Introduction to Kai Steinbeck

[00:00:00] Matt Waters: Hey there dive buddies, and welcome to the show. My next guest found his love for diving when he was just 16 years old, and quite simply, he's never lost it. He shares his experiences and knowledge as a course director conducting instructor development training 1994, In Queensland and the Sunshine Coast right here in Australia, albeit he's lived and dived all over the world.

Uh, Kai Steinbeck has been actively involved in the dive industry since 1993 and joins me today as we talk about the dive industry standards and a few of Kai's random adventures and the glorious waters around Australia. Welcome to the show, buddy. How you doing?

[00:00:36] Kai Steinbeck: Thank you very much. Yeah, I'm doing really well.

Thank you. And thank you for having me on. Great to be here.

[00:00:40] Matt Waters: I'm super excited, mate. I did the, the way that you do all your bits and pieces on Facebook and all the other stuff, it all looks super exciting. So I've been like a. Get it Christmas waiting for this one to happen.

[00:00:53] Kai Steinbeck: Well, um, you know, I'm glad to see that some of the advertising works, you know, it's just hard to figure out which one works, but, um, yeah, I'm glad that, um, you, you, you were getting the message, so that's fantastic.

[00:01:03] Matt Waters: Yeah, you're trying to attract people to become instructors, but you're actually attracting an instructor that wants you to come on his podcast.

[00:01:10] Kai Steinbeck: Hey, there's nothing wrong with that. I love your podcast. It's It's been, it's been really great listening to it. I've just done a bit of a road trip coming back from Cairns down to the Sunshine Coast and listen to the last two episodes on that, which, uh, yeah, great entertainment.

Happy days.

[00:01:23] Matt Waters: How long did the drive take you? That must've been quite some time.

[00:01:25] Kai Steinbeck: Uh, look, you can do it in two days, but you end up like a zombie. I did it in three days. Um, I went Cairns Townsville. I've got some friends down there. Um, and then Townsville Rockhampton and then Rocky, um, down to the Sunshine Coast arrived here.

Two o'clock this afternoon and, um, yeah, no time to waste. And here we are.

[00:01:43] Matt Waters: Yeah. And you're ready to get this done and go to bed. I've eaten mackerels.

Um, let's, let's wind it back a little bit.

[00:01:53] Kai's Early Diving Journey

[00:01:53] Matt Waters: I mean, we're, we're going to say all about what you do and the amazing work you do, but we're, you know, I mentioned briefly that, uh, you started at 16 years old, but how, how did you first, uh, get into having a go at diving?

[00:02:06] Kai Steinbeck: Well, I was, I was really lucky with my childhood that, um, when I was about 10, my parents decided to leave Germany and move to the Caribbean, um, to an Island called the Dominican Republic.

And, um, you know, being 10 at the time, I had no option but to, to follow them along. And that's where I grew up. And, um, yeah. Um, I, um, first, my first introduction to diving was with a Canadian dive instructor. He had a little company called Dive with Dan and, um, he used my parents pool. We had a small motel and, um, he used the pool and that's where I started first and then did nothing for a couple of years until there was, um, my brother actually who got into diving.

Um, who's a bit older than me and I started doing dive courses and, um, um, did my actually open water course, um, and then just dove, no further education, just kept on diving and diving. And, um. At the age of 16 or so, um, my parents decided that I should get some sort of an education and shipped me off to a boarding school in Canada.

Um, I left the Dominican Republic in December. It was 30 degrees, beautiful sunshine, nice and warm. Everybody was happy.

[00:03:19] Speaker 5: Yeah.

[00:03:19] Kai Steinbeck: And arrived in Montreal, it was minus 30 degrees and everything was grey and horrible and everybody was unhappy. Um, but, um, on the school holidays going backwards and forwards, I, I had a, I had a friend who, um, decided to open a dive shop in Costa Rica and, uh, flew down there on school holidays and did most of my, um, further training with him, like the advanced, the rescue, and, and then the dive master.

Um, yeah. And, um, after, after finishing high school in Canada and four years of university, um, um, as the story always goes.

[00:03:55] Professional Diving Career

[00:03:55] Kai Steinbeck: I met a girl, she happened to be Australian, um, and that's how I ended up in Australia and, um, did my instructor course, um, in Rockhampton with the legendary course director, Tony Fonts, um, who has probably certified more instructors in Australia than, than anyone else.

Um, he is a really, really. Really inspirational person and, um, yeah, 1993, that was pre internet. So, um, went off to the Rockhampton post office, looked at the yellow pages, a dive company in Cairns had the biggest ad and off I went and gave them a call and I said, brand new dive instructor, really, really keen.

I said, um, yeah, you and 20 other people standing outside the door. And I said, uh, well, I, I do speak German and then they said, when can you start? Um, so that was my foot into the door, um, uh, was a course instructor for them for, for a number of years. And then, um, went onto working on the boats as a trip director on the boats or dive supervisor on the boats.

Um, Got my sea time, did my skipper's ticket and, um, then probably for the last four years that I worked for that company, I did all their sales and marketing. So

[00:05:10] Speaker 5: I

[00:05:10] Kai Steinbeck: was fortunate enough to fly around the world and promote diving and the great bear reef and the company that I worked for as well as, um, you know, going to great dive shows and meeting lots of really interesting people along the way.

[00:05:24] Matt Waters: Yeah, it sounds like a terrible job,

[00:05:27] Kai Steinbeck: a horrible job, horrible job. And, um, it was so horrible that, um, I actually did end up leaving the dive industry now, not because it was horrible. Um, um, yeah, my ex wife, uh, she trained racehorses as a hobby up in Cairns. And, um, That really didn't go anywhere. And she wanted to do it professionally.

[00:05:47] Transition to Agriculture and Return to Diving

[00:05:47] Kai Steinbeck: So we moved down to Brisbane and left the dive industry completely and, um, ended up, um, on the land in agriculture, ended up managing a stock feed mill on the Sunshine Coast, manufacturing, chook feed, cattle feed, all those sort of things. Um, and, um, yeah, very different, very different, but it was really interesting for me because it gave me lots of experience outside of the diving industry, which I was able to now apply into my own business and, um, then about, Four years ago, I was made redundant and my old boss from the original dive school that I worked for, he, um, started up an operation in Port Douglas and build a brand new boat, which he brought into the, into the marketplace.

And, um, we were talking and I didn't have a job and I could move to Port Douglas and work in the dive industry. So it wasn't really very. A hard decision to make off. I went and moved to beautiful Port Douglas and, um, managed, managed the dive operation there, which was great. Um, hiring brand new set of staff, you know, and, um, working with some of the existing crew from Cairns that came up and gave us a hand.

[00:06:55] Matt Waters: This, this is, this is Diver's Den, right?

[00:06:58] Kai Steinbeck: This is Diver's Den. Yeah. Okay. And it's

[00:06:59] Matt Waters: four years ago.

[00:07:01] Kai Steinbeck: That's right. Yeah. Yeah. So the boat that we moved into Port Douglas was called Aqua Quest.

[00:07:05] Matt Waters: Yeah. Do you know, you must know Luke Murphy then?

