt and storm debris. The beach is littered with fresh water crabs (and all other sorts of plastic garbage) that snip at your feet as you walk to the boats (both the garbage and the crabs!). Since the crabs arrival at the beginning of the week they have become more sluggish as the salt water slowly kills them.
And every day this week we have dived! The weather has held off, but it is definitely “autumn” here in Mexico (and by autumn it means I have to wear shorts over my bikini during the day and in the evenings I wear my jumper). The nights are colder and everyone, except me, is wearing wetsuits (partly because I’m a tough cookie, and partly because I don’t actually have one).
This week we worked toward completing our Advanced Open Water, which has 5 components: boat, naturalist, peak performance buoyancy, navigation, and deep dive. Today was the finale- deep dive. We were told stories about narcosis, how people have tried giving their regulator to fish, how some people act like they would after a bottle of champagne. But, I knew I’d be fine, it won’t affect me. Wrong. This morning after kitting up and heading to the lovingly named dive site: Lagrimas Negras (Black Tears), we dropped to 100ft/30 metres. And it was beautiful. As we got to the bottom a 2 metre eagle ray glided over us, welcoming us to the depths. I tapped my dive buddy, Amir (a very entertaining American college student) and signaled: I (pointing to myself) - heart - that ray (pointing to the ray) and burst into a fit of giggles. Then I spent most of the 16 minutes bottom time staring at the algae next to me. I claim this is because I just learnt about the different types we need to identify for Point Intercept monitoring, but Martin (English instructor and all round legend) says I was, and I quote: “narced off your face.”
To be honest it felt like I was in a dream. Martin brought down a tomato, that on the surface is red, but at 100ft is green, and a bottle that on the surface is full, but at depth is a crinkled airless piece of plastic. It was a great dive.
My other favourite dive this week was the naturalist dive. Here at Pez Maya, the volunteers are split into coral and fish people. I’m a coral, but I got to buddy up with little Ryan, a sweet 18 year old Londoner, and also a fish kid. During the dive I would point to a fish and he would scribble down its name on his slate and vice versa. We saw a sand tile fish, which are rare in these parts.
Terrestrially the base is thriving. The resident ospreys finally have a little hatchling, which I’ve named Sergio, this morning I saw one of the parents carry a huge fish up to the nest. The other day a cliff swallow flew into a pole and died, allowing us to have a look at its beautiful form. Even with the bird’s body in our hands we still struggled to identify it! And just this afternoon I saw a snake catch and eat a gecko. The gecko had a hold of the snake and there was a short, but fiery battle to the death, to the backdrop of our ohs and ahs. It was a pleasant reminder that life is short, and that although I have come to love this place, it’s not my home. It’s home for the iguanas that bath in the sun, heads to the sky, home for the great blue herons that stride the beaches, and home for the brown pelicans that dive for fish along these shores.
On that note I am reminded of the green turtle nest we excavated. It was a shallow nest, too shallow. Of the 126 eggs that were laid only 19 hatched, 4 predated and three had embryos that died prematurely, one was a set of twins. The rest were either unfertilised (no embryo when we cracked them open) or cooked by the warm sand that was supposed to house it. Joao, the Portuguese turtle expert, informed us that this happens sometimes, the reality of it stole my appetite and reminded me again of our impact on nature.
If home isn’t here on the coral white sands of Mexico, where is it? Where are we meant to be? In our big shiny cities, where the only interaction with nature is cursing at the unwelcome possum that is nesting in your roof, or here amongst the mosquitoes and sand flies? I guess that is the great balancing act isn’t it. But for some brain food till next time. What does nature mean to you? What is home to you, and who and what are you sharing it with?
Happy thinking, hugs from Pez Maya, Mexico.
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