Asams,
The life of a diving instructor is as varied as the climates in which one works and the courses that one teaches.
When you're a kid, the "lifestyle" might be some far off exotic location where you show up in board shorts and Oakley's and worry about paying your rent and keeping your work visa so you don't get thrown off the island while you teach lots of DSD's, do open water check out dives, and wonder if your fingers are calloused from filling tanks all night or from peeling lables off beer bottles while not being paid to hang out and play Julie the Cruise Director to people on vacation. You'll work hard while others play. You'll have lots of fun and some memories that others would kill to know. But, after a while, just like college frat parties, the carnival life on the water meets the stark reality of adult concerns and you begin making promises to yourself that you'll grow up at 25, 35, 45 ... then "it" hits you. That "it" is whatever causes you to look back and wonder whether you should have never quit your real job.
When you're an adult, being a scuba instructor is more like working a real job and much less glamorous than the "lifestyle" portrayed by Paul Walker in
Into The Blue and that is marketed to divers to get them to Go Pro! Those who managed to keep one step ahead of "it" find better paying gigs than just teaching DSD's and filling tanks all day. Becoming a boat captain often gets one better pay and job security in paradise, but really limits the amount of diving you get to do. Others move into management roles and have the same schedules and headaches of managers everywhere, but the view from the office window might be better. Others will go on to start their own businesses and struggle with the same concerns of small business owners everywhere, but with the added challenge of negotiating "paradise politics" which often tries to remove foreigners and open up employment to locals. Some instructors end up going corporate and working office jobs much of the time at agency headquarters.
For some instructors, they have built successful businesses in places one wouldn't think people would enjoy diving. You could end up a technical instructor teaching trimix diving to students in the Pacific Northwest diving deep walls and stemming off the cold everyday with argon, drysuit insulation and a Starbuck's gift card. Or, you may find yourself living in the agricultural centers of Northern Florida and teaching a cave diving course while enjoying some breakfast biscuits and grits in a country store in the morning and swimming through gin clear water in tunnels that serpentine miles under the earth by afternoon.
If you're a teacher with summers off (not sure if you're teaching at a US base in Korea of what the Korean education calendar is like), PLEASE DON'T QUIT YOUR DAY JOB! You have the ability to get a taste of the dream while being a responsible adult. There are marine science summer camps for youth in places like the Florida Keys, Catalina and the Bahamas where you might get a chance to continue to make a difference as an educator and a diving instructor. If that isn't enough for you, maybe arranging a sabbatical for a while while you go and experience the dream will allow you to make wise choices for yourself and your family if you have one.
Most instructors are not full-time, but teach part-time through local dive centers. A long career as a diving student and a diving instructor will take you to places you may not believe you'll want to go.
When I became an instructor at 21, I wanted to live the dream on some island where I'd spend my days teaching diving on reefs and my nights trying to find either the perfect Scandanavian flight attendant or the most erotic island girl.
At age 41, and the technical director for a training agency 20 years later, I'd like to be spending my days teaching cave diving, my Sunday's going to church to repent the sins of my youth, and my nights watching TV in a trailer with my girlfriend or having some grilled chicken over at Wayne's trailer and Amigo's Dive Center.
It's still a good time!
If you found this post helpful, could I have your healthcare plan?