[00:07:08] Kai Steinbeck: Of course I know Luke . Yes. . Shall we do an entire segment on Luke Murphy?

Oh, no, .

[00:07:16] Matt Waters: It's, was it the, was it the Aqua Quest bow that he did the, um, did like a little music rendition as a pirate gangster rap kind thing, so

[00:07:24] Kai Steinbeck: that, that. There's this, that is, it's, um, sister ship called ReefQuest. Yeah. Um, yeah, the, um, the, that's where the, the, the briefing video came from, which is available on YouTube.

If you, if you, if you Google, uh, Diver's Den or ReefQuest safety video, it is, it is quite, quite, quite a video. I'm

[00:07:43] Matt Waters: going to put it in the show notes. It just makes me laugh all the time. He's, he's an absolute legend.

[00:07:47] Kai Steinbeck: Yeah. And the entire, the entire cast of that particular safety video, uh, not professional actors.

They are just all crew that love their jobs. And that's what's so great about the dive industry. Yeah. Well,

[00:08:00] Matt Waters: I used to work with, um, with Luke in Thailand. He came, he came and did his instructor training at the. Dive center. I was working at his other half, Joe. Um, I, I did her, uh, advanced training.

[00:08:15] Kai Steinbeck: Oh, wow. And then she went on

[00:08:17] Matt Waters: with us.

Yeah. It was very small world.

[00:08:20] Kai Steinbeck: Absolutely. Absolutely. And that's, what's so great about the dive industry, you know, like you, it's amazing how many contacts there are. And, and I mean, even the way you and I, um, met, you know, I mean, we've never actually met in person, but I was on, um, planning a trip to Komodo before.

Coronavirus and, um, you know, put out in a Facebook dive group, um, a post recommendations and, and you popped up obviously because of your previous, um, business that you were running that, um, that, um, before coronavirus, your, your, your, your business of taking groups all over the world. So, uh, yeah. There we go.

[00:08:57] Matt Waters: Yeah. And that's, that's the great thing about the dive industry. I love the way it networks and it works together. You know, if you spend a couple of years in it as a dive pro, then if you don't know the person directly, you're going to know someone that's worked with that person you're talking about.

It's, it's so small, but at the same time it just covers the entire globe. I think it's fantastic.

[00:09:17] Kai Steinbeck: Oh, absolutely. I'm pretty sure that I could couch surf the world for the next two or three years once the board is open again.

[00:09:26] Matt Waters: Yeah, me both mate. Yeah. Yeah. Take a bag with me, rags in and I'm away.

[00:09:30] Kai Steinbeck: Exactly.

Exactly. Yeah.

[00:09:32] Matt Waters: Yeah. So now you've, you've moved from, you've moved from Cairns and you've come down to the sunny coast and you're going to base there for a while now. Yeah.

[00:09:43] Kai Steinbeck: Yeah. Um, unfortunately due to, um, COVID, um, Cairns and Port Douglas is, is really suffering and shout out to all Australians. If you can, you know, spend your holidays, spend them in Australia, go travel, see your own backyard.

Um, unfortunately, Kansas and Port Douglas doesn't have a big metropolitan city attached to it where, where, where, you know, um, it can draw customers out of, and that international travel really was the base for all their customers. And, and at the moment it's, yeah, school holidays, very, very busy. Um, in between very, very quiet.

[00:10:22] Matt Waters: Yeah. And, uh, I think people are still scared about crossing the borders. And there's a bit, there's a lot of apprehension.

[00:10:27] Kai Steinbeck: Of course there is, you know, what happens if If something happens and they shut even a domestic border again, can you get back in? Do you have to quarantine? All those sorts of things for sure.

For sure. But yeah.

[00:10:37] Current Work and Instructor Development

[00:10:37] Kai Steinbeck: Um, so I, um, I have my own company called Dive Instructor Academy and, um, I did my course director's course about three years ago and I'm now down on the Sunshine Coast working with, um, Sunreef, um, down here and, um, teaching instructor courses, which, um, we did our first program, uh, a couple of weeks ago and our next one is at the end of August.

Thanks. Um, April, um, and yeah, it's all, it's all going really, really well. And I'm really, really excited. I mean, we, we start our instructor development program, not in a classroom. We go diving on the HMS Brisbane on the first day, which is just, I mean, how cool is that, you know, starting off your IDC

[00:11:12] Matt Waters: with a dive on a wreck.

That's it's a, it's a nightmare way to start a course. I is, is some amazing diving. Now you can sit in the classroom for two weeks.

[00:11:22] Kai Steinbeck: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. Exactly. So,

[00:11:27] Matt Waters: and, um, so where are your, uh, candidates coming from? Are they coming from all over Australia or are you finding it's more within the local vicinity?

[00:11:38] Kai Steinbeck: But the first program that we ran, um, it was, it was local. I think there was, um, let me think now there was three from the Sunshine Coast. Um, one from, um, who worked at Tangalooma and one girl that, um, worked on the Gold Coast and, um, on this next program, um, there's a lady from South Australia flying up.

There is, um, a lady from, where is Jetty Dive down there?

[00:12:04] Speaker 6: Oh, that's down South as well, isn't it?

[00:12:06] Kai Steinbeck: New South Wales.

[00:12:07] Speaker 6: New South Wales. Yeah.

[00:12:09] Kai Steinbeck: New South Wales. Yeah. So she's coming up from there. And, and, and then there's about three or four candidates from, uh, uh, Brisbane and the Sunshine Coast. So, um,

[00:12:17] Speaker 5: yeah,

[00:12:18] Kai Steinbeck: Australia white, we haven't had anybody from WA yet, maybe a bit far, but, um, for sure it's, it's, um, it's, it's a great, great location and it's beautiful.

And you know, yeah.

[00:12:28] Matt Waters: Mate, with your enthusiasm, it won't be long until you've got people knocking at the door and you can't, you can't take them, they'll be queuing up.

[00:12:35] Kai Steinbeck: Well, that's a, that's a horrible problem to have.

[00:12:38] Matt Waters: Yeah, I know.

[00:12:40] Diving Safety and Training Standards

[00:12:40] Matt Waters: Hey, um, one thing I did want to ask about on a, on a slightly more serious note, cause you're a course director and all that.

Um, last week's episode, you heard it yourself. I was speaking to Gareth Locke and I'd be keen to hear what your opinion would be on, I know it's very difficult because of what human factors is and what a Paddy, um, instructor development courses, but do you think there is room for human factors within an IDC?

[00:13:14] Kai Steinbeck: There is always room for, for extra training and, um, and adding extra things into the curriculum for sure. And, um, I mean, as course directors, we, we have a curriculum to follow and we have to do, you know, certain things in order to make sure that according to the educational system, the training agency puts out, we have ticked all the boxes.

Um, some programs, uh, Seven days, some programs are 10 days, some programs, uh, you know, longer, I run a 12 day program. So, you know, um, you, you can add other things into the programs in, in order to make it a better, better thing. And, and you can do that within the guidelines of the curriculum that the training agency provides you with, you just elaborate and go further to, you know, uh, elaborate further to whatever you want to include it.

