Day 363 – Hyperbaric Miracle

Today was my last session at the hyperbaric chamber. A year and a half ago, while in Cozumel on my medical leave, I discovered that hyperbaric O2 therapy might help with migraines. The regiment is 20 sessions, one hour of continuous breathing of 100% O2 at the pressure of 2 bar (aka depth of 33 feet). Having had experimented with pretty much every other treatment on earth and nearly dying of the exhausting non-stop unbearable pain, I went for it. And miraculously, it helped! It didn't make my migraines completely disappear, but they became much less frequent and much more tolerable. For best maintenance, you are supposed to repeat the treatment every couple of years. That's why I have just completed my second hyperbaric cycle.

Hyperbaric O2 therapy is an amazing phenomenon. It looks like it helps with a huge range of diseases and injuries, from a bad burn to stroke to autism! Stroke is a very popular diagnosis qualifying for hyperbaric treatment in Mexico. One of the patients I shared the chamber with this time had a stroke, and I during the 20 days of my treatment I actually saw the progress of her recovery with my own two eyes, and it is remarkable. When she started, she couldn't talk at all, and then, little by little, her mouth came back to function, and words started to come out: very unsteady and cautious at first, they reached the normal speed and quality pretty fast and by her 35^th session her speech completely returned!

Yes, I know, there are some threats presented by O2. The overdose may result in oxygen toxicity and cause some unpleasant CNS problems, but it's impossible to get to such a destructive amount given the usual treatments' time / pressure combination. Of course, I'm not a doctor, but I honestly believe that the hyperbaric therapy is not that popular in the US only because of the economic threat that it may pose for the medical / pharmaceutical industry. If O2 under pressure can cure pretty much everything and anything, then who would spend money on anything else?

Day 362 – Bicycle! Bicycle! Bicycle!

• Put the volume of your speakers on maximum.
• Click on this - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GugsCdLHm-Q.
  

Aha, thanks, now I can actually whisper it in your ear – I don't really know how to ride a bicycle. I have no idea how that happened, because I distinctly remember myself at the age of 3-4 on a four-wheel bike in front of my house. So I must have been learning how to manage it at some point. Or was I so terrible that my parents gave up and never offered me to try again? The reason is a mystery, but the fact is really sad. I mean, I can pedal of course, it's the stopping and starting that gives me problems. I remember when I was in Holland about 5 years ago, my friend Natasha had a really hard time babysitting me while we were driving the streets of Spijkenisse. There are special bike lanes and little bike traffic lights in Holland! Every time we had to stop, my poor friend had to hold my bike with one hand to prevent me from falling down. Luckily, she succeeded. Unlike me, she is very good on the bike (thank God).

But this ridiculousness stops right here, right now! I will learn to bike properly or else!

Step 1 – a bike

We bought a bike for me for $40 on the street. Somebody told us that there was a guy on the corner of 2^nd Street and 60^th Avenue who buys parts and assembles bikes. So we went to check it out. Walked the street back and forth, asked everybody around, but didn't find the guy in question. But pretty much everybody we asked had a bike of their own (or that of their son / daughter / father) that they were willing to immediately appraise and sell to us. Liang tested several of such offerings, and we ended up getting somebody's son's bike. I would have really loved to see the son's face when he came back home and realized that his bike had been sold…

Step 2 – a lesson

Javier is the best teacher. It's all because he is truly patient. His patience is real and sincere, he is patient with himself and others, and he is teaching you (at least trying) to be patient with yourself too. I need that. I'm very impatient with myself. I am a bit better with other people. But still, my patience is like Margaret Thatcher's, "I am extraordinarily patient, provided I get my own way in the end." (Observer, April 4, 1989). Well, in the bicycle case, I'll be patient, extraordinarily so, because I am fairly certain that I'll get my own way in the end.

The neighbor with the "small talk disorder" passed by as Javier was explaining to me how to train the brain to put the correct foot on the ground while stopping, and noted, "It's never too late to learn". Ouch.

Step 3 – a ride

I thought we were just studying today, but no, Javier had a different plan for me. He actually made me ride all the way from our house to the airport, then make a loop by the ocean and come back. We did it all at my turtle speed (it took 40 minutes!), but still I was completely drenched in sweat when I returned home. It was fun though! Thank God for other people's patience with me!

