By Emily Ashton
Swaying precariously on the seabed, I kept my mind off what was coming up by watching swarms of fish dart in and out of the coral. Instructor Nikki looked calm and collected as she made her way along our line, where we were trying to keep our balance and not float away or crash face-floor onto the sand. She gave my buddy the OK sign, shook his hand and turned to face me.
This was my moment. The swooshing sound of bubbles swept through my ears. I took a few deep breaths and slowly pulled the mask away from my face, grimacing as the sea trickled in, past my nose, past my eyes... I shook my head, shot to the surface and spluttered. Definitely not a natural diver then!
We were on an intense five-day course to become divers in the enviable surroundings of the Red Sea, based at a dive centre in the resort of Taba Heights in Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, with views stretching across the water to Saudi Arabia and Jordan.
We kitted up each morning in the sun, setting up the tanks with the help of our buddies. The girls in the group moaned a little on that first morning when it came to being assigned wetsuits.
"An extra small?", somebody asked me politely. Nice one, I thought. That was until I tried to squeeze into it and failed miserably. Too much breakfast?" said another diving assistant, with a grin. It was the kind of reassurance every woman could do without.
Soon enough we were wading into the sea like spacemen, tanks on backs, wetsuits firmly zipped up and fins in hand. We gathered together in groups of four with an instructor and slowly let out the air in our BCD, the jacket that lets you go up and down.
Our heads were only just below the surface but the sensation of breathing underwater was incredibly strange. Everyone's face seemed to be stretched into a permanent 'ooh' shape as they breathed, through the regulator, the compressed air on their back.
The glug-glug of bubbles from my mouth jostled my mask and we all flipped around trying not to fall over and kick up too much sand.