First dive with a different buddy - not fun. :(

[don Francisco]

Diving with strangers as buddies (or with strange buddies) is always interesting. Based on my experience, the most important thing to look for is similar temperment. Two folks diving as a team must have similar styles and goals or they'll drive each other nuts.

For example, I'm a "slow" diver, preferring to take macro photo's and can spend the whole dive on a single coralhead. If my buddy, prefers to cover lots of area, he'll resent being held back waiting for me to compose a shot. Conversely, I won't be happy chasing him all over the reef.

Combining a newbie with an experienced diver can work well, if the experienced diver is patient, and willing to take on the role of mentor if it's needed, or desired by the newer diver. It gets stressful if the experienced diver thinks assumes he's the master, and if the newbie is fairly self-sufficient, and resents being lectured to.

In my early days, I dove alone and was lucky to be paired with experienced divers very different from the one in the OP. They were great mentors, giving good advice in a friendly collegial spirit, and never made me feel like a rookie.

These days, when I dive with a newbie insta-buddy, I try to remember my early days, and be a gracious, sharing companion, keeping an eye out for the newbie, and offering gentle advice if it's sought.

Next time you're paired up with a stranger, spend more time on the big picture of the dive plan, and how you each prefer to dive to develope an understanding of how it'll work, (or not) before getting into the nuts and bolts of the dive. Above it all bring your patience, and focus on the dive not letting details get to you.

 

[fisheater]

Seems to be agreement on this one. (A RARITY on the Board!)

(A) He was a total jerk.
(B) You did great!
(C) Your next instabuddy is bound to be better.

Diving with different people will teach you different skills and improve your diving. Don't be afraid to ask questions and learn from everyone you dive with. (Not necessarily what they think they're teaching you, though!)

 

[NudeDiver]

I have never dived with someone else so we ran through our buddy checks, and he was a little aggressive in his checks and made it clear that he was more experienced and the dive was to be conducted on his terms.

I would have stopped things right there and said that I would dive with someone else. Aggressively laying down the smack for no obvious reason is the sign of a real jerk.

Also, I'd avoid diving with someone without a computer if I could help it too.

I did the next dive with him by his rules and it was ok.

Are you nuts??

But i didn't really enjoy it as by this stage i decided i didn't like him!

Yeah, if you're not having fun, then what's the point?

I've had lots of "instabuddies" (love that term). Really didn't have much problem with the buddies on a liveaboard - but never been real happy with the buddies on a day boat, but a couple have been OK. Is that just coincidence? Is there something about liveaboards that attracts better buddies, or something about day boats that attracts the jerks?

OP: you're braver than I. I never would have taken the second dive with this guy.

 

[ZenDiver.3D]

Hey there. You know, don't assume that diving for 20 years and AOW, means they are good experienced divers. The guy that has been certified for 20 years and is AOW, may still only have 15 to 20 dives.... Or he may have 200. You can never tell. Most often, those who are know-it-alls and dive tyrants, are not the really experienced knowledgable ones. Most really good ones don't yell and scream about their way. They are self-assured and usually helpful.
I told this once before- This past summer, we had a guy come in who was a master diver rated guy with over 200 logged dives... Good recent history...all of it. You would think he's solid... He joined us on a deep wreck dive. The current rips on this one and vis is about 3 feet(on a good day). But it is a great dive and a great wreck. It sits at 32 meters on the top and rests on the bottom of about 42 meters at high tide. This guy was in the middle of a group of buddy teams going down the line. He hit about 18-20 meters and total panic. Inflated and started to blow up to the surface. A couple of us got hands on him, deflated and slowed his scramble. He was completely pissed at the surface that we did, also. Come to find out, Every dive he'd ever done was in perfect, warm water, outstanding vis. The first time he had low vis he just lost it.

So, the moral of the story is that many dives or years and ratings don't neccesarily make a good diver or good dive buddy. That buddy talk and planning period on the boat is vital to reading a new buddy. How they act with their gear, stories they tell, their attitude toward diving and people, will give you a good idea about how they dive. I don't dictate, order, or demand from my instabuddies. and I don't let them do it to me. Calm, decent people above the water are usually the same below. Pushy and obnoxious above... you do the math.
OP, you were nice to this guy and handled it well. If you had good training, trust it, and keep learning. Keep on like you are and don't be afraid of all instabuddies. I have had some of my best dives with perfect strangers.
Good luck. Keep diving.