Day 361 – Neighbors

Our neighbors are two guys. Well, I am actually not sure of it anymore, because a couple of weeks ago they had "guests" over, and those guests never left. Their house is exactly like ours, which means it can comfortably accommodate 2 couples, and maybe if you have an inflatable bed – another person or two. They seem to have at least 10 people going in and out of their place every day. They are all nice, but they display some very strange behavior on a daily basis.

For example, one guy exercises every day – push-ups, pull-ups, pool, you name it. Nothing wrong with that in principle, but the sound track is a bit over the top. Every push-up he makes is accompanied by an orgasmic moan, every pool lap (and the pool is barely 12 feet long) produces a long loud wail. The first time I heard his exercise audio, I was taken aback, surprised that somebody could feel so compelled to advertise their sexual activities to the entire neighborhood. When I finally realized what was actually going on, I was no less surprised though. Why would you do anything like this? Really, why?

Another guy always strikes up a conversation with you. And not really "hi-bye" type of thing, but some kind of real – even though small – talk. And I personally see him many times a day: in the courtyard, by the gate, under the palapa (our terraces face each other). And no, he is not "interested" in me. It just seems that he feels earnestly obligated to say something when he sees a person. Some kind of social disorder, really.

Yet another guy is playing the guitar. Not that it's bad in principle, but… All day long… Sometimes it's just "tram-tram-tram" for hours. Sometimes he's also singing, which – again – is not bad, but if I want to keep my sanity, I have to find a way to make him expand his repertoire, because if I hear "bye, bye, miss American pie" one more time, @(%*&$)(%&!

P.S. Speaking of strange neighborship...

Days 357-360 – I’m a complete dork

I haven't been in school for about 15 years, so I already forgot what a dork I am. Now I remember… I just cannot stop studying. I don't think I would be able to sleep well at night if I didn't at least try to figure out everything that needs to be figured out for the exam. I can hardly imagine all the stupid pistons, diaphragms and valves of the dive equipment, but stubbornly, I keep reading about them in the hope that the information will somehow retain in my memory and my brain will miraculously be able to recognize the right answer's wording pattern from the multiple choice of the coming testJ. We shall see.

Luckily for my sanity, the course includes a lot of physical activity (otherwise I'd just happily bury myself in books and that would be the end of it for sure). For example, in the past couple of days I had to learn:

How to search and recover an object underwater

It was pretty fun. I was on the team of 3 people and we had to find an object – a weight – underwater at the Villa Aldora, tie it to a lift bag using one of the three knots that we were supposed to learn beforehand and bring it to the shore. It took us 39 minutes to actually find the object, so thorough was our search patternJ. And we messed up the route a bit, because our navigator buddy decided to change the course from 360/180 to 300/120 for some reason, so instead of going perpendicular to the shore in a more "compact" pattern, we were doing it pretty much diagonally. Oh well. We did not mess up the knots though! Which was nice, because for some reason I had a really hard time getting it when testing my skills on a real rope before the dive. It was strange, because when I practiced on my robe tie the other day at home, I was super comfortable with each of the required knots. Go figure…

How to tie knots

If for whatever reason you want to learn how to tie knots professionally, here are some helpful websites that show the process step-by-step:

• Bow-line knot.
  
• Sheet bend (Becket bend) knot.
  
• Hitch knot.
  

Try it when stressed out and frustrated. It has a good therapeutic power.

How to assist in an Open Water course

I also had to assist Liang in doing an OW course for Lukas – one of the German speaking Italian friends of hers. Man, teaching how to dive is pretty damn difficult (of course, I didn't do anything, just had to be there and demonstrate some skills on Liang's demand, but judging by the looks of it – very involved). And it takes a long time. But it must feel very rewarding as well. When we finished with the class, Lukas – who is a natural, really – was "shining like a polished samovar" (I'm sure you can tell that this is a Russian idiom for "looking happy"). And then we ate freshly "caught" sea urchins. It was delicious.

I have stamina!

I was dreading the day of the "stamina test", because not only you have to perform some swimming skills on the surface (which is no problem for me), but you actually have to do it under a certain time to pass! And although I am very comfortable in the water and can stay afloat / swim forever, I don't really know any proper swimming techniques and I was sure I was very slow.

