I want to be as close to a mermaid then learning to swim should come first.

If you have read the first blog of this series, then you already know that I got no knowledge or skill on swimming. So, I was on a lookout for a swimming  school. There were recommendations, but most of them only teach kids. Also, I have misgivings on a male coach maybe he would be too hard on me.

Luckily, one of my close friends knew a lady swimming coach who also has a day job. Perfect! We can negotiate our schedule. We texted for the schedule and rate. After we agreed on the terms, we had our first lesson that very Saturday.

One of my colleague also wanted to take swimming lessons which is very fortunate. I don’t want to be the only student. I realized that if you are the only student the teacher gets to focus on you and notice mistakes (flashback on one yoga class where the teacher had me do chatarunga dandasana for almost the entire session because my form was wrong). If there are many students, I might get too distracted. Two students seem just right.

We had our swimming caps and goggles and meet our instructor for the first time in Cebu City Sports Complex. She was already there when we arrived. Our instructor looks really approachable and pretty too. We did warm-ups while showering and proceeded to the small pool.

She taught us how to do proper breathing, flutter kicks and our form during oir sessions. Also on how to transition from a front crawl to floating on your back (in case you have cramps or too tired to swim) and vice versa. She was very patient even if she had to remind us every session our mistakes (we had long gaps on our sessions because of conflict of schedule too, we tend to forget).

I usually stop in the middle of the lap because I get to swallow water.  I was too fast in changing my hands. I stopped kicking when I breathe in. I exhale abruptly. I look at the sky when I had to breathe in. My hands are too stiff. My legs kicks slowly. The list goes on.

Even though our instructor would tell us our weakness (which she must) but she still manage to console and encourage us that it is already good for a beginner. That makes me try a little bit harder the next lap. Though, I can’t guarantee it would be as good as it should be.

Swimming looks somewhat magical; how one can glide in the water and look so graceful. Yet there I was thinking on what to do next and what not to do while trying to remember to breathe at the same time.

Hopefully on my last remaining session I get to at least improve one of my faults from the list above. See you on my next post for this series!