Chapter 39
Finding voice
In Cape Town, early January is the height of summer, with long, hot days and a welcome southeasterly wind to freshen the air. Out here, things couldn’t be more different.
We’ve crossed over into the “screaming sixties” of high winds and waves, and we’ve run into a force nine storm, with icy winds of over ninety kilometres per hour, and waves over seven metres high. The weather reports predict the storm will blow itself out in a few days, but right now the Syrenka rolls and lurches like a drunken pirate.
I’m sick as a dog, but I don’t dare go up on deck. Peeping out the porthole, I see how we ride up one side of a high swell and plunge down into the deep trough on the other, and my stomach heaves. I can hear the storm outside — the crash of towering waves smashing violently against the hull, the wind howling like a monster in torment.
I could so use some steady earth beneath my freezing feet right now. And some warm sunshine on my face.
We’re all spending the day preparing for our first mission, because yesterday we located the Japanese whaling factory ship, the Koshitsu. From now on, we’ll be sticking closer to it than a callosity on a Southern Right’s head.
The Koshitsu is a big and ugly ship, with the word “RESEARCH” neatly stencilled on its grey hull, and “RESEARCH ACTIVITY PURSUANT TO INTERNATIONAL WHALING CONVENTION” on the back above the very slipway where whale carcasses are hauled up to be butchered in the on-board processing factory.
The whalers claim they’re researching dietary habits, but what they’re doing is not for science, it’s for profit. Legally, no whale killed for “lethal research” can go to waste, so the meat gets sold on the open market and winds up on dinner plates, restaurant menus, and has even been found in sushi in California. It’s big business. Captain Murphy says one whale will sell for between a quarter and one million dollars, and the Japanese alone have a permit to take about a thousand whales this season — mostly Antarctic Minkies and some Fin Whales, with the occasional Humpback if they can get it. They’re prohibited from whaling in the Southern Ocean Sanctuary, but they do it anyway.
Libby has seen whales being killed. She says the grenade harpoons often miss the spine and don’t get an instant kill. It can take up to an hour after the grenade explodes for the whale to die, and all the while it thrashes about in agony, getting shot repeatedly by high-powered rifles. Sometimes the whale is dragged backwards by its tail until it drowns.
We all know what the whaler really is: a floating abattoir. A death ship.
Our goal is to wreak such financial damage and operational havoc, that it makes it unprofitable for them to continue. As soon as the weather allows, we’ll do an interception. In the meantime, we’re planning our strategy for the assault and stocking our arsenal with homemade bombs — of the stink and slippery variety.
The disgusting smell hits me before I even enter the common room. Actually, “disgusting” doesn’t even begin to describe the nauseating stench. It’s like a blend of vomit, dog doo and rotten drains.
Some of the crew, wearing eye goggles and masks over their mouths and noses, are hard at work filling dozens of glass bottles with a disgusting-smelling substance.
“What is that?” I ask Libby, who works with the practised hand of long experience.
“Putrefied butter. It’s non-toxic, but high in butyric acid — that’s what causes the smell, and the smell’s what does the damage.”
“We try to lob these onto the deck and slipway of the whaler,” Mike tells me. “When the bottle shatters, the muck spreads on the deck, and it sticks around for a really long time. Makes their work conditions deeply unpleasant. And even better, if the whale meat touches the stuff, it gets contaminated and it can’t be sold. Cool, ay?”
Gagging at the smell, I volunteer for the other task — scooping a white powder called Methocel into brown paper bags, rolling them up, and securing them with tape. Pete, the second mate who is another plain-spoken Aussie and, at fifty, the second-oldest person on board, explains that the packages explode when they hit the deck, scattering the powder everywhere. When it comes into contact with water, the result is a deck-coating substance so slippery that it becomes nearly impossible to walk and go about the daily business of hauling in and hacking up whales.
“Slippery as roo-poo, mate. I love it when it sends them arse over tit,” Pete says.
That afternoon, I get a twenty-minute slot on the Net and start by checking the reaction to my Christmas blog post. In amongst all the well-wishing comments from supporters around the world, as well as the occasional troll calling me a bunny-hugging eco-terrorist who should wash my stinky, hippie ass, eat a cow, and then die, is one that makes my insides leap — in a happy, thoroughly un-seasick kind of way.
Alabama_Hog (December, 25)
You go, girl! If anyone can save endangered creatures and other helpless beasts, it’s you. Merry Christmas, Romy. :)
It’s him — I know it is. It’s got to be.
I curse the fact that we get such infrequent access to the Net. His comment has been up for two weeks without my knowing about it. I type an immediate reply:
Romy (January, 8)
Thank you, Alabama_Hog, kind of you to say so. We welcome all supporters, even hogs and those who wear mullets. :)
I stare at the screen for a full minute, grinning wider than a great white, and then I check the Rusher sites.
Rehearsals begin for Broadway revival of Equus
Movie megastar Logan Rush yesterday sat down between rehearsal sessions with veteran of the stage, Sir Nicholas Dwyer, to talk about their roles in the latest Broadway production of Peter Shaffer’s classic Equus.
Rush will be playing the part of Alan Strang — an apparently mild-mannered young man who savagely attacks six horses with a metal stake. Dwyer plays the psychiatrist who investigates the inner demons which lead the boy to commit the atrocity.
“I’ve done several films now,” said Rush at the Paladium Theater today, “but I’m a novice on the stage, so I’m extremely fortunate to be working with such an experienced and talented cast.”
When asked about his feelings regarding the infamous nude scenes in the play, Rush quipped: “I guess I’m going to be asked about that in every interview from now on? Let’s just say the play will be a challenge to me on many levels. But I’m excited by the opportunity to test myself as an actor, and to grow my craft.”
Many in the showbiz community have dismissed the casting of Logan Rush in the play as a moneymaking ploy to pull in Rush’s enormous fan base, but Dwyer disagrees: “I’ve been highly impressed with what I’ve seen of Logan’s ability so far, and I believe he has only just begun to tap his talent. People are going to be surprised.”
An assistant director agreed. “Guy can act, you’ll see.”
Theatre-goers will be able to judge for themselves when Equus premieres at the Paladium on February first.
I am so proud of him. So. Freaking. Proud.
Quickly, before I run out of my allotted time, I type a note to Logan — his personal email address is still burned in my brain. I apologise again for reading his letter and snooping into his past. I tell him how impressed and excited I am about all his amazing news, adding, “Finally you’re saving a creature that was endangered — yourself.” I share a little about what my life’s like on board the Syrenka, and tell him that I’m finally learning the value of a good pair of shoes, because mine aren’t. I can imagine him smiling when he reads that. I end by wishing him a happy New Year, hesitating over how to sign off. I settle for, “Romy xoxo.”
I hit send, and when I rise from the computer, my heart is lighter than seafoam on a cresting wave.