To be precise, during this test, you have to:

• Swim (no snorkel or fins) 400 meters under 6.20 minutes for 5 points, under 8 minutes for 4 points… and you have to just do it for 1 point;
  
• Perform a tired diver tow for 100 meters under 2 minutes for 5 points, under 3 minutes for 4 points, under 4 minutes for 3 points (and my God, this one is unexpectedly tough, all of us felt completely dead on arrival);
  
• Swim (with snorkel and fins) 800 meters under 10 minutes for 5 points, etc. (this one is still pending for me).
  

I was going for 1 point (just for doing it) on each of the timed exercises. So imagine my surprise when I actually got 4 points for the no-fins swimming (to be fair, I was still the last one, but I did it under 7.20 minutes!) and 4 points for the tired diver tow (I actually could have gotten 5, I came at 2.01)!!! It's so funny how little things like this make you happy. The realization that I'm actually not as physically-challenged as I thought I was gave me so much energy for the rest of the day that I could have surely moved some mountains (fortunately, the need for testing that never arose).

Day 356 – The coolest exercise ever!

We did the coolest exercise as part of the Dive Master course today – equipment exchange while buddy breathing. What is means precisely is you have to swap all your gear (fins, booties, BCDs, masks) underwater while sharing the same regulator, which in turn means that you make 2 breaths through the regulator and then give it to your buddy and while they are breathing, you are just exhaling for their 2 breaths, and so on. Since a picture is worth a thousand words, here is one - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VPNF4OsAMME&feature=related. Liang and I, of course, didn't do it wearing just bathing suits like the guys in the video; it was more like 15,000 mm of neoprene and hence 15,000 pounds of weight to make sure you don't float up when removing your BCD.

I loved it! Of course, you would never do anything like this on a real dive. So why include it in the training? Well, because this is exactly what diving is about – being in total control while multi-tasking. And if you do it well (which I did, yay!), you feel super-accomplished. It was a lot of fun, too!

The additional bonus of the day was a totally unexpected night dive. I actually got to go on the boat as a Dive Master candidate, so I had to assemble people's gear, distribute weights, etc. And to have dinner with those clients afterwards. Work, in other words. It was pretty awesome to participate in diving from "the other side". And it was equally awesome not to have to pay for this dive.

Day 355 – Physiology of diving

I never thought I would enjoy studying for the Dive Master exam that much. Of course, now I have a total mess in my head from all the three thick books we had to digest, but it's a pretty cool mess! Physiology and physics turned out to be the most interesting part. Not only I can explain the Decompression Sickness phenomenon in scientific terms based on the Henry's law and Haldanean model, but I also know the mechanism of shallow-water blackout during apnea diving and can easily distinguish ossicles from cochlea. Well, maybe some people know all of this without any studying, but since I didn't, I'm excited now. And I feel accomplished. Now we'll see how I'll do on the actual exam – hopefully, the mess in my head will turn into a somewhat organized formation in the next couple of days…

Day 354 – Finally clean and suddenly gasless

Naturally, my badmouthing of the gas truck yesterday was immediately followed by punishment. We invited Daniel and Lukas, Liang's friends from Italy, for dinner. The guys are from the Northern part of Italy that, apparently, should belong to Austria, and insist on speaking German, not Italian – very confusing. Anyway, Liang was planning to make chilaquiles, but when she turned on the stove, there was no gas… And it was already in the evening, after the gas truck's hours of operation. And our water is gas-operated, so no hot shower either. We wished that in addition to the usual million times it would pass by our house just once more today, but no such luck. That'll teach me not to blow upon municipal services!

There was a bright side to the day though. Finally, we got a cleaning lady to come to our house! We have been trying to do it for over two weeks now. I never imagined it would be so difficult to convince a cleaning lady to show up. But there was some communication issue between all the parties involved in this negotiation, so in the meantime we had to live in a pigsty (well, that's an exaggeration, of course, it wasn't that bad). But now the house is spotless. And it will stay this way at least until tomorrow, because right now there's no gas to splash any cooking oil around and dirty some dishes. Indeed, there's a silver lining to anything…