Friday, September 26, 2008

Meters, Kilos and Centigrade, oh my

Okay, If I could just take a moment and voice one iddy biddy complaint about the U.S. standard of education for children... Why, why why haven't we been properly taught metric conversions? Why? I have so much I could blog about on this but the most salient point I want to make is it makes traveling to other countries like taking a math test.

I've struggled with this concept off and on since I've been here but I complain about it now because of my two days of diving in Tulumben where it would have been most useful for me to have been fluent in metric conversions. I am now officially an Advanced Open Water diver. I just completed three days of diving, 5 dives in Tulumben for the Advanced Open Water course and 2 dives today at Nusa Penida... a drift dive. For this course I did a naturalist dive (learning about fish and habitats), a wreck dive (the USS Liberty), advanced navigation (swimming in a square pattern with compass headings), a night dive (diving at night), and a deep dive to 30 meters which is about 100 feet. Depth gauges here are measured in meters, water temperature is in centigrade and well, I had to wear 8 kilos on my weight belt. So As you can see, I'm well on my way to finally understanding conversions... or at least having a better handle on them.

So why didn't I bring my own gauges? Sadly my dive computer didn't make it to me in Banjarmasin before I left for Bali... I think it's there now though, but that's doing me no good. So I ended up using the dive center's (Bali Scuba) gear. And it wouldn't have mattered because they all talk in metric here. So it looks like I have to learn Bahasa Indonesian, Banjarese, a smattering of Balinese, maybe some Javanese and of course Metric, I better bust those books! In any case, they were fun dives, I highly recommend these people if you are coming to dive in Bali.

The drift diving was amazing. You basically drop down into a current and just go with it. We went along a huge reef with millions of fish and other marine life. Just amazing. At one point the current got pretty strong and you had to hug close to the reef so as not to get swept along out towards the sea. I'll blog more details later and of course pics (none from below... sorry) once I'm back in Kalimantan.

Advice for you folks back home: Learn your metric!

5 comments:

Cat said...

Yes, the metric system should be taught in the US. I don't know why we cling to our own way of doing things - it just makes life more difficult the moment you step out of the country.
I am positively GREEN right now because I so wish I was out there diving with you! When I visit next summer you'll have to take me to all the best spots. So what sorts of marine life did you see? What types of habitat did you visit? What interactions and biological processes did you observe? How was the wreck dive? Did you go inside?

Aundi said...

soooo many questions1 I saw a lot of fish, pigmy seahorse, puffer fish on the reef at Nusa Panida, other divers, etc. There's not much of an inside for the wreck. We went through parts tho. I have more to tell and will later.

Anyway, Seminyak has expensive internet time compared to the last place so I'm going to update the ol blog when I return to Banjarmasin Thursday.

Lara Lutrick said...

Aundi

I hear your pain! I'm with Cathy, we should be teaching metric. Sure it would be hard for adults, but for kids, it would be better in the long run. I doubt this will change in my lifetime.

I'm looking forward to seeing your photos of the dive. Sounds so cool.

lara

Electronicah said...

I did learn the metric system as a kid in U.S. public education. Everything we did was in metrics! Of course it was worthless because the "real world" (U.S.) was not in metrics. So there ya go.

Aundi said...

Hey Wendy,
Not sure if I get it...