Journal lingqi's Journal: August 11th, 2004 2

August 11th, 2004 (4:45pm)

-- continuing about Okinawa --

Whale shark is called Jinbei-zame in japanese. "zame" is the conjugated form for "same," meaning shark. Jinbei is a little more interesting. Of course, back in the days when everybody work the traditional japanese kimono, only the most aristocratic would be hanging out in fancy clothes all the time, and casual outerwear is called Jinbei. Traditionally made with wood fibres, it was quite rough and often died to a dark colour with repetitious patterns. To explain the patterns, it really comes back to the original topic: it looks very similar to the pattern on a whaleshark's back. While the name completely omits the fact that this is the largest shark ever, a, I suppose, notable property, I must say that the name is quite accurate.

On the day of booking the trip, I was presented with an "options" booklet, in which there was this "swim with a whale-shark" dive for a fat 13,000 yen. To me it's very expensive for a dive (i mean, come on, ONE dive!), but the prospects of hanging out with the biggest known fish in the ocean does have its special appeal. The price was 12,000 yen for those holding a license, but then you'd have to shell out 3,000 yen for rental fee. (So basically, get license and you get to pay more)

I think I sort of figured out how the business arrangement worked out - An "adventure company" in okinawa provides various types of adventure programs to the travel agency, and on the other end contacts the local shops for setting up the deals. We went to the said adventure company early morning, and was promptly picked up by a bus to the actual dive shop in the midst of what really looked like a fishing village. The sign on top of the dive-shop said "Organized by Okinawa Fishery Association" or something. No kidding.

for 13,000 yen, the program would be "experience diving" and for 12,000 (+3,000 rental) "fun diving." The latter, as I mentioned earlier, was only available to those holding a a diver's license. On that particular morning there was maybe 15 non-license-holders, and I was the only one with a license. To be honest, I did like a whole ONE DIVE after I got my license, so I'm not exactly a pro - but as hesitant as they are (seeing that I forget which side does the high pressure hose goes), license speaks and they had to allow me to go on the course by myself - the instructor being my diving buddy.

The instructor was a thin young man about 20 years old. Same as everyone I have seen working at a dive shop, he was dark and toned. I think I remember from some of my training courses that corpulence and diving doesn't go very well together (nitrogen accumulation in capillaries? or maybe bouyancy of fat? I forget) - but for some reason, all the dive shop divers are always super thin and has nearly no bodyfat. The guy, Mack, was quite a cheerful young man - another trait that divers seem to share...

After some explanation, I finally understood what the dive entailed.

Instead of actually taking a boat to seek out a whale shark, they actually have one captured, and contained in a mostly cylindical net-cage about 30m across and 20m tall. To be honest it is not a terribly large cage seeing as the shark is around 8 meters long. Here is where the difference comes in - as a licensed diver, I was allowed to enter the cage, while all the poor souls that doesn't can only hang out above it, holding onto the net like flies stuck to a spiderweb.

All of us had short and stout steel tanks. I have only used aluminum up to this point and had always found them to have been heavy. I was wrong. On land, steel tanks weight like mountains down your back.

We boarded two boats in the small harbor. The boats, one by one, speeded away from the shore past some banks of concrete for stopping incoming waves, and headed directly away until the peripheral vision was eventually filled with only the blue sky and the land faded into the distance - though still visible with crystal clarity.

Ahead, a platform emerged from the void of the ocean, and someone was already on the platform making preparations for the morning's dive. The platform was maybe a square of 100sq meters. It had some aluminum picnic table on it, and besides the human hussle, nothing else. The entire structure is of a colour of aluminum rust that has been bleached by the sun, and I'd imagine that if nuclear apocolypse ever did occur and the polar ice melts and floods all the land, these platforms would be where we live out our lives.

Despite being quite a large platform, it swayed with the ocean waves quite noticably. It was not sufficient for you to lose balance, but upon standing on it, one is immediatly assailed by the onset of nausea. The feeling was brief and goes away in a brief moment, but nonetheless made me look forward to being in the water all that much more.

-- to be continued --

As a short update, China lost 3-1 to Japan... Subsequently riot breaks out in Beijing. I have a creeping suspision that China is heading to some submerged nationalism, which could be powerful but quite dangerous if not properly managed.