deco_martini
Contributor
I'm working on a new edition of "Bonaire Shore Diving Made Stupid" (tm), but thought about writing this essay as well.
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There you were a new recreational diver. You had to go on trips. Your "Local Dive $hop" ran trips and you went on some. You had a schedule, you a time to be at the boat, there were these other people called "Divers" though. Some of them were cool, some were loud when you wanted quiet, some were complete dicks. Diving was pretty cool except for them.
After a trip or two, you started seeing diving as a value proposition. If you get 3 dives per day for 7 days, for 21 dives total, and the trip costs X much then want to minimize the dollars per dive. Soon you stop going with locals at all and booking your own adventures.
Now you're diving on boats with randoms and paying less than you were because your Local Dive $hop was going places they schmoozed comped bar tabs for themselves from at Dema.
You're on vacation but still waking up early, to be around people you don't like. Me and my dive buddy call the "the Jaffs". Most other divers are cool, but it only takes a few Jaffs to harsh your own mellow. The loudmouth who can't shut up, the guy wayyyyyyy too awake at 8am, the zero-boat etiquette guy, the tech wanna-be knowitall, the smarmy college age guy who smirks at everything everyone else does like he's too cool to even be there, etc, etc. The Jaffs. Who the Jaffs are might be relative to you. But you have your own catalog of who "The Jaffs" are. I might even be a Jaff to you.
Maybe at some point you spin the wheel of diving and come up with Bonaire. You run the numbers and the math is right. The price per dive is amazing since you can dive 5 times a day or more if you want to.
That first trip, you do a bunch of research and read a bunch of websites, but still have no idea what you're doing. You commando dive. You do double-morning shore dives. You eat lunch as fast as you can to get back out in the afternoon, you are still programmed for diving with the Jaffs on the Jaff-boat.
At some point, you learn to to dive your own schedule. You're on vacation. But there's a wreck, you have to dive that, right? There isn't much ... on it. You go through the list of dive spots and learn really quickly which spots are one-and-done, which sites are algae and fire coral, which sites are covered in.... Jaffs. The Hilma Hooker is a primetime Jaff location. But that Jaff was maybe you on your first trip, or me:
ZOMG ITS A WRECK LETS DO IT!!! <-- Me Jaffing out.
ZOMG, 100FT SANDY BOTTOM GOTTA HIT IT <-- more jaffing from me.
I'm not saying you have to be a Jaff to dive the Hooker, I'm just saying it is a magnet for them. And for the Jaffs you tried to leave behind..... You see, someone's Local Dive $hop schmoozed a deal for themself at the Divi Flamingo. They just pulled a boat up to the Hilma and dumped a Jaffload of people off plummeting straight to 100 ft down. They don't have the gentle relaxing swim out checking the shallow and reefs for stuffs, the gradual swim down the reef where it's protected from weather by the ship, the joy of seeing that dark hull come into view.
You keep returning to Bonaire and evolving. You start waking up when you want to, diving when you want to, with who you want to. You stop calculating price-per-dive and just enjoying when you do dive. You take your time to enjoy that sandwich from Between-2-Buns for lunch. You don't rush dinner for the night dive. You walk up to the boat signup chalk board at your dive operator and write "Lul? No" on it. You stop caring about "hitting bottom". Three long dives a day starts sounding nice.
I'm still going through my own de-Jaffination process. I don't proclaim to be a Bonaire expert or a warm water diving guru. I'm just a dude who with his diving buddy, are just trying to chill and have a good time. You know what I'm saying though when you drive up to that dive site (with 6 trucks already parked) and take one look at some of the people. Now you have to the words to verbalize "let's move on and find another site with less Jaffs".
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There you were a new recreational diver. You had to go on trips. Your "Local Dive $hop" ran trips and you went on some. You had a schedule, you a time to be at the boat, there were these other people called "Divers" though. Some of them were cool, some were loud when you wanted quiet, some were complete dicks. Diving was pretty cool except for them.
After a trip or two, you started seeing diving as a value proposition. If you get 3 dives per day for 7 days, for 21 dives total, and the trip costs X much then want to minimize the dollars per dive. Soon you stop going with locals at all and booking your own adventures.
Now you're diving on boats with randoms and paying less than you were because your Local Dive $hop was going places they schmoozed comped bar tabs for themselves from at Dema.
You're on vacation but still waking up early, to be around people you don't like. Me and my dive buddy call the "the Jaffs". Most other divers are cool, but it only takes a few Jaffs to harsh your own mellow. The loudmouth who can't shut up, the guy wayyyyyyy too awake at 8am, the zero-boat etiquette guy, the tech wanna-be knowitall, the smarmy college age guy who smirks at everything everyone else does like he's too cool to even be there, etc, etc. The Jaffs. Who the Jaffs are might be relative to you. But you have your own catalog of who "The Jaffs" are. I might even be a Jaff to you.
Maybe at some point you spin the wheel of diving and come up with Bonaire. You run the numbers and the math is right. The price per dive is amazing since you can dive 5 times a day or more if you want to.
That first trip, you do a bunch of research and read a bunch of websites, but still have no idea what you're doing. You commando dive. You do double-morning shore dives. You eat lunch as fast as you can to get back out in the afternoon, you are still programmed for diving with the Jaffs on the Jaff-boat.
At some point, you learn to to dive your own schedule. You're on vacation. But there's a wreck, you have to dive that, right? There isn't much ... on it. You go through the list of dive spots and learn really quickly which spots are one-and-done, which sites are algae and fire coral, which sites are covered in.... Jaffs. The Hilma Hooker is a primetime Jaff location. But that Jaff was maybe you on your first trip, or me:
ZOMG ITS A WRECK LETS DO IT!!! <-- Me Jaffing out.
ZOMG, 100FT SANDY BOTTOM GOTTA HIT IT <-- more jaffing from me.
I'm not saying you have to be a Jaff to dive the Hooker, I'm just saying it is a magnet for them. And for the Jaffs you tried to leave behind..... You see, someone's Local Dive $hop schmoozed a deal for themself at the Divi Flamingo. They just pulled a boat up to the Hilma and dumped a Jaffload of people off plummeting straight to 100 ft down. They don't have the gentle relaxing swim out checking the shallow and reefs for stuffs, the gradual swim down the reef where it's protected from weather by the ship, the joy of seeing that dark hull come into view.
You keep returning to Bonaire and evolving. You start waking up when you want to, diving when you want to, with who you want to. You stop calculating price-per-dive and just enjoying when you do dive. You take your time to enjoy that sandwich from Between-2-Buns for lunch. You don't rush dinner for the night dive. You walk up to the boat signup chalk board at your dive operator and write "Lul? No" on it. You stop caring about "hitting bottom". Three long dives a day starts sounding nice.
I'm still going through my own de-Jaffination process. I don't proclaim to be a Bonaire expert or a warm water diving guru. I'm just a dude who with his diving buddy, are just trying to chill and have a good time. You know what I'm saying though when you drive up to that dive site (with 6 trucks already parked) and take one look at some of the people. Now you have to the words to verbalize "let's move on and find another site with less Jaffs".
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. Took us 2 trips before forming our travel group 'Just Us' consisting of The Curmudgeon and Ms. Jersey. We call them Nudnicks or Spores - the former usually reserved for newer divers and cuts some slack. Spore is a term reserved for the most egregious and/or special people. You know the ones who after the dockside roll call and briefing to "get on the boat and sit down immediately" proceeds to get on the boat and wander aimlessly illiciting a loud "PLEASE SIT DOWN" from the DM which is ignored as they continue tripping over gear before falling gracelessly onto your lap - that's a Spore.
