This is my favorite underwater picture. Of course I wasn't exactly underwater when I took it. In fact I was totally dry and trying to keep my digital camera steady against the glass of the aquarium. I couldn't use flash since the light will just scatter in the sediment rich water or else if the camera wasn't touching the aquarium, the flash would have just bounced off the glass. The room was also a bit dark but fortunately the jellyfishes were slow moving enough not to create too much blur in this slow exposure shot. This was also taken from the Berlin zoo.
I couldn't imagine diving into water filled with these jellyfishes though. There's a big chance that I would just freak out. I still remember a skin diving trip where my upper lip was swolen to about 4 times its size because of one of these babies. My diving mask wouldn't seal properly because of the swelling and I was leaking water in my mask. It was not a very pleasant experience. I was just glad nobody volunteered to pee on my upper lip to get the swelling down (absurd as it may sound, it's a well known remedy - although I'd rather have vinegar any day, another effective remedy for stings). In another skin diving trip I had, I remember that I spent most of the time splashing water at jellyfishes so that they would drift someplace else. I guess we were just unlucky that it was that time of the year when they were plentifull.
They are not much of a menace with SCUBA divers but with skin divers you have to be conscious of them since you spend a lot of time in the surface. Or am I the only one paranoid about them? The common ones found in our beaches nearby are the small short tentacled ones that does not really sting in the true sense of the word but rather irritate the skin such that they get very itchy. Scratch the itch and you get swelling.
I am looking forward to our diving/beach outing scheduled sometime next month and hopefully it's not jellyfish season. :/
I couldn't imagine diving into water filled with these jellyfishes though. There's a big chance that I would just freak out. I still remember a skin diving trip where my upper lip was swolen to about 4 times its size because of one of these babies. My diving mask wouldn't seal properly because of the swelling and I was leaking water in my mask. It was not a very pleasant experience. I was just glad nobody volunteered to pee on my upper lip to get the swelling down (absurd as it may sound, it's a well known remedy - although I'd rather have vinegar any day, another effective remedy for stings). In another skin diving trip I had, I remember that I spent most of the time splashing water at jellyfishes so that they would drift someplace else. I guess we were just unlucky that it was that time of the year when they were plentifull.
They are not much of a menace with SCUBA divers but with skin divers you have to be conscious of them since you spend a lot of time in the surface. Or am I the only one paranoid about them? The common ones found in our beaches nearby are the small short tentacled ones that does not really sting in the true sense of the word but rather irritate the skin such that they get very itchy. Scratch the itch and you get swelling.
I am looking forward to our diving/beach outing scheduled sometime next month and hopefully it's not jellyfish season. :/
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