PADI Showcase of Manuals in Egypt

In May 2012 Divers Down Under cre­ated a ‘PADI Book Sta­tion’ mar­ket­ing dis­play, built and installed with the help of Regional Man­ager Mat­teo Bram­billa. Divers Down Under is a PADI 5* IDC cen­ter located in Dahab, South Sinai, Egypt. 

PADI Show Case

DDU staff attended a work­shop with Mat­teo, to dis­cuss the impor­tance of sell­ingPADI course man­u­als to each indi­vid­ual diver, both for pric­ing as a key fac­tor in oper­at­ing a suc­cess­ful dive busi­ness and for meet­ing the require­ments of PADI train­ing stan­dards. To sup­port their enthu­si­asm and to gen­er­ate more busi­ness by pro­mot­ingPADI man­u­als, the Book Sta­tion was designed specif­i­cally for DDU by Mat­teo, pro­vid­ing a unique and high-impact visual dis­play for the DDU store.

A large part of the suc­cess of the PADI sys­tem is the struc­ture and pro­fes­sion­al­ism of the train­ing pro­grams and the strength of the sup­port­ing mate­ri­als. It is the inten­tion of PADI that stu­dents have access to the lat­est edu­ca­tional mate­ri­als and also that they have the oppor­tu­nity to retain these after the course for future ref­er­ence. For those who do not dive on a reg­u­lar basis, hav­ing access to the PADIOpen Water Diver man­ual gives them a ref­er­ence guide prior to going back into the water. For any Dive Cen­tre oper­at­ing in a busy tourist loca­tion, uti­liz­ing the PADItrain­ing mate­ri­als and PADI brand­ing which is rec­og­nized world­wide is an added advantage.

Mat­teo says: “I think this is a great oppor­tu­nity for any PADI Cen­ter and if you are inter­ested please drop me a line to dis­cuss a tai­lor made solu­tion for your business” [Region Egypt and Mid­dle East]

Left-Right: Samir Ash­mawy, Mat­teo Bram­billa and Emad Ash­mawy with the fin­ished display

The DDU PADI Book Sta­tion dis­play pro­vides a great talk­ing point in the dive cen­tre, giv­ing staff a demon­stra­tion tool to use when talk­ing to cus­tomers about con­tin­u­ing their dive train­ing with them. Being able to show divers the mate­ri­als they will use in each course is also a great way to encour­age them to con­tinue their div­ing expe­ri­ence.  They can see the the­ory require­ments and under­stand the excit­ing expe­ri­ences they will explore dur­ing their PADI course with DDU, while enjoy­ing a fan­tas­tic hol­i­day and incred­i­ble div­ing in Dahab.

Member Social in Marsa Alam and Hurghada in June

2 Member Socials have taken place in Hurghada and Marsa Alam in June 2012
Thanks to all participants

 

 

Member Social Hurghada and Marsa Alam

Don’t miss the 2012 PADI Member Social! The following exciting topics await you:

PADI Europe, Middle East and Africa: Important current information.

PADI goes e: PADI app, eCard, Facebook, blog etc. PADI goes digital. What’s new out there?

PADI Scuba Earth: A social media network for divers. How does it differ from other social media networks?

The diver’s potential on the market: The statistics show unequivocal trends. What do they look like and how do you profit?

PADI TecRec und CCR Training: How the PADI Technical Diving Division approaches the topic of closed-circuit rebreathers?

PADI Recreational Sidemount Diver Specialty: We will provide information about the new course, which will be available in the PADI Europe, Middle East and Africa region from the beginning of 2012.

PADI Business Academy: PADI launched the new seminar series. What is it about, and how can you benefit from it?

Special Guest Speaker: Amr Ali – Hepca

All PADI Members are very welcome

Where and when? 

Member Social Marsa Alam

Date: June 18^th 2012

Time: 19.00 – approx. 21.00 o’clock

Location: Calimera Hotel, next Kahramana Beach Resort

Free Food (Buffet)

Member Social Hurghada

Date: June 22^th 2012

Time: 19.00 – approx. 21.00 o’clock

Location: Papas Beach Club Ex Hedkandi, New Marina

Free Food (Buffet)

No registration required.

Coast To Coast Egypt’s First Diving Expedition

http://www.coast2coast-egy.com/

by Kareem Farid

As a PADI diving instructor and throughout my exposure to multiple dive sites and many students with different ideas and requests for dive sites, marine creatures and adventures I came to believe that we have not yet tapped one-third of the scuba diving beauty and resources that still exist in Egypt.