Um, but yeah, for sure. I, I, I believe that, um, you know, it's, it's, it's our responsibility just not to, not to just churn out instructors, but to churn to, to, to, to bring people into the industry with the best possible knowledge, um, in order to create. Great divers listening to the podcast last week that you that that was put out.

I believe that there's there's a really fine balance of at the end of the day. This is a great industry to be in, but at the end of the day, I still have to buy groceries and pay rent,

[00:14:49] Speaker 5: you know,

[00:14:49] Kai Steinbeck: so, you know, you, you, you have, you have open water courses, which are done in three days and they tick the boxes and you've got your open water certification.

And, and I remember vividly hearing, you know, that you are trained to the conditions in which you are trained in. So if you've learned to dive, for example, you know, somewhere in. on the Great Barrier Reef with 20 meter visibility. And it's, it happened to be a beautiful, calm weekend when you did all your training.

And then all of a sudden you go to say, um, diving somewhere else along the coast, whether it be the Yungala or here at the HMAS Brisbane or in New South Wales on Victoria, where conditions are vastly different. That's where us as instructors have that responsibility really to instill into their students that if you're not trained in that, particular environment, get an orientation dive with somebody, you know,

[00:15:47] Speaker 5: get,

[00:15:47] Kai Steinbeck: get the experience in order to dive that area safely.

Um, we get regularly clients on, on the dive boats out of Cairns and Port Douglas who, you know, come up and they haven't dived in five or six years. And that's when they did their open water course and they come on and, and want to go diving, you know, without having done that refresher course. And it's such a vital.

An important thing for, for certified divers to understand that, yeah, I've, I've done my training, but if I haven't dived in five years, then I shouldn't just jump on a boat and go for a dive. I should probably do the refresher just like we tell you to in that training initially. I mean, if you're comparing it to somebody who learns to drive a car, my daughter is about to go for her driver's license.

Yeah. God help us. But, you know, um, these, it's the same thing there. If, if you have somebody who's just learned to drive a car and then doesn't drive a car for three years, you know, putting them behind a wheel, being allowed to drive a hundred kilometers down the road is going to be a very risky thing.

activity. And anybody who's saying that diving is not a risky activity is not really portraying the truth. It is risky, but it is safe as long as we follow the guidelines that we've put in place. From the training agencies where you've learned to dive with.

[00:17:13] Matt Waters: Yeah, I 100 percent agree. But I also think that there should be more emphasis right from the word go on safety and repetition.

And the thing I like about having done a few IDCs and ITs, IEs, um, over the years, I like the repetition. I think repetition is. Um, something that creates, um, the element to be able to respond straight away without having to think about it. And that as a diver is, is paramount,

[00:17:49] Kai Steinbeck: for sure, for sure. Absolutely.

And, and, um, you know, I, I, I myself, and I certainly encourage any instructor that when you certify that open water student, you know, to encourage them, go diving, get that experience you've done for training dives with me, basically guiding you and making sure that you're okay. You know, your first dive by yourself with another buddy is going to be.

Um, you know, you are responsible for everything, all the planning, you know, you have this license, which allows you to jump in the water off the beach, rent a tank and go diving. But it's important that you, you do follow all the procedures and, and, and, and, and get that experience in order to become responsible and become proficient in, in the diving industry.

[00:18:38] Matt Waters: Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it's not even, it's not even proficiency for the dive industry. It's, it's the safety of the individual, isn't it? Um, I just, it grates me when I get on a boat or I'll go diving somewhere and you just see like the blasé kind of attitude and the lack of knowledge. And then you get under the water and everybody's got a camera nowadays, so it gets even worse.

Um, and I know there's not a lot that the training agencies can do to enforce making repetition of skills, you know, um, a requirement. But. I think there's a lot more that can be done right at the base level, right from the word go on the emphasis and then it's re emphasized on every course that's, that's, um, that's achieved and that way that becomes second nature in itself that people, um, have it in their head that they've got to do something that's a repetition, that something that is going to keep that safety and Get rid of this ridiculous notion of people jumping in.

I don't really, I'm going off on a bit of a rant here, but, um, I had two, two good friends contact me maybe 30 minutes before we jumped online. Uh, and they're living in Bali, which is clearly torture for them right now. But, um, they're like, uh, we're just being offered a ridiculous price to go on a boat in Raja Ampat for 11 days and four dives a day.

Um, do you think it's a good thing we should do? So yeah, it's a great place to go. But have you learned to dive yet? No. Okay, so you might need to get your license first and then maybe not think about Raja Ampat because it might be a little bit difficult for your skills. Um, thankfully I'll put him in touch with Panida.

Go and do your course and do some fun diving, get some repetition, get some skills, get some, some safety behind you before you go and challenge something like Raja Ampat. Um, well, yeah, there you go. I'm going off on a tangent again, but there we go. We'll come back in now. No, look,

[00:20:42] Kai Steinbeck: I understand what you're saying.

I think, you know, and I think it's, it's the, the whole adventure in this tree and scuba diving is part of that adventure industry, um, has made it incredibly easy for someone to, you know, do a dive course and go diving in some incredible, amazing places. You know? Um, and, and then I think it back boils down to the dive operators themselves, because once the customer is certified, the training agency really has, has no overarching control over somebody who's just going on a, on a, on a, on a fun dive, you know, and that's where it then comes down to the operators to run a very safe dive.

operation and, and looking at their clientele and saying, all right, these people are really, really confident and comfortable and competent. And, um, you know, versus these guys are not, and they're going to be the ones that I'm really going to have to look out for. Um, I, I was working for another company up in, in Port Douglas that, you know, if you go diving with them, it doesn't matter who you are.

You have to go Guided. Yeah. No, no buts. Um, their sister company would have staff that come up and they would be instructors teaching with their sister company. They would not be allowed to go unguided. You know, that's just a blanket rule they have. Um, you know, uh, yeah. So a, a, a lot of it. comes then back to the operators to make, to ensure that, that safety is followed.

And I think that's where in Australia, we, we are so incredibly lucky that we have, you know, an overarching, uh, code of conduct, um, um, that, that, ensures that we operate safely. You know, it does make things more expensive because on the boats you need a safety surface watch, et cetera, et cetera, you know, um, but it, it, it makes diving certainly in Australia and incredibly safe activity afterwards.

[00:22:48] Matt Waters: I kind of agree. And I kind of disagree as well. Yeah, because I feel for the operators because they're the ones that are stuck in the middle. So they're trying to create a reasonable price that people are willing to pay to go on their boats. But at the same time, that price is that low that they're having to put more people on the boat.

Therefore, the boats are getting pretty damn crammed. And the dive guide to customer ratio, um, tends to be pretty big.

[00:23:17] Speaker 7: Yeah, it's, it's usually 8 to 1.

[00:23:19] Matt Waters: Yeah, and there's no way, I mean, I'm, I'm a pretty good instructor, I like to believe I am. Uh, and you clearly are as well, but there's no way on God's green earth are we going to be able to control 8 divers in the water at once and provide a good level of customer care.

[00:23:39] Kai Steinbeck: Yep. You're, you're, you're correct with that. There's, there is, and, and, you know, you see it, it just, it just really comes down to the makeup of the group that you end up with as an instructor on that day that you're guiding around as, as, as a certified dive guide. Um, yeah. I, I look, I don't know what the answer is.

