Here's some fact about your Course Director and IDC Staff instructor. Feel free to email and ask more "personal" or "professional" questions and we will make sure they reply to you.
Thien Do - PADI Course Director Arrived in Phuket, Thailand in 2001, Thien was attracted to the island for her tremendous underwater marine life, great local and international food, and the first class professional training facilities.
Born in the former South Viet Nam, Thien grew up in California where he had lived for 20 years. A graduate of University of California at Santa Barbara, his professional life has been as a Stores Manager for Gap Inc. and a Business Development Manager for the team that launched E-greetings Network Inc. in 1999. Prior to making Scuba Diving his daily lifestyle, Thien's hobbies included mountain trekking, running marathons, stumbling through triathlons, and had fallen off his skis and mountain bike quite often while searching for the ultimate “downhill adrenaline rush”.
Between the IDCs, Thien loves to go diving ("better that way. Please don't stay in the office!!" ...is the comment from his partner and his staff ;) with his students, customers and friends to local and liveaboard dive sites not only in Phuket but also to other part of Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia and, of-course, Viet Nam. He also enjoys teaching all levels of PADI courses to a 8 year old to 60+yrs. He is one of not-so-many Course Directors who actually teaches real-life courses. To keep himself discipline at logging his dives, Thien logs his dives and trip comments on the web, at http://thiendivelog.blogspot.com (but recently not doing good job...) When he's not diving, he spends some time trying to catch up with his other business (he is trying... but more often traveling or chilling with his friends).
Born in the former South Viet Nam, Thien grew up in California where he had lived for 20 years. A graduate of University of California at Santa Barbara, his professional life has been as a Stores Manager for Gap Inc. and a Business Development Manager for the team that launched E-greetings Network Inc. in 1999. Prior to making Scuba Diving his daily lifestyle, Thien's hobbies included mountain trekking, running marathons, stumbling through triathlons, and had fallen off his skis and mountain bike quite often while searching for the ultimate “downhill adrenaline rush”. Between the IDCs, Thien loves to go diving ("better that way. Please don't stay in the office!!" ...is the comment from his partner and his staff ;) with his students, customers and friends to local and liveaboard dive sites not only in Phuket but also to other part of Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia and, of-course, Viet Nam. He also enjoys teaching all levels of PADI courses to a 8 year old to 60+yrs. He is one of not-so-many Course Directors who actually teaches real-life courses. To keep himself discipline at logging his dives, Thien logs his dives and trip comments on the web, at http://thiendivelog.blogspot.com (but recently not doing good job...) When he's not diving, he spends some time trying to catch up with his other business (he is trying... but more often traveling or chilling with his friends).
Achieved "Platinum Course Director" status for 2006 and 2009 - Achieved "Gold Course Director" status for 2007 and 2008
- Received PADI Recognition for his participation in the inaugural PADI Instructor Examination for India (Andaman Islands, Nov 2009)
- Conducted Cambodia's 1st IDC - 7 candidates including the first Cambodian Khmer candidate to be PADI OWSI (Sihanoukville, Oct 2008)
- Conducted Bakersfield's first 3 IDC's (Kern County -California, 2005, 2006 & 2007)
- Graduated from PADI Headquarters in California in 2004
- The first and only Vietnamese-American Course Director
- Specialty Instructor Trainer: Deep, DUP, DPV, Emergency O2 Provider, Gas Blender, Naturalist, Navigation, Night, NITROX, Search & Recovery, Wreck
- EFR Instructor Trainer
- DAN USA Instructor Trainer
- Have trained 600+ instructor level students
- Have certified 1,300+ PADI divers
- Business owner of three companies in Phuket & US
- Language: English & Vietnamese
Mike - PADI IDC Staff InstructorHaving worked as a Divemaster in the UK for 2 years, Mike felt like he needed to feel some warm water for once. He decided to leave and started working in Dahab, Red Sea as a PADI IDC Staff Instructor where he taught instructors and all levels of divers. After 3 years, Mike once again got itchy feet and headed over to Asia, working in Koh Lanta, Thailand.
Now he is happily diving for Blue Coral Diving in Hoi An and hopes to achieve Steve's (his boss) PADI Master Instructor rating. Mike is the most experience instructor of the Blue Coral Diving Team and he can take on the most demanding of students in his stride! A welcome member of Blue Coral Diving. Come test him out!
He did very good job
More info on Mike is coming soon!
Email us at info@gopro-vietnam.com for inquiry or visit Thien's divelog and gopro-thailand.com to find out more about Thien