It’s been a crazy last week to say the least. We had some unexpected early goodbyes, but didn’t let the decrease in numbers keep us from enjoying our final days in paradise. After a couple of days of adjusting to our new group dynamic, we were more than ready to start the last part of our adventure. We’d already trekked through tree-covered hills and burned rubber through busy city streets, and now it was time to master a completely new territory: underwater. It took a 5 hour classroom course, a swim test, and a skills portion in the pool before we finally made it to the ocean, but it was worth it. By the end of it, some of us got our 60 ft open water scuba certifications, while others (Lindsay) got the 40ft scuba cert because turns out you need to know how to swim in order to scuba dive. Many of us found our liking for the bottom of the ocean to exceed that of the above ground world and wished we had more time to explore this vastly uncharted terrain. All in all scuba diving was incredible, but nothing beat Maggie’s face plant in front of the entire boat from a 3 foot platform. She was a good sport about the whole thing, but I’m pretty sure she was just trying to one-up that time I used my back to mop up the bathroom floor during a group meeting. She won. I could write forever about all of the hilarious and absurd things that we experienced together over the course of these past 3 months, but no matter how hard I tried, only us 12 will really understand and fully appreciate all that we went through. There are officially zero days left of our excursion, with our final hours together spent crowded around a table in the Ho Chi Minh city airport, not fully able to process how close we are to departing ways. A special thanks from the entire group to our amazing leaders Lindsay and Topher for making this a transformative experience, and keeping us constantly entertained with their absurdity.
Smell ya later,
Shannon