I think, I think you're right. There should be more emphasis in the training side of things on ensuring that putting some of that responsibility back onto the actual students to ensure that, you know, if I haven't dived in that environment, I get some training in that environment. Or if I haven't dived in, you know, Two years, 12 months, six months, whatever it is, depending on your comfort level.

I mean, look, if I haven't dived in 12 months, do I need to do a refresher course? No, somebody who hasn't dived in 12 months, who's just done their open water course for sure should do a refresher course.

[00:24:27] Matt Waters: Yeah.

[00:24:28] Kai Steinbeck: Yeah.

[00:24:28] Matt Waters: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it just needs to change a lot at the bottom, I think. And, um, you know, I've, I've been, um, responsible for it in the past and, you know, you, you sell and, Hey.

Four days with us, three days with us, you get four dives and you can dive anywhere in the world. Boom. Um, and it, well, I'm not going to labour the point, but, um, yeah. We need to try and find some changes somehow to make it work, and I don't know whether that's to do it, uh, locally. And like you say, the agencies themselves, they can't be responsible for it because once they're post, or once the people are post training, then they're no, not really the responsibility of the training agency anymore, are they?

[00:25:11] Kai Steinbeck: Correct.

[00:25:12] Matt Waters: Yeah. Correct. Yeah.

[00:25:13] Kai Steinbeck: It's like learning how to drive a car. You know, the driving instructor teaches your son or your daughter how to drive a car, but you know, it's not once they have done and deemed them competent enough to go and pass the driver's test. It's not, it's not really back to left.

[00:25:27] Matt Waters: Ciao.

[00:25:30] Kai Steinbeck: Exactly.

[00:25:33] Matt Waters: Hey, um, just getting onto a bit of a lighter note. Tell me about the, um, Your little trip. I mean, I, I to, to give everyone who's listening, I, I got kind of, um, engrossed in this thing where, you know, I'll let Kai tell the story, but going from point A to point B and back again, and the adventures along the way, I need to hear it from you firsthand, dude.

[00:25:53] The Mexico Adventure

[00:25:53] Kai Steinbeck: Yeah, well, the, uh, the little trip is probably the one, um, you're referring to when I decided to, um, go to Mexico in the middle of a pandemic chasing a job. That's the one. Yeah. Okay. So it all actually started in about, uh, October, November, 2019. I saw an advert on a Facebook page, um, looking for a course director in Mexico who is, um, able to speak German and Spanish.

And I thought, well, gee, that sounds like me. I am German. I speak German growing up in the Dominican Republic. I'm fluent in Spanish. And, um, look, I didn't really put much effort into it. I just sent my resume off and never heard from them. COVID came along, everything was shut down. And in about August, 2020, um, that company Contacted me and was wondering whether or not I'd still be interested in the job.

And, um, you know, being up in Cairns and Port Douglas and things had really quiet and down. Um, I thought to myself, well, you know, even if you give this a go for six months or 12 months, what could the worst be? And I said, yeah, I'm sure I'm interested. So, um, we, We came to an agreement and, um, then the first hurdle was as well, how do I even get out of Australia because you're not allowed to leave Australia.

So I applied to the government and because I had a, a, a job offer. And I was planning on leaving for a significant time, I, I got permission to leave the country. So that was the first tick. Then I thought to myself, well, how do you get to Mexico in the middle of a pandemic? And went to your

[00:27:29] Matt Waters: little

[00:27:29] Kai Steinbeck: road.

Went to, um, your, uh, local, um, travel agent and he sort of laughed at me when I told him I want to go to Mexico. And then five minutes later, he said, I don't understand why this is so easy. There is a direct flight from Cairns to Sydney and then Sydney, San Francisco and San Francisco, Cancun. And these flights operate every single day.

I said, okay. And it wasn't too expensive either. So, um, yeah, I decided to, um, quit my middle management job in a, in a very prominent dive operation in Port Douglas. And, um, you know, um, sacrifice my job, keep a payment and sell my worldly possessions. And, and, and, um, at the age of 49 was able to cram everything that I own in three suitcases.

One of them was dive gear. Another bag was my cat. was closed. So, and off I went to, uh, to Mexico and, um, yeah, look, Mexico, um, it was a real eyeopener for me. Um, obviously, you know, of course I was conscious of the fact that, you know, Corona virus is, is far more advanced or rampant over there than what it is in Australia.

But, um, I didn't realize to what extent it would affect me personally. Um, you know, I have no problems wearing a mask, but having to wear that mask constantly, you know, being in a restaurant and wondering whether or not the cook has COVID and whether you're not going to get sick. Eating this meal. Um, well, long story short, I realized that, uh, you know, I have two daughters who, um, they're very, very keen for me to move to Mexico so that they could come and visit and go diving in some of these amazing places.

Um, but realizing to that, you know, they probably can't come and visit for another 12 months, two years, quite potentially. And, um, The, the economic situation down there was, was not as, as, as good as what I had, um, believed it would be the, the, the, the, Being hit in the face with coronavirus, you know, and trying to adapt.

And I think because people have become accustomed to it in America or in Mexico or in Europe, you know, that they're dealing it probably very differently to me, who's just arrived from Australia where we live, like nothing's happening. Um, and, um, so I very quickly realized that, um, I should, if I can, Move back to Australia.

Um, and I, I, um, I was dealing a little bit with, you know, panic and anxiety and thinking, you know, my God, what have you done? So I looked and, and, and there were three flights left. There was one tomorrow, the next day and the day after. And, um, the company who, um, who employed me, I have to say they were, they were nothing but brilliant.

They really understood and, um, you know, accepted the fact that, you know, This was a bad decision on my behalf and they were incredible and helped me out. So, um, I, um, yeah, somehow, and I, I hope I, I'm not going to get hate mail from 40, 000 Australians who are trying to return to Australia and can't because flights get canceled.

I somehow lucked out. I booked a flight online from Mexico and I was never bumped. And I flew from Mexico to Washington, Washington, San Francisco, San Francisco too. To back to Sydney and, and, and I really feel for everybody who is out there trying to get back home, um, you know, the situations that you're in.

And I have to say, I was just lucky that I managed to do it.

[00:31:09] Matt Waters: It's probably easier to get you on a flight as well. Cause you're just one man as opposed to a couple or a family.

[00:31:15] Kai Steinbeck: Potentially. Yes. Potentially that is, that is the case as well. Yes. So, um, Yeah. And then the fun really started because, um, I'm in quarantine and after, you know, you, you check in and I remember we, uh, we were in a five star hotel and upon check in, they said to us, uh, would you like to upgrade to a room with a balcony?

And Thought, Oh yeah, that would be quite nice because I'm going to be in for two weeks. And they said, well, that's an extra 300. I said, okay, well, 300 for two weeks. That's all right. No, no, no. That's 300 a night. Get out of it. Extra for the upgrade for a room with a balcony. Otherwise your, your, your window does not open.

I said, well, no, that's more than the quarantine itself. And, um, I, I am a dive instructor, so we all know what the wages are. And so, um, I decided against that. And then you, um, On the first day you get a, um, a coronavirus test where they shove something up your nose and tickle your brain. And, um, a couple of days later I was starting not to feel all that great and I'm thinking to myself, Hmm, this doesn't look very good.

