With the Project AWARE week I got some new energy to save the ocean!! It is always very exciting when you introduce people to the underwater world. I feel that just by doing so, showing how beautiful the ocean is, you plant a little seed of care in every diver’s heart. Even better if you offer them to continue their education with Project AWARE courses, run free workshops about conservation and fish identification. And so we did at Trawangan Dive Centre.

During this week every dive was a dive against debris dive and anyone could grab a mesh bag to clean up ocean floor. Lucky for us we didn’t find much rubbish. It is quite common this time of the year, as the currents are strong enough to sweep everything away. With the first rain we will have much more work to do.

Main item found though were the fishing lines and left over of the nets. Fishing Nets and lines are otherwise known as ghost nets. Imagine that over 640,000 tonnes of nets are abandoned each year in our oceans! Nearly half of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch is made up of old fishing gear. These nets will last in the ocean for hundreds of years. They also continue functioning to trap animals even after abandoned. Animals typically cannot detect these nets and become entangled and eventually die. Many species of Fish along with turtles, sharks, whales, porpoise, dolphins, seals, sea lions etc. are unfortunately casualties of these abandoned nets. Thankfully we do not often find trapped animals around Gili Islands. How to help? Try to eat less fish or better yet fish caught in a sustainable way if you eat fish at all! 

You could learn facts like that one on our AWARE bingo night. It was a found raising event for Project AWARE, therefore profit from every bingo card will contribute to ocean protection. Every bingo card had item found in the ocean, different species of corals and fish on it. Once the picture was shown on the screen we would tell and interesting fact and you could cross it of your card until you get a BINGO!! We had amazing prizes to give away thanks to the local community of business owners. One of our Open Water Diver got himself a night in the luxurious villa on Gili Trawangan.

We end up our week with a big island clean up organized by Gili Eco Trust on the worlds clean up day and collected almost 1 ton of rubbish. Video from all the underwater and land clean ups, will be used as a promo for a new pro-eco platform called #Planetheroes, that’s coming up soon.    

It was super fun to be a part of the Project AWARE week and contribute to their work. We support our ocean every day by teaching divers about the environment, developing good habits and promoting eco lifestyle. This year we will continue to do so as well. And maybe, if you are around the Gilis for the Project AWARE week 2020, you may join us at Trawangan Dive.

If you are interested to see what we’ve been up to last week check my insta posts @laura_kazi or visit our dive centre page @trawangandive.

For more contribution to Project AWARE check out my found raising page      

Photos by @karolatakesphotos