Diving in Koh Tao

I am a certified Open Water Diver now- which means I can dive (with a buddy) up to 18m. My week of diving was really great. I thought I'd be scared of breathing underwater, like it might feel claustrophobic but it didn't at all. It's hard to be scared when everything looks so cool! The first day was just theory, watching silly movies and then doing an "exam" which I got 100% on. Then we got 4 dives, each dive was about 45 minutes and they got deeper each time. I saw tons of fish; angel fish, banner fish, groupers, bat fish, clown fish (NEMO!!!), parrot fish, barracudas and a puffer fish. I'm not sure which one was cooler, the barracuda because I played for that hockey team for years, or the puffer fish because he was so big and had a funny looking mouth. Being underwater felt so cool, laying on your back looking up and seeing the sun through the water- it felt like being in a dream. Unfortunately I was just getting over a sinus infection which isn't good for diving and I got the WORST sinus/ pressure headaches. The air in my head compressed as I descended which felt fine but then when I was ascending it was expanding and since my sinuses were still blocked it had nowhere to go. Terrible. The diving itself was so cool it made up for the terrible headaches though. A few days into my stay in Koh Tao I lost my cellphone... I think I put it down for a second and someone picked it up and walked away with it. It makes staying in touch really difficult because now I have to find internet cafes (which on the islands cost a decent amount of $$). On top of the communication factor I'm also now missing my alarm clock, music, flashlight, notepad, one of my cameras... a shame. I'll look into getting a cheap one here so I can at least stay in touch. After Koh Tao we took a night ferry which was pretty cool. It was a big open boat with one big mattress all the way down each side. It was like a huge slumber party (with 200 strangers). Despite all the people, the ocean swaying and the heat I actually had a pretty good sleep. We took the ferry to Surat Thani and then got a bus to Krabi. We had a few epic waits for transfers between the ferry and the bus. "Soon" here means more than an hour. (I'm catching up on blogs now that I've got internet for a bit so see the next one for more adventures) <3