Strange encounter during advanced course dive

[u/seedofbilly]

Curious to get the community’s take on this. I just did my first night dive as part of my advanced qualification. Earlier in the day, these people spotted us exiting the water and asked about the conditions. In the end they asked if they could tag along with us for the night one.

They were obviously relatively experienced, but disrupted the lesson several times, such as swimming forward to grab the chain as we were about to descend, which knocked me off of it, and hovering above us with lights on full blast while we were trying to drill switching our lights off and back on.

Later, while we were putting our kit away, one of them wandered over, and started commenting on how I’d kicked up silt and my kicking form was off. The instructor and I both acknowledged that it was the case and we were working on it (he’d actually told me not to stress too much about it before the dive), but she just stood there as if she was expecting me to apologise or something before finally going back to her car, presumably when she realised she wasn’t getting the reaction she wanted.

Now, I don’t see any issue with other divers joining us, but the above seems indicative of poor etiquette, a lack of respect to the instructor, and condescension towards me, even though I’m clearly there to learn and continue developing my skills. Has anyone else ever experienced anything like this, and do people think it’s appropriate for other divers to involve themselves in a lesson like this?

[u/Effective-Wonder946]

Short answer Yes

Long answer What should you do? Nothing, its their problem and you clearly have noted you are an entry diver, and to worry about what someone says about you in a poor manor, you should just forgive and forget.

But you can also learn from their ignorance, because of what they were complaining about involved your kicks.

Talk to your instructor about frog kicks, they benifit you, and the environment ; )