Great find Diduk!

Our eagle-eyed Dive Controller Diduk spotted a beautiful (but shy) Mandarin fish in the Padang Bai area today. Normally we find these colourful critters in Pemuteran but we seem to be hosting our own welcome little visitor just around the corner from the dive shop.

This is brilliant news for all you photography divers out there!

Say 'hello', wave Goodbye

We've waved goodbye to Wayan, one of our equipment guys, this month as he has been given the opportunity to travel to Australia with his girlfriend. You'll be missed Wayan, good luck for your future.

Into his shoes steps Kadek Ade, a local boy, quick humored and willing to learn. Welcome to the Absolute Scuba team Kadek ☺

Reef clean ups and turtle watch

This year Absolute Scuba has become an SSI EcoLogical dive centre. This means we will help to maintain and promote the healthy eco system that we all need to live a healthy lifestyle.

We will:

 Instruct all boat and shop employees as to proper safety and environmental care techniques

 Conduct and advertise beach and dive site clean ups

 Ensure all briefings to divers contain advice on environmentally sound diving practices

 Provide recycling points throughout the dive resort premises and vessels

 Ensure there is no line fishing or collection of any organisms

 Ensure there is no spear fishing

 Provide clearly marked dustbins for waste on boats including cigarette butts, and dispose of receptacles appropriately

 Use purpose placed moorings where possible

 Avoid takings divers or open water students who have not yet demonstrated proficiency in buoyancy directly over corals or other fragile marine environments or habitats

 Participate in local environmental projects

 Report all whale shark & turtle sightings to local recognized data collection points

 Encourage no feeding of fish

 Discourage customers from applying sunscreen before diving

 Run environmental awareness programs for local schoolchildren and communities

 Conduct regular reef checks or surveys

 Offer ECO Logical diver training to our customers

So look out for the reef clean up dates on the website (coming soon) and join us, you never know what you will find underwater as one of our dive controllers, Sean, found this week, when he came across a rice cooker sitting on the reef!

New website design

After over 6 months of waiting, we are starting to redesign the scuba website. It's taken a lot of hard work from behind the scenes, thanks to all involved. It's still not completely finished and even now, I still find typos everyday, which means I must have read the bloody thing 20-30 times by now! If only we could have used a professional web builder as first was discussed, but hey ho!

Anyway, take a look around, there's plenty to read (which is one of the problems, we wanted less text and more photos and we've ended up with MORE text and LESS photos)!

And, if you find a mistake.............it's not my fault. LOL

New year, new hobby?

Have you ever considered scuba diving as a past-time or hobby, or maybe you are already a diver but have plans to improve yourself with continued education in diving, or perhaps taking your diving to a professional level? Ever thought about Technical diving but never had the time or understanding of the skills involved?

Drop me an email through the website for further information about any diving course; we can answer most emails within 48 hours, but if you don't receive an answer by that time, then please send again.

Happy, safe diving for 2011.

Seasons greetings

May we take this opportunity to wish all our friends, old and new, a very Merry Christmas and a peaceful New Year for 2011.

Ceremony day AGAIN!

It is said there is never a day in Bali without a ceremony of some kind and if you include all the life cycle rites (baby ceremonies, puberty rites, weddings, cremations,Temple festivals), then this adage is probably true. There are definitely certain times that are “ceremony-heavy” such as the full moons in April and October and the high holy days of Galungan (it is Galungan today). Balinese religion (called Agama Hindu Dharma) consist of three primary elements: Hinduism based on what is practiced in India but differing substantially from those traditions, animism (where every living thing has a soul) and ancestor worship (the Balinese deify their ancestors after a proscribed process of cleansing has been done).

Temple festivals are held on the anniversary of when the temple in question was consecrated. This could be an annual event, held on a new or full moon or more likely every 210 days, based on the wuku system, a complex calculation of overlapping days of confluence, some being more “powerful” than others (think of Friday the 13th).

An Odalan or temple ceremony usually lasts for three days, but larger ones (which occur every 5, 10, 30 or 100 years) can last for 11 days or longer. The gist of what is happening here is that the Balinese are honoring the deities that rule over the temple by giving them a myriad of offerings, performances of vocal music, dance and gamelan music. They invite them down from their abode on Mount Agung to partake in the activities.

The temple is dressed up in colorful golden clothes, the images of the deities are taken to the local holy spring to be bathed and dressed in their best, shrines are cleaned, performances are rehearsed, committees are formed and then the big day arrives. Usually people take their offerings to the temple in the late afternoon, after the heat of the day has gone, and everyone's work and school obligations are over.

The offerings, consisting of fruits, rice cakes and flowers, are brought in on women's heads and placed at strategic points around the temple. These are blessed with holy water by the temple Pemangku or priest. The pilgrims then pray, are blessed with and drink holy water and then take the offerings home to share with their families. The gods have taken the sari or essence of the offerings, leaving the “leftovers” for the humans to consume. In the evenings, there could be spectacular performances of music and dance by local groups.

Since every village has at least three major temples (and often many more than that), there is always some kind of community religious activity going on. Aside from the village temple festivals, every household compound's family temple (mrajan/sanggah) also has its ceremony every 210 days.

Busy time in Bali again