The constant bobbing of the waves mysteriously had no impact on my pancake filled tummy. I floated at the ocean’s surface, completely calm despite the threatening look of the sky above. What my eyes had witnessed just minutes before had completely astounded me. The gentle sway of the most exotic corals, boasting a palette of pastel hues to the polka dotted slithering Murray eel that seemed friendly enough when I approached it, and to think this was just my first taste of being at the seabed. For as far as the eye could see, there was only water. A blue so rich that it stirred fear in my gut and yet I floated relaxingly, waiting for the boat to pick me up.
The year 2009 had been declared the year of self-indulgence. Fresh out of university and with pockets full of summer earned cash, it almost seemed necessary to travel. I picked Mauritius out of my sheer fascination with the ocean. Deemed courageous by my family and friends for wanting to travel solo, I thought little of the dangers involved and was optimistic that friends could quite easily be made on my travels.
There was a certain familiarity about Mauritius that never left me feeling foreign. Quite simply put, the locals bore the same skin tone and Indian features that I had. Not a single encounter went by without them speaking the island’s broken French to me. I used this to my advantage on days that I visited animal parks and museums, nodding occasionally and muttering what I had overhead to be “yes”, getting off with paying only the local fare instead.
While the sight-seeing was pretty and culture eye opening (Mauritians ate their baguettes stuffed with spicy Indian chicken curries), the real reason I came to Mauritius was to discover the ocean. I remember standing on the balcony of my hotel and hearing the roar of the waves crashing onto the beach. It scared me. It fascinated me. It intrigued me.
I signed up at a local dive shop and began by far the most exhilarating journey of my life that day. I have always felt at ease in the water. I’m what people call a water baby. The ones that don’t come out of the pool until the stars are out and everyone else has left for dinner.
Strapping on a 15 pound oxygen tank was probably the moment reality set in. Before my mind had the time to process this potentially death defying dip, I was ushered into a little speed boat. Despite the rickety exterior of the boat, we were out in the open ocean just minutes later and one by one divers were dropping out of the boat like flies. I felt sick, the kind you feel once you’re strapped onto a rollercoaster while waiting for the attendant to hit that big fat green button.
I did as I was instructed and tipped myself overboard. There was NO turning back now. Every episode I ever watched from Shark Week flashed right through my mind and I felt the hysteria of panic rising within me. Suddenly I was more eager to get my head wet than float around like bait on a hook.
The first time your eyes adjust to the darkness below, you can’t help but feel insignificant. If the width of the ocean made you nervous then the depth of it would paralyze you with fear. I clung to the boat’s anchor and ironically seemed a natural at making my way down 20 feet.
At the bottom, the very first thing I noticed apart from the myriad of colourful fishes swimming by were seahorses, swimming in small circles close to the reef. I glide effortlessly from one hunk of coral to the next, the Little Mermaid soundtrack playing on loop in my head. “Darling it’s better, down where it’s wetter, under the sea!!”
Convinced that I was a sea creature in my past life, I was reluctant to return to the surface. There was too much to see, too much to explore, and too much for my confined mind to absorb in just this one dive. I remember bidding a group of brightly coloured fish goodbye as my group of divers begun our ascent. I was blowing kisses to the fishies when in the corner of my eye; I spotted a flash of grey. Fear sunk to the pit of my stomach.
Right off the bat I knew it wasn’t a shark. It was a manta ray, wings spread wide and flapping gently as she swooped in for a closer look. The gentle demeanour of its flapping convinced me that this manta was a female, a strong, curious one, just like me. She was no ordinary ray, she was an eagle ray and her wings span was almost 6 feet. I stayed as still as I could despite the buoyancy and she came closer and closer. She was so close that I could reach out and touch her but every voice in my erratic head reminded me that she was a creature of the wild, and my curiosity could be only be perceived as a threat.
She swam double circles around me, teasing me or extending the hospitality of the ocean no doubt. I felt warm and special that she only seemed interested in me. But soon her interest faded and the call of the open waters was too much for her to resist.
I watched her until she faded into the black of the ocean stretched before me. I’d made my first connection, one I would treasure forever and relive in my mind time and time again. The ocean had called out to me and I was only too happy to have answered.
And so began my passionate love affair with the deep blue sea.
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