British school boy William Gordon age 10 ½ from Burgess Hill, Sussex has collected GBP600 (almost US$1,000) for Malapascua. Horrified by the televised events shown on UK TV, William bucked the trend at his school last week during the annual Children in Need charity event.

Unlike everyone else who went to school dressed in pyjamas, William was determined to raise money for the Philippines (which of course includes thousands of children) by himself. Not knowing the best way to send the money he rang his Great Auntie – Ali Pockett, frequent visitor to Asia Divers and well versed in Philippine etiquette. Ali P obviously contacted AD and was directed to the plight of Malapascua – an island she has dived together with her partner – IDAP Course Director Kenneth and friends Johan and Maria Lyrevik. Continue reading →

Thank you to everyone that has supported the grass-roots campaign of PG Dive Centers to support the relief effort. We have been working with other dives centers in our area and have had tremendous support. Rick Kirkham went to Malapascua and should be back online by the end of the week with photos of the relief effort. He will also be visiting DAANBANTAYAN in northern Cebu which has yet to be even accessed by the Red Cross. The rumor is of 14000 families homeless.

The money has poured in and there are vans with food and construction supplies being bought in Cebu and winging their way up to the island. Last Wednesday several tons of supplies from Springboard Foundation were being shipped for free by LBC foundation from Manila.

Come next week more food will be needed. This is a disaster that will continue to need help for months to come. If you would like to donate please contact Alli at instructors@asiadivers.com.

A very special thank-you to our partners Cressi, Waterproof, and LW Compressors for their generous support.

Tommy and Alli went to the DEMA show in Orlando recently. It’s the world’s only international trade-only event for the diving industry. It was a great opportunity to do meet up with all of our wholesalers in the U.S. do some business, learn a few new things, and to see some friends of course.  Thanks to two of our 25^th Anniversary photo competition winners for coming out to visit us at DEMA, Alex Suh and Beth Watson.

Last year Asia Divers launched “Movember” with Pete, Jamie Troy, Brad, Mazi sporting bushy staches to raise awareness and some money for men’s health. This Movember the guys have started to sprout for awareness yet again, but are combining the awareness with raising money for the Malapascua typhoon relief. A few nights ago the guys decided that “Mohawks” might be a good way to introduce the “Mo-ness” of “Movember” and to raise some money for Malapascua. The guys got their Mohawks and raised almost p20,000 in one night up in the bar! If you would like to donate to this cause please email Alli at instructors@asiadivers.com. We’ll keep you up to date on where your money is going.

Here’s some great news for all you folks in the U.K. and even Europe. Philippine Airlines will fly to and from London starting November 4, 2013 and will operate direct, non-stop flights, providing the fastest travel to Manila from London (average 13 hours).  The five-times-a-week service to Manila from London will use PAL’s Boeing 777-300ER aircraft.

Check out this link for some good prices on PAL

http://www1.philippineairlines.com/special-offers/fly-london/

Stephanie Scawen has been diving with Asia Divers for many years and also did her instructor course with us.  Steph, Al Jazeera’s South East Asia correspondent came here with the production team in early June to film part of ‘MS and Me” and it’s now on air. It a beautiful, honest, strong and touching doco which shines a new light on what it’s like living with MS for sufferers and their families. Definitely worth watching!

If you can’t see it on TV you watch it here through this link:

http://www.aljazeera.com/programmes/aljazeeracorrespondent/2013/10/ms-me-2013102482622778691.html