[00:32:20] Returning from Quarantine

[00:32:20] Kai Steinbeck: And of course the test came back positive. So, yeah, here I am, um, after having returned from being in quarantine. Mexico for five days and I was so careful. I was so incredibly careful I have no idea how I caught it. But yeah, I ended up positive

[00:32:37] Matt Waters: you were you were only there for the five days

[00:32:39] Kai Steinbeck: I was in Mexico for five days.

Yes

[00:32:42] Matt Waters: So you're lucky to get a flight but you shit out of luck when it comes to Catching the disease.

[00:32:46] Kai Steinbeck: Yeah. And I think maybe, you know, look the flights, the flights to and from Australia, there was maybe 40 people on the flight. So I don't think I got it there, but the internal flights, Mexico throughout America, throughout the U S they were full, you know, and, and I'd suggest possibly there.

I, I really don't know. I've tried to figure it out, but no idea. And, uh, yeah, and then I had all sorts of, um, really horrible, um, thoughts about, you know, what's going to happen to me, and, you know, ventilators, and, you know, what you sort of see in the media, and, and it was, it was really frightening. And, um, so then they move you from the, the hotel that you checked in to what they call the hospital hotel.

And that's where all the positive cases are and I'm lucky in the positive, in the, in the, in the hospital hotel that, that it was, uh, an apartment hotel and it did actually have a balcony. So I never had to pay the upgrade. I got the balcony for free, but the cost was coronavirus. Um, yeah, and, um, there was, there was a couple of people who I'd love to give a shout out who are really instrumental in me getting through this.

And one of them is Bridget Yeager, who used to work for Patty. Um, and, um, she, I was talking to her and, and, um, telling her how horrible the food was. And she was a gem. She lives in Sydney. She made me home cooked meals and dropped them off at reception for me. And, um, you know, legendary. Absolutely. Bridget, thank you.

And the other person is, is, is Dr. Kathy Meehan. Um, she, um, is a, a dive doctor from Cairns. And it's been my, Doctor for as long as I remember. And she, she was of course, very excited to have a diver who is positive. So, you know, she can find out what it's all about. And, um, yeah, she called me every single day and also just for my mental stability and mental health, um, got me through this and, and so really much.

So shout out for those two. amazing individuals getting me through this.

[00:34:44] Navigating COVID-19 Testing Protocols

[00:34:44] Kai Steinbeck: But the interesting thing was that, um, I, um, I said to New South Wales Health, okay, so when are we doing my, my next test? And they said, well, no, there is no more tests. And I said, but, but how does this work? I, I need a test, a negative test to get back into Queensland.

And they said, well, no, because once you're positive, we don't test you anymore after. 14 days. If you don't show any signs or symptoms for three days after those 14 days, we let you go

[00:35:13] Matt Waters: without a test,

[00:35:14] Kai Steinbeck: without a test. And I said, but I need a test. And they said, well, we don't give you a test anyways. We're backwards and forwards.

Eventually they said, the reason we don't give you another test is because you can test positive for up to six or eight weeks later, you're no longer contagious. But you're still positive. You will still return a positive test.

[00:35:38] Speaker 6: And how do they know that you're not contagious then?

[00:35:41] Kai Steinbeck: Look, uh, I'm, I'm a dive instructor, not a doctor.

Somehow it's the incubation period after 14 days, three days later, if no signs and symptoms, you're no longer contagious.

[00:35:53] Matt Waters: You know,

[00:35:53] Kai Steinbeck: that's, that's what they tell me. And, uh, and yeah, so, um, and they said, well, and the other thing is, you know, if we, if we do give you a test and you do turn positive, we don't really know if we can release you or not.

So anyway, um, in my most. I am German diplomatic way that I can possibly be with another government authority.

[00:36:15] Speaker 4: Um,

[00:36:16] Kai Steinbeck: we argued backwards and forwards, and they did end up giving me another test. Um, that was after three weeks in quarantine, um, they did give me another test and that test became negative.

[00:36:27] Speaker 6: Okay.

[00:36:27] Kai Steinbeck: And I thought, hallelujah. Great. Cause the rules were, if you have a negative test, you can drive to the airport in special transport, hop on a plane, fly to Brisbane.

[00:36:35] Journey Back to Queensland

[00:36:35] Kai Steinbeck: But of course, um, with my luck, um, that's the day that Queensland health changed the rules. And so if you were positive and tested negative, now you needed to wait another two weeks.

Um, and give them another negative test before being able to enter Queensland. So, um, yeah, I ended up, I said, well, you know, I checked out of my beautiful apartment hotel in, in Sydney and, um, and bought myself, uh, uh, a car, a friend of mine had an old car for sale that he wanted to get rid of. And, uh, it was a 2, 000, um, little investment, which was great.

Okay. It didn't last all the way. So that's a whole nother story for another episode, but, um, I basically drove up to the border, took my time called in, of course, as you do every single dive shop along the way. And I think that's the Facebook following that, that you, that you did. And so where, where I was and all the amazing places and, and what was amazing was that all the dive shops along the way.

We're incredibly busy. I remember being at, um, at fish rock. And they said, if you want to go diving with us, there's a two week waiting list. So this is, this is amazing, you know, so it was so great to see that, that the, the dive industry that was capable of drawing out, um, clients from, you know, the, the larger metropolitan cities were actually really, really busy.

And, and, and speaking to, um, Um, one of the training agency, well, the one I'm affiliated with, um, they, they saying that, you know, they've had, um, not a drop, but actually a rise in certifications. Um, um, which is great to see because, you know, Australians are. Diving at home and doing courses at home, which is, which is brilliant.

[00:38:28] Speaker 5: Yeah.

[00:38:28] Kai Steinbeck: So, um, so yeah, then, um, decided, um, after two weeks, another test crossed the border and had all my paperwork in place. And it was really disappointed when the police officer just waved me through, didn't even look at anything.

And, um, on my way stopped, um, again, at dive shots along the beach. Brisbane and Gold Coast and Sunshine Coast and Harvey Bay and had another meeting with the guys at Sunreef.

[00:38:53] Diving Industry During the Pandemic

[00:38:53] Kai Steinbeck: And that's really when the relationship developed of doing instructor courses up there, because there was, there was no one doing them in, on the Sunshine Coast as such, but, um, but further on to Corona virus and diving, of course, the next thing I had to do was, was a dive medical and, um, um, again, a bit apprehensive about the whole thing because I, I felt perfectly fine.

Um, uh, the first. day, there was a tightening in the chest and, um, but other than that, it just felt as if you had a bit of a chest cold and if it wasn't for a pandemic, you'd go to work. Having said that, um, when I was, um, in quarantine, lying on the couch watching TV and with nothing else to do, but lie there, resting heart rate was up to 145 beats per minute.

[00:39:40] Matt Waters: 145,

[00:39:43] Kai Steinbeck: 145 beats per minute lying on the couch and I'm thinking to myself, my God, you know, there's finite number of heartbeats. This thing has

[00:39:54] Matt Waters: he's shaking a few minutes off the, off the back.

