There is a never-to-be-forgotten moment... perhaps the pivotal point which defines one's course in life. For shark diving expert Andy Cobb, that moment arrived in the shape of a whale shark.
At the time, Cobb was working on offshore moorings off the coast of Mombasa, Kenya. It was his first shark sighting in the water and he was in awe. Someone assured him it was a docile creature and suggested he take a ride by holding on to the shark's fin.
"I was told the whale shark's skin was rough, so I took a scraper along with me and scratched its back. It slowed down. The next day it returned and I did the same thing. It obviously enjoyed it. By day three it was there waiting to have its back scratched," said Cobb, "but the 'demon' shark still remained a mystery to me."
Had his father remained in the UK, Cobb's life might have taken a very different course. Charles Cobb went to Kenya in the 1920s, during the Depression, and eventually married Teddy (Doris) Stedman, a contract nurse whom he met on a ship on a trip home.
The Cobbs farmed with sisal, pineapple and Zebu cattle in the shade of Mount Donyosabuk, near Thika, about 50km from Nairobi. "We also had about 500 giraffe, zebra, impala, warthog. But particularly special were the leopards," said Cobb.
During the Mau Mau uprising, Andy was sent to England.
"I attended the oldest school in the country, Kings, Canterbury. Because of the right contacts I was accepted into the inner circle...the colonial yobbo amid the toffs," he said.
On his return to Kenya, Cobb was attached to the Kenya Regiment doing forest patrols to clear out the remnant hardcore Mau Mau living in the forests.
"The RAF and British troops, the Kenya police and the general service units were the main forces against the Mau Mau. However, the pseudo-gangs were very effective - of European origin, but Kenya-bred," he said.
Rhino and elephant in the forest were often panicked easily as the RAF had used bombs against the Mau Mau and it was not unusual to have scary moments on the narrow forest paths when they encountered these spooked animals.
Light relief was gained by tormenting the city boys who were at times assigned to these non-conformist soldiers.
"We would give them a nice soft leaf to use after they had been to the toilet. But under it would be a stinging nettle."
Cobb said he had also been the second most capped rugby player for East Africa. "I even played rugby against Idi Amin - he was a popular second row forward in the King's African Rifles."
After attending university in the UK, where he studied agriculture and automotive engineering, Cobb had a series of jobs, eventually coming to South Africa in 1981.
Around this time, people's impressions of sharks were still being formed by the Jaws movies. He remembers the only dive shop in Durban being Trident...and tame diving, pottering around the boat's anchor.
It was so different from what he had been accustomed to in Kenya, where he headed the Kenya Diving Association. As a civilian there, he had special access to diving with the Kenyan Navy.
Many of his dives had been around a Portuguese ship that had sunk and been washed ashore near Fort Jesus in Mombasa in the 16th century.
Cobb decided local dives could do with a shake-up and he introduced the concept of using a surface marker buoy. As divers practised the 2x2 buddy system, new, safer avenues and wider areas of the ocean floor opened up.
As a police diver, Cobb said the diving was normally in low visibilty water, retrieving bodies, stolen goods and even murder weapons.
Greater adventures in the open ocean lured. Cobb recalls early dives with Ricky Schick, and being mentored by Natal Sharks Board scientists such as Geremy Cliff and Graham Charter (who later became CEO of the body).
"I found that they knew everything there was to know about the biology of sharks, but were sadly lacking about shark behaviour, and I wanted to know more about these animals that people had such a phobia about," said Cobb.
During one of his early dives at Aliwal Shoal, he remembers the instructor ripping his mask off his face. Thinking this was just the standard technique to see how he coped, Cobb paid no attention and carried on swimming.
The dive master was trying to warn him that he was swimming into a cave full of ragged-tooth sharks.
Instead, unaware, Cobb swam inside the cave and found himself surrounded by about nine sharks, all of whom paid him little attention.
That is when he began to realise the myth that was driving humans' fear of these sleek sea predators.
Over the years Cobb has found himself often speaking out not only for sharks, but for the entire marine eco-system. A particularly high-profile campaign saw him take on Sappi-Saicor over the dumping of effluent.
He recalled being part of a workshop charged with looking into coastal tourism. "Jacob Zuma was in the chair," he said.
He was involved in getting the oceans included in the Tourism Act, became friendly with Ina Cronje in the days when the environment was her portfolio and succeeded in getting shark finning banned within South Africa's exclusive economic zone, as well as satellite tracking of vessels in this zone.
Borrowing, he said, from an Australian concept, he suggested that vessels be boarded so that environmental officers could check that they were complying with their fishing allocations.
He has won international environmental awards such as the 1998 KwaZulu Nature Conservation Award for work done getting Aliwal Shoal recognised; in Dusseldorf Germany, The Shark Guardian 2005; and on Vancouver Island in Canada the Whale's Tail for one man's passion influencing others; and has featured in a BBC documentary.
He also plans to have a book published on shark behaviour.
Never afraid to express his views, Cobb was often used as the point of the spear in discussions with government and municipal scientists. "Kathy Kay (a campaigner of note attached to the Wildlife and Environment Society of SA) said they often used me because I was their stroppiest NGO speaker," he said.