In a small city called Dahab located in South Sinai which hosts some of the most beautiful dive sites I have ever come across started an adventure Idea (An Expedition of the Mediterranean & the Red Sea)  where I believe still many things to be discovered as throughout history and as known the sea always claims back what was once belonging to it (ex: Cleopatra City in Alexandria)…

Our goals for this expedition is to uncover the underwater beauty around the Egyptian coasts. We will be looking for Wrecks, Cave Systems, Shark spread in Egyptian waters & amazing coral life.

We will be documenting all our findings as we go using still picture & video as well hoping that we would be able to create a documentary at the end of the expedition to share with the world the beauty around the Egyptian coasts,

Our major issue at the moment that this is an Individually financed expedition therefore we are looking for sponsors for the expedition, Data gathering is not as easy as it sounds neither, we are trying to work with the Egyptian coast guards to be able to acquire mapped areas and possible hazards. Last but not least trying to acquire the proper permits from the government always proven to be a time-consuming issue…

AVAILABLE NOW, THE NEW ISSUE OF THE EQUALIZER

Finally Issue Eleven is available for download
http://www.aziabmedia.com/THE%20EQUALIZER.htm

Loads of interesting articles on Diving in the Red Sea.
Win Red Sea Dive Safari in the photo contest!

25 Jahre James & Mac

Vom Baggersee bis zum Roten Meer

oder was Du schon immer über den Werdegang von „James & Mac“ wissen wolltest. Nachdem die beiden Freunde „James & Mac“, ihre Leidenschaft zum Tauchen im Jahre 1984 entdeckt hatten, ließ sie die Unterwasserwelt nicht mehr los. Es folgten mehrere Urlaube im Ausland in denen sie die meiste Zeit versuchten dem „Meeresgetier“ näher zu kommen.

1987 entschließt sich Mac, nachdem er seine Tauchlehrerprüfung in Cannes abgeschlossen hatte, sein Abenteuer als Tauchlehrer in Ägypten zu beginnen. Wie der Zufall es will, landet er im Giftun Hotel und wird unter dem ehemaligen Basisleiter Manfred Krüger eingestellt.

Die Begeisterung ist- über Kontinental und ergreift auch nach kurzer Zeit seinen Freund James in Deutschland. Kurzer Hand ergreift James die Chance und fliegt nach Hurghada um sich selber mal ein Bild von seinem „vielleicht“ neuen Leben zu machen. Auch er bleibt nicht verschont, von dem allbekannten“ Tauchervirus“ und wendet seinem bisherigen Leben den Rücken zu.

Es kam viel Arbeit auf die Beiden zu, was sich bis zum heutigen Zeitpunkt nicht geändert hat. Aber durch tatkräftige Hilfe von neu gefundenen Freunden, wie z.B. Mohammed Sayed, Hossny Hellal, Mohamed Mahmoud und Alla Fahmy ließ sich über all die Jahre und lässt sich auch  noch heute immer eine Lösung für jedes Problem finden.

Ziemlich schnell zeigten sich die jeweiligen Stärken bei den beiden Allgäuer Jungs: James der Organisator und Mac der sich immer bei Schulung und im Wasser am wohlsten fühlte.

Nach dem James & Mac sich nach fast 10 Jahren, ihren Platz am Roten Meer hart erarbeitet hatten, entschloss sich Mac mit seiner dänischen Frau Karin nach Schweden zu gehen.
Nach einem turbulentem Jahr im „hohen Norden“ zog es Mac und Karin zurück nach Deutschland in‘s  Allgäu, dort wo alles begann.

James blieb bis zu dem heutigen Tag seiner „neuen Familie“, ob es die Basis ist oder die ganzen Menschen die mit dahinter stehen, treu und das wird auch so bleiben.

Auch wenn James & Mac nicht zusammen auf der Basis agieren, so sind sie noch immer ein perfektes Team. Vor Ort direkt, und virtuell überall.

Egal ob die beiden Golfkriege, extreme Regenschauer, Hochwasser oder die Revolution  in und um Ägypten tobten, die Jungs haben immer weiter gemacht.