[00:39:57] Kai Steinbeck: Exactly, exactly. By the time I got released, we were down to probably about 80 to 90 beats per minute. And now it's perfectly normal.

[00:40:05] Matt Waters: And was this, this high heart rate, was it like consistent or was it fluctuating?

[00:40:10] Kai Steinbeck: No, it was consistent. That's what it was.

That's what it was. Yeah. And, and I didn't even feel it. Like, you know, when you're, when you're running or exercising, you, you can feel your heartbeat. I wasn't aware of it until they come and see you twice a day and check your blood pressure and heartbeat and heart rate. Sorry. And, and that's how I was aware of it.

So, yeah. Um, yeah.

[00:40:30] Health and Diving Post-COVID

[00:40:30] Kai Steinbeck: And then so dive medical, um, lung x rays came back completely clean. I was like, Oh, thank God. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Somebody's watching over me finally. Um, but interestingly enough, and, and anybody who's, who's done a professional dive medical before would have knows what a spirometry test is.

It's basically like a, uh, a hairdryer blow into that, that measures how much you can actually exhale. And, and it's, and my, My results all my life where we're very, very constant and this time around, it was actually 7 percent less than last year. So there is, there is certainly some damage, you know, and whether or not that is going to now be the way it is for the rest of my diving career, or I am healthy, I don't smoke, I do exercise every so often, you know, whether or not that is going to repair itself.

Well, we'll, we'll, we'll find out. The interesting thing of all that is that the average person doesn't have that benchmark test of the spirometry. And, and if they catch coronavirus, you know, they, they probably don't do a dive medical as such. And, and, and don't, wouldn't realize that there was some underlying damage potentially done.

So,

[00:41:46] Speaker 4: yeah.

[00:41:46] Kai Steinbeck: I am, I am very, very glad that we, we have the very strict restrictions we have in this country. And, you know, certainly our industry, the tourism industry, the dive industry has suffered tremendously in it, but. Look at how we live. We, we walk around as if nothing happens. You know, we walk around in shopping centers.

Most of us have jobs and can go to work, you know, and it really doesn't affect us so much in comparison to people in, in the States, in Europe and the rest of the world. I think we are, we are very, very lucky the way it's been handled over here.

[00:42:22] Matt Waters: Well, I think, I think it's down to the Australian people, the population.

Oh, for sure. When the, when the government, and it's as much of a pain in the arse it's been, when the government has said, masks on buses and trains, or stay at home, you've got a lockdown, social distance, people have done it. Quite simply, they've just done it. And it's worked.

[00:42:42] Kai Steinbeck: Exactly, exactly, yeah, for sure, for sure.

[00:42:45] Matt Waters: Without going down the rabbit hole of, The existence of Corona virus or that kind of thing.

[00:42:50] Kai Steinbeck: Oh, and it's 5G is actually causing it and tinfoil hats. Yeah,

[00:42:58] Matt Waters: yeah, for sure. Just, just going, just going back to, you know, you, you, you stint with the Corona virus. So you, you, how long did you feel as though you were, you know, suffering from a cold or flu like symptoms?

How long did it, you know, and so you thought, right, I'm good to go.

[00:43:17] Kai Steinbeck: It was, it was a good two, two weeks. It was a good full two weeks. Yeah. Um, and, and, and I, I never got any of the symptoms that, that you hear of loss of taste and loss of smell maybe because the food was so bad in the hotel. Not sure. But there are Facebook groups specifically for people in quarantine.

And you know, what we did on those Facebooks group all day long is we compared what we got lost. Fed and took photos of it

[00:43:45] Speaker 4: and

[00:43:45] Kai Steinbeck: showed each other. But, um, you know, I, yeah, the first two days, um, um, I didn't feel very, very good at all. Um, and after that it was a chest cold, you know, I never had a fever, never lost taste or smell.

And, and, and, um, but yeah, it, it, it lingered around for a good two weeks and, and, um, other than, Other than the, the, the high heart rate and, and what it does to your head, um, you know, being locked away in a room, you can't go anywhere. Um, was, was tough. It was really tough doing quarantine for three weeks. Um, but in the big scheme of things, certainly worth it in order to be able to live the way we live.

Um, yeah,

[00:44:32] Matt Waters: happy days. Well, I'm glad you're over it, Chief.

[00:44:35] Kai Steinbeck: Oh, and so am I. And so am I. You know, I'm glad that there's, there's other people, you know, obviously, who, uh, I was talking to my doctor and she, she knows of, of somebody who is similar age to me, who lives in America. He was very much into tech diving and he ended up in a respirator and can never dive again and has to, you know, You know, swallow six pills every day for the rest of his life, you know, so yeah, I was, I was, I was very, very lucky with, with regards to being able to come back to Australia.

And even though I caught coronavirus, um, that I'm healthy and all is good.

[00:45:10] Matt Waters: Yeah. Yeah.

[00:45:11] Kai Steinbeck: Yeah. Imagine never being able to dive again.

[00:45:13] Matt Waters: Oh, that's, that's up there as one of my worst fears.

[00:45:18] Speaker 5: Yeah, for sure.

[00:45:19] Matt Waters: Um, there's an old boy actually. Um, I was, whenever we get on this kind of subject, I always think of him. He's, he's named Smoothie.

Uh, and he is a smoothie when the, when the women are around. But he's, um, he's what, 80, 85? Maybe 86, but he goes back to Thailand every year, um, just to get a tick in the box to say that he can continue teaching the kids in the pools, uh, back in the UK. Uh, he, he's been diving 59 years, I think it is 30 odd years as a police diver, but now that he's of the old age, he just sits in the pool and teaches basic skills for the, for the kids, but he has to get certified.

Yeah. And every year, uh, I'm thinking back to a couple of years ago when I was out there every year, he'd come back and yeah, this is definitely me last year. I can't do it anymore. I'm getting too old, but I'm going to miss it. And sure enough, 364 days later, smoothie, a rock up on the rock. And yeah, just one more year, just

[00:46:20] Kai Steinbeck: one more year for sure.

No, and it's, it's. Because it is such a great industry, you know, and, and, um, um, certainly for somebody like that, you know, being able to continue to do it, which, um, you know, the, the, the whole experience has, um, you know, uh, created havoc, obviously in the dive industry in Australia with jobs and so on and so forth.

But, um, you know, it's, it's great to see that.

[00:46:47] Opportunities in the Dive Industry

[00:46:47] Kai Steinbeck: Um, domestically, the smaller operators that are attached to a larger metropolitan city are actually doing really, really well, um, you know, and, and there are jobs in the dive industry available. Um, um, I have. Just gotten two candidates who did their IDC with me last year, a job on an island in off the, off the coast of Queensland.

They're working off there and, and all the people on the, on the last instructor course that I did at Sunreef. Um, I have either come from positions where they were dive masters and working at dive masters and upskill themselves to instructors so that they can, you know, be more employable and useful to that particular dive center.

And, um, yeah, there are jobs around. It's not like what it used to be. And it certainly, you know, Southeast Asia and the rest of the world is really suffering because there are no jobs there, but certainly in Australia. Um, if you go away from those major tourist hops, such as Cairns and Port, um, and, and look for work as a dive instructor, um, if, if you, if you, um, if you look, you, you, you can find employment for sure.

