This last week we have had a visitor from the A.V. Zhirmunsky Institute of Marine Biology, Far East Branch of the Academy of Sciences in Vladivostok. Konstantin A. Lutaenko, who is specialized into mollusks, has heard about us when researching about biodiversity databases in the internet.

Of course the Dive Shop's instructor and divemasters helped to collect material and we hope to do our part in pushing research in Cambodia forward.

"During the last decades, biodiversity in the in the marine and coastal zones has experienced considerable pressure. This situation is absolutely novel in the history of life on Earth and can be regarded at the Sixth Mass Extinction [Loreau, 2010]. The main causes of biodiversity loss are habitat change, climate change, invasive species (the introduction of invasive exotic species), overexploitation of biological resources, and pollution. ... Mollusks are the second largest group in terms of the number of species in marine environments, and they play an important role in communities and ecosystems. The first step for conservation of this regional biodiversity is preparing an inventory..." [Lutaenko, 2012; Catalogue of the living Bivalvia]

In future we will continue to cooperate with Konstantin and the A.V. Zhimursky Institute of Marine Biology. Hopefully this was not his last visit, anyways we will keep our eyes open on future dives and supply material to the experts at the Far East Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences.

Please visit the website of the A.V. Zhimursky Institute of Marine Biology http://www.imb.dvo.ru/.

Welcome to the team Erin and Lee

Another warm welcome to Erin and Lee, our new Instructor and Divemaster - trainee from the US!

Erin is scuba diving for a long time already, she has learned scuba diving in Aruba in between her studies at university. From the very first time she took a breath underwater, diving soon became an important part of her life. She continued diving the summers on the British Virgin Islands with Action Quest, a dive center specialized on teaching kids. After becoming PADI Divemaster, the decision to sign in for the instructor training was obvious.

Lee did his PADI Open Water with Buddha View in Koh Tao and instantly felt in love too! A few months later and plenty dives after, Lee is now about to start his Divemaster training with us on Koh Rong Samloem.

Staff diving days!

We have had great fun whilst teaching our new Cambodian staff members diving! Sophea and Ren who started working with us did their first scuba diving experience in a PADI Discover Scuba Diving program together with our awesome instructors.

Both boys were very good, learning the skills necessary for their safety in the shallow water just off the beach very fast.

As we call ourselves The Dive Shop, we do what we do best and try to teach diving to all of our employees. Even our accountants in our office in Sihanoukville have tried scuba diving already!

Welcome to The Dive Shop's Team Steve and Nari

Back at the Dive Shop is Steve from South Africa who has been working for us as instructor already in 2011 when we have still been based at Koh Rong island.

Also we have Nari joining our kick-ass team working in the office in Sihanoukville as accountant.

Steve was born in Cape Town/South Africa and fell in love with scuba diving in 2001 when he was Koh Tao during his vacation in Thailand. From there he decided to take diving as a career and a PADI Dive Center in Cape Town was found to train him all the way up to PADI Divemaster. For becoming PADI Instructor Steve traveled to Thailand again to pass his IDC at the Samui International Diving School. After living the dream in Thailand for another 8 years, now Steve moved to the Kingdom of Cambodia to dive its almost unexplored sea!

Nari has been playing with the thought of working in The Dive Shop since a long time. She is good friends with Vesnea, a good friend of ours and also Sothea's husband. Nari is now practicing her swimming skills and in future her dream is to become a certified diver. We can't wait to take her through the academics and into shallow water soon to make her experience breathing underwater!