Wir freuen uns, inschallah, auf weitere 25 Jahre im James & Mac Divingcenter und auf „Kleinigkeiten die den Unterschied machen!“

www.james-mac.com

info@james-mac.com

Tel: 0020 122 3118923

Earth Day 2012 at Dive Point Red Sea in Hurghada

© Text Matthias Breit

22nd April was Earth Day, with worldwide activities for the protection of our environment going on.

This was reason enough for the team here at Dive Point Red Sea in Hurghada to organize in cooperation with HEPCA (Hurghada Environmental Protection and Conservation Association) a large clean-up. 30 guests as well as the new PADI Instructors, who had passed their Instructor Examination just one hour earlier and all of the staff from Dive Point collected more than 25 large bags full of rubbish from a part of the shoreline south of the diving centre. Additionally divers cleaned two dive sites that day, whilst out on the boat.

© Dive Point Red Sea

At the beginning of March this year Dive Point Red Sea already received, as one of very first diving centres worldwide, in recognition and appreciation of our conservation initiatives and efforts to reduce the environmental footprint of our business, the PADI Green Star Award!

© Dive Point Red Sea

Our achievement helps confirm green initiatives as both environmentally and commercially viable and in turn helps to promote green initiatives among other organizations. We are very proud to have received this award showing our outstanding performance in initiating green business practices; exhibiting conservational responsibility!

Dive Point Red Sea Hurghada/Red Sea, Egypt

Tel.: +2–0122-3255483 / Tel.: +49-(0)7044–306675

Email: hurghada@dive-point.com Web: www.dive-point.com

HEPCA: Web: www.hepca.com

Photo Festival Sharm el Sheikh 10.6.2012-17.6.2012

Come and join the Photo Fes­ti­val in Sharm el Sheikh from June 10th to 17th 2012. Dom­ina Coral Bay and Sheikh Coast Div­ing Cen­ter, together with PADI and Scubapro, present an under­wa­ter and exter­nal pho­tog­ra­phy course and con­test with Guido Bis­sat­tini and Alberto Balbi, with par­ties, din­ners, unlim­ited div­ing, prizes and many other sur­prises. For fur­ther infor­ma­tion con­tact booking@domina.it.

Sched­ule for photographer

Sched­ule for under­wa­ter photografer

Photofes­ti­val Egypt

Dahab International Festival of Watersports 14-20. April 2012

What do Bedouin camel races, chill­ing wind­surf­ing stunts, pho­to­graphic fish hunts, trash art and kun­dalini yoga have in com­mon? They are all part of the spec­tac­u­lar pro­gramme of the Dahab Inter­na­tional Fes­ti­val of Water­sports from 14 — 20 April 2012, Cul­ture and Desert Adven­ture – return­ing for its sec­ond year big­ger and better!

© PADI

In 2011, the whole of Dahab came together as a com­mu­nity for the first time to organ­ise this fab­u­lous Fes­ti­val, with the local Bedouin and Egypt­ian pop­u­la­tion and expats all join­ing hands to make it a truly community-wide co-operation. This year the Fes­ti­val has grown into an event of epic pro­por­tions, with peo­ple com­ing from all across the globe to this gor­geous, tucked-away,Red Seatrea­sure to show­case for you all it has to offer. Dahab may be smaller and con­sid­ered less pol­ished than its glam cousins Hurhgada and Sharm el Sheikh, but the vari­ety of mag­nif­i­cent activ­i­ties it fea­tures is sec­ond to none.

From 14–20 April 2012, there is really some­thing for every­one to enjoy, in a week-long pro­gramme stuffed to the gills with fun events.

You can jump into the water and enjoy the mar­vel­lous won­ders under­neath the sea – you can surf over it and revel in speed and wind – you can relax into a med­i­ta­tion or heal­ing ses­sion or stretch your­self doing yoga and all kinds of dance exer­cise – you can dis­cover the won­der­fully diverse and his­tor­i­cally rich Bedouin cul­ture – you can taste all the culi­nary delights on the menu of Dahab – you can check out our mar­vel­lous young per­form­ers of the famous Dahab children’s cir­cus Circ Bon­boni and try out some cir­cus tricks in a very spe­cial work­shop – you can see how inspired our artists are by our beau­ti­ful town and desert and become inspired your­self doing all sorts of cre­ative work­shops, you can have your face painted, com­pete with your home-made kite made of recy­clable mate­ri­als and dance till you drop to the music of tal­ented bands and DJs.

