First Omani woman to dive in Lake Baikal shares her experience

Muscat: An Omani woman has become one of the first Arabs to dive into Lake Baikal, the world’s deepest lake.
Laila Al Habsi, whose day job sees her working for a mining company in Oman, decided to dive into the lake, which is located in Siberia, when she fell in love with Russia while she was a student in Moscow.
“I got so intrigued with the geology and mysticism surrounding the lake,” she said.

“My obsession with the lake then grew to the point that I only started drinking Baikal water. The dive was done on the 24th of January 2019, three days after my birthday.

“This trip was a birthday gift to myself,” added Al Habsi. “After a year of research and asking around, it became evident that I was in fact not only the first Omani woman to dive there but also the first Arab woman. I travelled there with my best friend Anna Lutkova, a Russian who’s been my friend since we met on a flight in 2014.”

Sharing her experiences of what it was like to explore under the surface of Lake Baikal, which has a depth of 5,387 feet, and was declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1996, she said: “Baikal holds 20 per cent of the world’s fresh water, so it was extremely clean and clear. Looking up at the ice and watching the light shine through was magical. My feet, face and hands were cold but the hot chocolate I was asked to drink before the dive did keep me warm.”