[00:47:55] Matt Waters: Yeah, I'm with you on that one. I think it's a great time to do the training, especially if you're thinking about stepping up and becoming an instructor, because, you know, years ago when I did it, there was a gazillion instructors. So you're always fighting for the jobs and trying to prove yourself. But the way.

The world is at the moment. We're just, everybody's just waiting for the doors to open. And I think there's going to be a mass exodus from all the countries to all the other countries just because people want the freedom to be able to travel again. So there's going to be all of a sudden a lot of people rocking up at resorts that want to go diving.

[00:48:32] Kai Steinbeck: Oh, for sure, for sure. Absolutely. You know, I, I couldn't agree with you more on that. It's, um, um, Tourism will open up again internationally when that is. And, and, and, you know, there's all sorts of things about the vaccine and how. That is going to open the doors and I hope it does. And, um, yeah, and, and, and it might be another 12 months time, but yeah, I agree with you.

I think, um, you know, if you want to be in this industry and, um, you know, whether you are, you know, an open water diver today and you're thinking, you know, I might want to become an instructor one day. Start doing your courses now, you know, do your advanced course, do your rescue course, because, um, the more training you have, the, the, the, the better you will, um, be employed or the easier it will be for you to be, to become employed and further down the track.

And then when you get down to the professional levels, you know, dive master course, you know, you've always thought about it. Yeah. If you have, you know, whether can you do it part time or full time, take time off if you're not working, you know, talk to your local dive centers, they might put in a payment plan for you, you know, um, and, and the same thing for the instructor course.

Yeah, for sure.

[00:49:45] Matt Waters: Yeah. Yeah. And anyone who's considering doing the IDC. Um, can clearly hit you up and you can sort them out with a cheeky little trip up to the sunny coast.

[00:49:56] Kai Steinbeck: Absolutely. Absolutely. So, um, yeah, we would, we would love to, uh, we're running five instructor development courses per year now as a minimum on the Sunshine Coast.

Um, the next one starts at the end of April and, um, uh, yeah, look with, with, without making this a commercial about myself, um, yeah, please by all means hit me up, um, dive instructor. com. au. A very easy website to remember dive instructor. com. au, um, yeah, and, and, um, send me an email and, and, um, yeah. You know, whether you're a dive master looking at becoming an instructor, whether you're certified as open water and have nothing, and you want to know what is the path to get there, or whether you're already a dive instructor and looking at, you know, master scuba diver trainer rating or staff instructor rating, so on and so forth.

Yeah, please, um, would love to help you out and be in touch with you.

[00:50:48] Matt Waters: And what's your, um, what's the long range goals for training?

[00:50:52] Future Plans and Training

[00:50:52] Matt Waters: The dive instructor Academy,

[00:50:55] Kai Steinbeck: the long range goals is I would, I would love to see, um, you know, certainly, uh, Cairns and Port Douglas come back up and being able to, to operate, uh, a couple of instructor development course out of there as well.

Um, I think that will take some time, but I would love to see, you know, working with the guys at Sunreef to make it, um, one of the premier destinations to do your instructor course. We, we do include. Other aspects or, you know, we were talking about, you know, for the training and not just sticking the boxes, I include lots of other things in the instructor development course, um, that are outside of the, uh, Patty, uh, curriculum and they don't, they don't have anything to do with instructor development course, but I think they're really, really great, um, really great knowledge for you to become more employable.

One of the things I, I worked with a marine biologist and we put a marine life knowledge course together, which is 14 modules, everything from, you know, how coral is formed, what is coral, different, um, keystone species of, of aquatic and underwater environments and animals, um, and covers, um, A plethora of knowledge, because one of the things that, um, unfortunately is lacking is marine life knowledge throughout the training agency.

Certainly that I'm familiar with, you know,

[00:52:16] Speaker 5: if,

[00:52:16] Kai Steinbeck: if, if you did, if you didn't do fish ID in your advanced course, um, you can go all the way to course director and never really gain any knowledge through the training agencies about marine life. And, and, and here you are now an instructor, you know, the instructor is.

Somebody who needs to have that knowledge, you know, somebody comes along and ask you a question. What is this? What is that? How does that work? Or how, how does coral work? What is coral? You know, what is bleaching? What's happening? They need to have a baseline understanding. So we, we include that. Um, I also include, um, other aspects of, of, um, the industry, such as we, we go over, for example, how to price a dive course, how to, you know, what a margin is, what discounts do to you, you know, we, I haven't,

[00:53:06] Matt Waters: you're actually giving them a bit of business acumen as well as the social and professional skills required to do the job they're going to do.

[00:53:16] Kai Steinbeck: Exactly, exactly. I hope that the candidates that graduate from Dive Instructor Academy come out and they are very, very well trained, not just in, you know, what they have to do in order to be able to teach scuba diving, but also have some business knowledge, marine life knowledge. Um, we're in the midst of, of, of developing a dive center management course, which will, um, cover things, simple things, you know, I'm not talking about how to.

Take a compressor apart and service it and build it back together again, but how to change a filter in the compressor, you know, the fact that there is silicon charcoal in there and some felt filters. Most people have never seen that, you know, so we, we aim to include real life knowledge for. What they're going to require for on the job so that when these candidates go to their first job as a dive instructor, the dive operator doesn't have to spend so much more time in training them up.

[00:54:17] Matt Waters: And let's be fair. I mean, I think back to when I was DM in an instructor, um, you kind of. Don't really realize at the start how much other stuff you're going to be doing.

[00:54:28] Kai Steinbeck: Oh, for sure.

[00:54:30] Matt Waters: You know, if you're not a team player, get out.

[00:54:32] Kai Steinbeck: Exactly. Exactly. And, and, and, you know, the industry, um, the industry itself has changed so much from, um, way back when, when you did your, uh, instructor course and I did mine, I mean, we're showing our age maybe now, but let's not talk about that.

Um, but you know, social media, you know, I, I encourage all my candidates to have a You know, their private social media and then put together a dive social media, um, platform, you know, whether it is Instagram or Facebook so that they, you know, have continuous contact with their students and the students can come back to them and that relationship follows, you know, it's just stuff that.

It's, it's all common sense and it's, it's not hard to do, but somebody needs to tell these candidates and show them that, Hey, this is a great idea. You don't have to do it, but you know, I just try to teach more than the bare minimums.

[00:55:21] Matt Waters: Yeah. No, a hundred percent behind you on that one as well. Uh, I'm still in touch with guys that are, you know, I taught them their open water eight years ago and you know, they still come dive in with me year after year.

Corona year.

[00:55:35] Speaker 4: Yeah.

[00:55:35] Matt Waters: Yeah.

[00:55:36] Kai Steinbeck: Well talking about diving together, you know, you should definitely um, come up to the sunshine coast I understand you up here every so often and and we'll dive the brisbane together.

[00:55:43] Matt Waters: Oh, may that be fantastic That would be fantastic. I've not i've not dived anywhere near brisbane yet.