© Project AWARE

Pro­gram for Divers

For the divers there is an under­wa­ter pho­tog­ra­phy com­pe­ti­tion with four cat­e­gories and great prices, there is a buoy­ancy com­pe­ti­tion, there will be Project AWARE pre­sen­ta­tions on shark con­ser­va­tion, there will be the oppor­tu­nity to sign a shark con­ser­va­tion peti­tion with Fin from “Fin and Fin­ley on Tour”, there will be “Dive for Debris” dives and there will be under­wa­ter pho­tog­ra­phy work­shops and lectures.

Through­out the week, there are sched­uled activ­i­ties and ongo­ing ones, and of course the cen­tral Fes­ti­val Square­n­ear the cen­tral Dahab bridge is hop­ping with activ­i­ties, mar­kets, cul­ture and music the whole time. For full infor­ma­tion on times and places check out the Fes­ti­val web­site www.dahabfestival.info.

Come and dive into our Fes­ti­val Big­ger and Bet­ter – we are wait­ing to wel­come you!

Join the Rebreather Revolution! 16.April 2012

16. April 2012

Posei­don would like to give you a head start on the future of div­ing. Open cir­cuit instruc­tors around Europe will now get the oppor­tu­nity to Join the Rebreather Rev­o­lu­tion by attend­ing a Posei­don MKVI PADI course in Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt hosted by Posei­don Div­ing Sys­tems*.

The course will be con­ducted from the 30th of April to the 5th of May, at PURE Rebreather Col­lege at Red Sea Div­ing Col­lege (http://www.redseacollege.com). We will also con­duct a sec­ond course from the 5th to the 10th of May, in the likely event that the first event is sold out. It will be pos­si­ble to fly out on the evening of May 5th, as the div­ing stops May 4th. As the max­i­mum course par­tic­i­pants will be held to four stu­dents you need to sign up early to secure your spot.

Cour­tesy of Posei­don Div­ing Sys­tems, © Posei­don Div­ing Systems

The four par­tic­i­pants per course will not only get a 5-day Inte­grated PADI Rebreather Diver and Advanced Rebreather Diver course on the Posei­don MKVI but also one addi­tional day with the unique oppor­tu­nity to talk to the Posei­don team. You will be given an extended main­te­nance train­ing ses­sion and the sales and mar­ket­ing tools to jump-start your rebreather career. There will also be a deal offered to par­tic­i­pants to buy a Posei­don MKVI at a spe­cial price.

Posei­don will offer you this course at only €799. The orig­i­nal Inte­grated Rebreather Diver Course includes the following:

• A 5-day Inte­grated PADI Rebreather Diver & Advanced Rebreather Diver Course, held by a PADI Rebreather Instructor.
• Rental of a Posei­don MKVI
• Rental of a bailout cylinder
• 2-days of boat dives
• Com­pressed air and oxy­gen fills
• Scrub­bers (3 car­tridges, enough for the course)

Posei­don Div­ing Sys­tem will add the fol­low­ing on top of this, at no charge:

• Half-a-day extended main­te­nance ses­sion held by Poseidon
• Half-a-day Mar­ket­ing and Sales train­ing held by Poseidon
• Great oppor­tu­nity to dis­cuss the Rebreather Rev­o­lu­tion with Poseidon
• First 2 book­ings will receive a Posei­don One Suit Sport Instruc­tor Edi­tion as a thank you!

Not included in the pack­age price are; rental of addi­tional dive equip­ment, flights, accom­mo­da­tion, food and beverages.

*Posei­don Div­ing Sys­tems AB is not a train­ing agency so an inde­pen­dent PADI Rebreather Instruc­tor will con­duct the course.

Cour­tesy of Posei­don Div­ing Sys­tems, © Posei­don Div­ing Systems

Accom­mo­da­tion close to the dive cen­tre at a rea­son­able rate is Ibero­tel Lido (approx­i­mately €50/night) if you book it through www.hotels.com or www.booking.com. Another pos­si­bil­ity is Eden Rock, which also is nearby. The €799 needs to be paid prior to the start­ing date of the course to Posei­don Div­ing Sys­tems. Pay­ment can be made with a VISA or Mas­ter­Card. Posei­don Div­ing Sys­tems need to receive the pay­ment on April the 16th at the lat­est. Please con­tact Daniel Benér at Posei­don Div­ing Sys­tems for book­ing or fur­ther infor­ma­tion: daniel.bener@poseidon.com.