Confessions of a Card Collector

[Lorenzoid]

I like taking courses, whether diving or something else. I like learning new things, even if I'm unlikely to use them. You sign up for a multi-day course, you get some reading material to prepare with, you have to show up each day at a certain time, there's even actual classroom time in addition to being in the water, there's a quiz, and if you're really lucky then at the end of a long day you get to commiserate with your classmates about how hard it was--I LOVE it, all of it. I guess I just like being a student--my student days were the happiest days of my life. As for the card, you're darn right I want the card afterwards. I plan to take plenty more courses--just a matter of time and money.

 

[scubafanatic]

I think the ridicule associated with 'card collecting' is more associated with the endless number of trivial PADI specialty cards available, like doing 3 10-minute dives in the LDS pool to earn the 'snorkel clearing' specialty card, etc.

 

[MaxBottomtime]

Scubafanatic is correct. Not just in the number of "specialties" but the fact that when you collect five PADI specialty cards you get a bonus Master Diver card! I've known far too many divers who took AOW but still wouldn't qualify as an Open Water diver if they took a course from me. I know two who are rescue certified but have no clue how to handle themselves underwater.

 

[TMHeimer]

I have nowhere near the collection of several of you guys. I got AOW several months after OW when it presented the only way to get out on a boat in N. FL in winter. One of my Adventure Dives was Nitrox. The instructor said I should finish the course back home and did (well, had to do and pay for both halves of the course there). Then I got curious about all the courses in the famous PADI list. I noticed Rescue, and read on SB this was a good idea. So, I took EFR (in New Jersey, as the one here at home was cancelled--try legally parking close to the dive shop in Hoboken.....). After that it was back to the FL panhandle, and I got the idea to do 4 more specialties to get the magic MSD. I actually took 5 within our 3 months there (well I had the $ then). The instructor was ready to collect my $41 fee and send out for my MSD card, but I said to hold off until next week when I will do my 50th dive.....Wanted it to be "official". Man I knew I was no Master Diver, but I had the patch to prove I was. I learned from SB it's probably a huge mistake to wear the cap I put that patch on around divers. So I wore it elsewhere. "You're not really a Master Scuba Diver, are you?" "Why, yes, I am". If I weren't married I can't even imagine how that would've worked with the ladies.
Next, Divemaster. Thought I'd get one more card besides Rescue that really meant something. And it did. More work getting that one than most of the others combined. It was interesting being a student again, after so many years as a Band teacher. And it was fulfilling assisting with courses, where you got back into education--and without the buck stopping with you all the time. And, I did make enough $ in 4 seasons to cover the course, gas and some left over.
No more cards for me. I'm way behind someone like stuartv, but still know way too much for the simpleton diving I do.

 

[thbcthomas]

So which one of you was trying to get their "solo hurricane card" and did you get it? Or did it not count since you had to be rescued by the 2 good Samaritans?

 

[Bubblesong]

I cruised on my OW card for 23 years until my kid got interested, since then she and I together rolled through AOW, Rescue, Nitrox and Drysuit. I feel I can justify blowing money like crazy on scuba now that it is "educational" and in the same budget column as lunch money and spiral bound notebooks!

 

[Diving Dubai]

An interesting topic.

I had my perception changed over the MSD, by one post in a thread about such things. The poster was by their own admission shy and somewhat uncomfortable about going on dive boats and diving with strangers.

So they chose to take some specialties, diving with an instructor worked for them and kept them diving. Of course divign with teh same shop led them to meet people and get to know them which meant that diving with them was easier and more fun. In their case it wasn't about the collecting cards but a means to dive.

Had I not been part of a club, then I would probably either done the same or not dived at all. (My first 5 years post OW cert, I didn't have the confidence to rock up as a single diver on a commercial boat)

Regarding specialities being a water of time. I think here PADI don't help themselves. Their website just shows the bare minimum about a course. Take boat diver. On the surface it seems a waste of timeand trivial. If you dig down, there is an optional section which if taken with a knowlegable instructor teaches you about small boats (if you operate or own one) Engines, knots, anchoring, basic boat handling, charts navigation etc etc. Unless you know what to search for, you'll never find that info.

Often there are more to the course than appears on the surface

 

[woodcarver]

Finding this thread is refreshing after seeing a number of threads that seemed to kinda disparage additional certifications. I am trying to learn as much as possible having gotten what I consider a late start to diving, at 52, 56 now. Training courses have been a reason to dive and with only one exception (boat), have been great. At this point I have 14 c-cards, the most advanced is Rescue. Even though I have no interest in going below rec limits, and don't have much interest in wrecks, some of the tech courses look like they would be interesting and provide a better understanding of diving. Same would apply to taking the Divemaster course. Not sure if I want to teach or not.

 

[lowviz]

I have a bunch of cards, so what? My most favorite card is the one that I don't have. Solo Diver.

Maybe I'll issue it to myself when I think that I'm finally there...

 

[woodcarver]

That's next on my list also. Setting up to do it in Bonaire in August.