I've only done new south wales There is some

[00:55:52] Kai Steinbeck: incredible diving up here. You know, there's stratbrook island. There's um, I haven't Yeah, there's, there's mantis all around there. And then of course the Brisbane and then further North, they sunk a wreck, um, a couple of years ago of Harvey Bay, um, the HMS to Brooke, you know, there's Wolf Rock.

There's just, yeah, it's just, it was really, really good diving here. I've got

[00:56:12] Matt Waters: a mate actually, a shout out to Jai Kennedy over on North Stradbroke Island. He's an absolute freaking legend. This guy, um, if you get the opportunity to pop over and go diving with him, you can't forget his name. It's very similar to yours.

[00:56:25] Speaker 7: Yeah,

[00:56:25] Matt Waters: uh, giant guy,

[00:56:27] Speaker 7: um,

[00:56:28] Matt Waters: but he, the, the pictures that he's showing at the moment and another mate's just been there diving with him, Stevie Larder, uh, some great manta shots. So I'm just, I'm, I'm gagging to get up there and dive it. I really am. So as soon as the, uh, the next business trip occurs up to Brisbane, I'm going to be knocking on your door chief.

[00:56:46] Kai Steinbeck: No, that sounds great. That sounds great. That sounds great. Um, a little plug. If, if, if anybody is looking at, um, at doing the dive master course or the instructor course with, with us, um, through Sunreef, um, we, um, if, if, if they mentioned scuba goat, they have to mention scuba goat, um, then they'll get a hundred dollar voucher, um, that they can spend on anything in the shop.

Uh, whether it's, you know, if you need a bit of dive gear or you can put it through to something. Yeah. Yeah.

[00:57:13] Matt Waters: Happy days.

[00:57:14] Kai Steinbeck: So, but they need to mention scuba goat.

[00:57:15] Matt Waters: All right. So get in touch with you or Sunreef and quote scuba goat. Yep. Get your course booked and get your voucher a hundred dollars.

[00:57:24] Kai Steinbeck: That's it.

[00:57:25] Matt Waters: That's a nice little sweetener.

[00:57:26] Kai Steinbeck: Yeah, for sure. And that's for the dive master and instructor programs. Yeah.

[00:57:30] Matt Waters: And, um, so I've got to ask, um, you did, you did tell me the other day that you've sent us something, something in the post and the postman's failed. He's not turned up.

[00:57:39] Kai Steinbeck: Oh, that's such a shame. I was hoping, I was hoping that the postman be there by now.

[00:57:43] Personalized Dive Gear

[00:57:43] Kai Steinbeck: So, um, yeah, one of my, one of my, uh, sideline businesses is, um, I make. Custom made and personalized mask straps. And, um, I was cheeky enough to get onto the scuba goat website and steal your logo and get it digitized. And in the mail is a, a really cool looking mask strap with the scuba goat logo, um, coming your way.

And, uh, yeah, that's something that I do. And. And you can have your own design or you should choose one of ours and have your own personalized name on that. And yeah, I did. I did one. It was a, it was a married couple and they had two nudie branks. They had a nudie brank each on the, on the mask tamer. And then, um, one said, Just, and the other one said marriage,

[00:58:29] Speaker 5: but

[00:58:31] Kai Steinbeck: I don't know if they actually thought this through, because if they're diving where it says just, and the other one says marriage, whereas if they swap sides, it will say married just,

but yeah, that's on the website, diveinstructor. com. au go to the shop. Yeah, you can, you can have a look on there.

[00:58:50] Matt Waters: I'm excited to see this. I bet it turns up in the post tomorrow morning.

[00:58:53] Kai Steinbeck: Of course it is. It's called Murphy's law. Yeah. Okay.

[00:58:56] Matt Waters: So I'm a strap with a scuba goat logo on it. Happy days. Thank you very much, sir.

[00:59:00] Kai Steinbeck: Oh, that's my pleasure. Thank you. And if it,

[00:59:01] Matt Waters: if it looks slightly good, then, um, maybe we need to have a little cheeky chat and maybe put them up on the scuba goat website and, uh, get some freebies on the go and people can purchase a few as well. We get to get some goat masks out there.

[00:59:14] Kai Steinbeck: Yeah, absolutely. Get the scuba goat masks out there and create your own little scuba goat tribe.

[00:59:20] Matt Waters: Hell yeah.

I like the way you're thinking, Kai. Yes. We're going to go far.

[00:59:27] Kai Steinbeck: Well, somebody has to pay for the sound engineer in the background who's being very quiet.

[00:59:32] Matt Waters: Oh, yeah, he's very good, but as soon as we stop recording it just stop it won't stop talking.

[00:59:37] Wrapping Up and Future Guests

[00:59:37] Matt Waters: He's got a cat Okay, well I think we'll wrap it up in a mo and just so anyone who's listening and still listening now next week I do have I don't know whether you know her actually Kai a young lady called Uh, Kirsten Shepard, or Shep, and she's one of the owners at, uh, Ningaloo Dive.

Um, so we're going to be talking all about, uh, the beautiful Ningaloo Reef and a new liveaboard that they're bringing in as well.

[01:00:07] Kai Steinbeck: Oh, fantastic. That sounds awesome. Yeah. I've never had the opportunity to go over there, but I have some friends who've, who've been there on vacation or a couple of worked over there as well.

And it's, it's yeah, certainly from what I've seen, it looks spectacular.

[01:00:21] Matt Waters: Yeah. Hey, and you're more than welcome to join me, but I'm determined as soon as that WA border opens and we're comfortable to move between the two, I'm going to plan a trip to Nangaloo. And if it's going to be timing in with this new boat coming in, I'm going to try and fill the bloody thing up just with awesome people, get some awesome times on Ningaloo.

[01:00:43] Kai Steinbeck: Oh, that'd be awesome. Because that's what you, that's, that's, was your business prior to COVID, wasn't it? You, you were arranging trips to all over the world, um, doing some incredible stuff.

[01:00:53] Matt Waters: Yeah. My fiance nearly divorced me before we even got married. I was away that much.

I assume that everyone can find you on Twitter. I certainly know that they can find you on Facebook and Instagram as well.

[01:01:14] Kai Steinbeck: Yeah. IDC with Kai, um, type that into Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram, um, Google IDC with Kai or the actual website is diveinstructor. com. au. Um, and, uh, look, even if you, even if you, uh, not planning on doing anything, if you have any questions about the dive industry, you know, what is the job market like, um, you know, uh, how do I get from.

Being recently certified to, to a, the first professional level. Any questions at all, please. Yeah. More than happy to answer anything.

[01:01:47] Matt Waters: Good on you. Good on you. So there you go, folks, you know, who to go to IDC with Kai. Um, Kai, it's been an absolute pleasure. Thank you so much for coming on the show and, uh, we'll do it again sometime.

[01:01:58] Kai Steinbeck: No, that sounds brilliant. And thank you very much for having me. I've really enjoyed it. I was a bit nervous when we first started talking about it, but Hey, it was, it was fairly easy and painless.

[01:02:08] Matt Waters: Happy days. Yeah. Thank

[01:02:09] Kai Steinbeck: you.

[01:02:10] Matt Waters: Thanks everybody. Goodbye.

[01:02:15] Kai Steinbeck: The podcast for the inquisitive diver.