Father and I had just gotten off the deck of the yacht that had taken us into the deep blue Arabian sea off the Netrani island… the sheer excitement of seeing & feeling the marine life up-close for the first time had been giving me goosebumps through the morning. The physical act of diving into their habitation had its own set of attached fears but I had waited with glee on the porch as mother picked up the diving gear from the rear of the yacht and flung it across to the doorway… the scuba diving instructions father had been giving me since the past couple of weeks had as though been ingrained into my head and I had sped my way through the diving suit.
Having been brought up on the Goan coastal belt, father always had a strong connect with the waters since his childhood. The years of independently taking to the waters and diving to new stretches had made him fearless of the blues. It was this fearlessness along with his professional diving qualification that had made him take mother into the depths of the sea as well… a reluctant swimmer at first, mother had initially been skeptical of the deep waters but it was the shadow he caste over her that had made her feel secure among the undersea currents. With amateur experience of a few years, she had felt a lot more confident of taking the plunge.
Our practice sessions had spanned well past noon during the past few weekends, with father coaching me in the shallow waters off the coast on critical diving skills - flooding and clearing the mask, recovering the regulator, sharing air, in-water resuscitation and the likes. The dry-training regimen had included regular fitness exercises on the beach with a few rounds of jogging across the sandy laps ensuring physical fitness for a tryst with the blues. Father had always put practice of the ways of the sea on top priority for he had known the unpredictability of situations that could surprise any newbie.
As mother & I had put on our scuba set, father had turned off the engine, anchoring the hired yacht to a halt. The waters had looked inviting with a promise of the expanse of the sea opening in full bosom - the weather too had been most conducive with the sun shining overhead & only a few white clouds in sight. Mother and I had decided to jump in first with father trailing closely behind us to keep a vigil.
We had broken through the cool water surface in a splash and the marine life below had only begun to show a glimpse with some herrings swimming across the sunlit surface waters. Tightening my scuba harness support and holding the helmet mouthpiece firmly once inside the water, I had been careful to navigate through the waters whilst mother had been in my proximity - she in turn had ensured not to lose sight as I had ventured around.
The colourful reflections of the corals on the sea-bed had become evident in the azure blue mid-way below. The spiraling schools of brightly coloured and strikingly patterned butterfly fishes, bearing shades of black, white, blue, red, orange and yellow had made their entry first. I had just been thrilled by the sight of these residents below when the patched scales of orange & white clown fishes had made me sit up and take notice of their ornamental bodies. I had wondered what laid farther in the depths of the sea beyond these beautiful sights.
Next, a swarm of eels, generating body waves traveling through the length of their bodies had made their presence felt rising jointly from the sand burrows on the sea bed. As I had reeled around their slender, scaly bodies, trying to reach out with my hands, mothers tug on my back had indicated the need to keep away. A pair of leatherback sea turtles with their mosaic of bony plates beneath the leathery skin had also begun to swim upwards making a beeline to the surface for a breath of fresh air. My touch on their soft shells had irked them but the physical touch had as though brought me closer to them in a strange way.
With mother’s shadow caste over me, I had gone further down a few crevices to discover the texture of the corals on the sea-bed. It had been a while since we had been underwater and with mother having joined me in examining the teeming hot-bed of brilliant corals, the timing of father’s entry into the water and his venturing into the farther depths of the sea had been absent to our cognizance.
The multi-hued colorful tentacles with the enveloped skeletal structure of the corals had looked phenomenal – as I had explored the vistas the sea had offered, almost oblivious to anything else, my mental space had been thoughtless and the eerie silence of the deep sea had as though filled my whole being.
Those moments at the nadir of the sea-bed spent in the solo company of my mother had been priceless whilst uncovering the under-sea treasures – the crescendo had been the revelation of a flurry of fluorescent corals when we had shaken up a large undergrowth of plankton on one of the structural tentacles of a coral. The enchanting illumination and luminescence emitted by the glowing corals had as though enveloped us in a radiance. I had seen a beautiful twinkle in mother’s eyes and a smile had come alive on her face underneath her helmet in that hypnotic instant. It had almost felt like nature had conspired to bring together that moment in its entirety for us.
As I had adjusted my fins to get closer to the fluorescent corals, in my eagerness and excitement, I had accidentally ruptured the cord connecting my mouthpiece to the main air supply chamber. Occupied with the under-sea bounties, the resultant air-bubbles arising from the air chamber had gone completely unnoticed.
It had been the wing-like movements of triangular fins attached to the horizontal flat body of a large black manta ray that had kept us engrossed at the sea-bed. With all attention devoted to the bird-like creature flying through the watery-sky, we had noticed the rupture to the umbilical cord only when the air supply had almost halted and I had begun to feel out of breath.
On reaching the surface rather hurriedly, my eyes had gazed upon the nearby waters for any sign of mother or father. Father had been out of sight since our dive and had taken off to a deeper part of the sea. Out of the water and onto the anchored yacht, I had kept yelling for mother to take notice… even after a few minutes further though, there had been no indication of either of them. It was only twenty minutes later that father had come back to the yacht without any awareness of our ordeal.
Mother had still not surfaced and father had plunged right back into the waters keeping a keen eye on the under-sea waters for any hint of movement. In those moments, he had felt like a fool for having followed a shoal of sharks that he had spotted and had trailed right into the deeper waters of the sea – he had not been able to rid himself off the feeling all through the look-out for mother and had boarded back on the yacht an hour later only to vent his emotions with a large outburst.
A decade later, as I graduated today, each event of that fateful day re-surfaced as I stood on the dais of the Professional Association of Diving Instructors, receiving the outstanding student award at the hands of father, a special invitee for giving away the honor as an exception this year.
I felt a shiver down the spine remembering the glowing smile on mother’s face from under her diving helmet during that supernatural moment we shared over the fluorescent corals – that instant was special! I wish I could turn back the clock and bring the wheels of time to a stop in that express moment, she had gifted me her last memory for a lifetime! How I wish I could re-live that instant with her again.
I take my life as a gift from mother! She has been my progenitor, protector and overshadow all throughout – it is her inspiration that has shaped my choice of career too.
Whilst her absence has been a great personal loss for me and father, we have used the experience positively to give back whatever we can to ensure no accidents of a similar sort take away from others what could have been a fulfilling life otherwise.
I hope to continue to see mother in the smile on every diver’s face when they discover the treasures and bounties of the underbelly of the blues.
Pictures courtesy: https://www.facebook.com/pascalcampionart
