Shark Attack!

I've always been afraid of deep water.

Just something about the billions of dark, secretive, deadly, and slithery creatures tooling around my feet that has always freaked me out. Even swimming pools used to inspire concern if I couldn't clearly survey the contents of the area.

I mean, seriously...

I am SO not a fan.

However, I also have this great love of the ocean. Never have I spent more than a few months away from close access to a beach. If I can't get myself to the ocean at a moment's notice, I feel landlocked and trapped.

So it has always bugged me that I've been afraid of venturing into something I loved so completely. What was I? Chicken?

So one warm December day in 2003, as I was lounging on a glorious beach...I decided to be brave. This particular beach was on one of the smaller populated islands located in the Republic of Vanuatu (formally the New Hebrides).

It was a beautiful day, the sun was shining, the children were laughing, and the string band was playing. Combine all this with water as clear as crystal and I was feeling down-right confident about venturing into the water. All it took was a dozen darling little Nevan kids looking like this...

And I was sold. 

I dove right into the water and was stunned to find out what I had been missing all these years. 

It was fun, exciting, and the biggest pool EVER. I was heady with freedom. So when the kids went swimming further out, so did I. Swimming amidst twelve squealing and happy children is an amazing motivator.

I was happy.

I was free.

I was...suddenly alone?

I looked towards the shore and saw the bobbing heads of all of my confidence-bolstering children racing towards the beach like their lives depended on it. 

This concerned me.

But I still couldn't figure it out...what was going on? Even though I could clearly see all the way through the ten feet of ocean water to the bottom, an eery feeling had begun to creep it's way under my skin. I was in deep water, in a foreign country, nowhere near another human being...and then I saw it.

A single dorsal fin. 

Followed by another.

I allowed myself precisely 0.5 seconds to hope that dolphins were coming to teach me the ways of the ocean.

I allowed myself another 0.1 second to collapse into a fit of hysterical panic.

And then I was moving...as fast I could swim...with two aggressive Tiger Sharks after me.

At this point I can't even tell you what kind of adrenaline I was dealing with. All I know is that every stroke, every drop of water flying through the air, and every pump of blood through my ears was as painfully slow as anything I have ever experienced.

Waiting for an honest politician would take less time than my swimming to the shore. It seemed to get farther away the more I swam until I realized that the sharks had gained on me (shocker) and were currently circling around me at a distance of about 20 feet. So I did what any normal, terrified, Irish girl would do...

I struck a fighting pose and faced the nearest one...ready to punch his mean little face.

I was full of an undeniably sinful envy for Batman's Super-Dandy Shark Repellent. 

I had just resigned myself to a fight to the death with two (probably not very hungry) meanies when I heard a whizzing sound.

And there they were...two rigging canoes full of island men in loincloths. 

The Canoes

The Loincloths

My Face

And they were throwing SPEARS.

Flash forward four hours and I was sitting amidst all of the kids I had been swimming with. They regaled the village with the story of the fat, white girl born to be bait. I sat and laughed with them in a state of post-traumatic shock when the village women brought out dinner.

Broiled Tiger Shark with Shark Fin soup.

I was offered the honorary first bowl and commended for my conquest. I thanked them and polished it off.

I didn't like it.

Sharks are gross.