 

[bowlofpetunias]

:blinking: It bears repeating.

He was a jerk.... coping that attitude before the dive and insisting on signals different from your PADI ones would justify asking for another buddy pairing!

I've seen "experienced" divers whose skills were not up to the standard of "newbies"

I have refused to be buddied with a newly certified Dive Master because her skills were not enough for me to trust my life to her! It was her first dive off course without an instructor. Conditions weren't good and I wasn't familiar with the site. Certification doesn't count as much as real experience an appropriate attitude and skill in the water.

Sounds like you handled the situation well but doing the second dive with him? Fool for punishment!:shocked2:

Glad it didn't put you off. Any dive you return from is a good dive and any dive you develop more skills on is a great dive. We can learn from everyone by example or by learning from their mistakes. Sounds like you certainly learned some valuable stuff. like Jerk on the boat = Jerk magnified in the water

Instabuddies always make me appreciate my regular buddies more Keep blowing bubbles:blinking:

 

[Andy_HFC]

Good points raised folks cheers for that. Agreed - In hindsight i shouldn't have done the 2nd dive. I'm putting this down to an element of naievity on my part as it was my first diving experience with a different buddy, and an irregular system. I just put it down to not being used to diving with someone else.

I won't make the same errors again that's for sure!

How do you cope with diving with someone who uses different hand signals etc.? Someone has to change? Or would you ask for a different buddy who uses PADI signals? Or someone without a computer? For sake of argument.

I don't particularly want to offend someone out to have a nice days diving either. I'm not saying i would jepordise safety, but there has to be solution to these situations?

 

[Sas]

Good points raised folks cheers for that. Agreed - In hindsight i shouldn't have done the 2nd dive. I'm putting this down to an element of naievity on my part as it was my first diving experience with a different buddy, and an irregular system. I just put it down to not being used to diving with someone else.

Been there done that, don't feel too bad, lots of people have been in your shoes and made similar decisions! I have been a sucker for punishment with a few buddies I have dived with... sometimes even when someone is a good diver they are clearly incompatible with the style of diving you do.

How do you cope with diving with someone who uses different hand signals etc.? Someone has to change? Or would you ask for a different buddy who uses PADI signals? Or someone without a computer? For sake of argument.

I don't particularly want to offend someone out to have a nice days diving either. I'm not saying i would jepordise safety, but there has to be solution to these situations?

I have a good memory for hand signals so I would always offer to use theirs as I find it easy enough to remember other signals - so I guess it depends if you think you can learn them well enough or if they are more comfortable. Perhaps invest in a slate or wetnotes, they are cheap, so worst case, you can always write down what you are trying to say or ask them to do so. Out of interest, what signals did you guys have different to one another? I have rarely encountered a person who has significantly different signals to the ones I use... usually it is just one hand v two hand signs such as for pressure and things like that. Also even when I have dived with people where we might have missed discussing a sign or an unusual situation has come up it is easy enough to get your point across, I have rarely had a time when I or my buddy haven't been able to communicate what I want through hand signals/charades/etc. (well once I had to write 'blurry' in the sand to get my buddy to fix the camera haha) so I dunno why this guy found it so difficult to be honest.

 

[Brian Sharpe]

sorry to hear about your experience, sounds like the guy was a complete

Hey, it sounds like he was a jerk not a dork - dork divers (Dork Divers Network) are fun to dive with

 

[FF-EMT Diver]

By no means am I questioning your actions, (sounds great to me), What I wonder if this guy had a dive plan, you said he didn't have a computer so were ya'll supposed to dive your computer or did he have a timepiece for bottom time, If he did not have a plan I would have to assume he would not dive a plan hence I would not dive with him. Just my.02.

 

[LarryHinDC]

Like everyone has said, it sounds to me like you handled the situation pretty well. You said that you were paired with this guy -- so I assume you were with a group of divers, perhaps on a boat. One possibility I haven't seen mentioned is that you could have talked to the DM to see if you could switch buddies between dive 1 and dive 2. I doubt that anyone else you were paired with could have been worse!