Putu, my Instructor, picked me up from my hotel at 10:00 so I had a nice lie in. We moto’d up to the dive shop where we spent a couple of hours going through all the material I’d covered the day before.

While we were plodding through it all, a young German couple came in and booked a dive up in Tulamben tomorrow, so I’ll be having another 6-hour return trip with them. It’s all experience, which is good, and counts towards my final grade.

I got to have a look at the Instructor Manual, and I think I’ll be trying to get an electronic copy… it’s huge! Putu’s printed his out and put it in a ring binder and it’s about 3″ thick. It’s also ridiculously expensive, but you have to have one for the Instructor or Assistant Instructor courses – no borrowing is allowed. The problem with manual fees is that they’re the same worldwide, allowing for taxes. So what’s considered “hefty” in the U.S. or U.K., for instance, is simply astronomical to someone living and working in Indonesia or Vietnam. Putu’s annual registration fee for PADI costs him a month’s wage! But without it, he can’t work.

After we finished, Putu kindly bought me lunch. We went to a nearby stall and had nasi… something. “Nasi” is rice, and it had shredded chicken, omelette, green beans and a stupidly spicy sauce on it, too. Tasty and I guess quite cheap, but even Putu said it was too spicy for him!

He then dropped me off back at my hotel with the Instructor Manual, Encyclopedia of Recreational Diving and one of the quarterly PADI magazines to leaf through. I’m developing quite a pile of books in my room!

It’s around 2pm as I write this and my plans are to laze around, read and then go and watch the Chelsea v Man U game this evening. No excessive beer with a 7am start tomorrow.