After 9 days of preparation and one day of rest the IE arrived with great anticipation. Friday morning Kasia and I decided to guide clients on the boat to get our mind off of the IE that started at 4 that evening. Diving, guiding, and working with our clients was the best brain break for us. After that we knew that we were prepared and we just needed to ease nerves so all 5 of us spent the last few hours listening to music, watching our shows, or generally keeping to ourselves until the moment arrived. Four o’clock rolled around and we had our orientation with our examiner at the Costa Rica Spanish Institute. He seemed nervous as well and all 9 of us taking the IE (4 joined us from other places in Costa Rica) gathered in the same room for the first time to hear about the upcoming weekend. Legs were shaking and minds were racing! After hearing the schedule we got our assignments for the weekend.
After the orientation we had a quick break and began all of our written exams. Half of us started with theory and half of us started with the standards exam. One by one we finished and got the handshake of approval from the examiner.  Everyone kicked butt, even if some people played nasty jokes by saying they didn’t pass as they walked out just to see our reaction. 🙂 Once we all finished we ordered pizza and reconvened at the dive shop to work on our knowledge development and open water presentations for Saturday. It was a late night as we burned the midnight oil in preparation for day 2.