Why we are here...the reason has arrived ,,, and we are expecting them to be killed tomorrow

Imagine the scene, two 40 something’s sitting on a beach laughing at the fact they have just heard that there have been more death threats made against Sea Shepherd in Japan. And both ladies are wearing Sea Shepherd colours….surreal…well I’d have thought so except one of them was me..

I don’t want to write a blog tonight, I just want to sleep…if I can…so I’ll just give you a quick run through the day and then attach a link to Elora’s ..she’s the reporter

As we drove to Taiji this morning we expected the fleet to be in the harbour respecting the festival /holiday as we’d been lead to believe by differing sources. We’ll never know who lied to who or even if it was disrespectful for the fishermen to go out today….but as soon as we saw guys walking around in white wellies we knew what was going to happen. The boats had gone out and the sea was flat calm…
John and I went to the vantage point and the others to the beach with our only “weapons” ..the cameras.
It wasn’t long before we saw the boats coming in in formation. The water was breaking in front of them and for as long as possible we could tried to convince ourselves the white water was, well, anything except for  dolphin, although we know it was .. And eventually we saw the first fin.. I cried and John told me to toughen up, there was so sympathy, we had a job to do.. I could cry later, at home in Manchester.

So we filmed the drive in ..the panicked dolphin, the sound of the banging boats and as soon as they were in The Cove we dashed back to the others.  We had not been able to see the species from the top of the hill, but they are Risso Dolphins.. Guess that means their fate is sealed, they are not as pretty as “Flipper” (bottle nose) so they’ll be meat with a mercury garnish….

A lady said to me on the beach that the Japanese have a longer life expectancy ..the longest in the world ..
I didn’t know anything about this subject so I’ve just googled it. And yes, she was right, although they tip the chart for death by strokes, and looking at the faces of some of the fishermen today, for reasons I’ll go into later, I don’t doubt it!! I’m happy for them. But I’m not here to worry about their life expectancy, I here to worry about the life expectancy of our oceans as they, and other countries, “farm”…..no not farm, as that implies sustaining your stock, no.. the only thing I can liken the human race to is a parasite, something that feeds of something till that something dies and then the parasite dies with it. Clever hey? Not !!

We had a busy beach ..and lots of fishermen watching their ££££££’s We were reminded of our promise not to swim in The Cove when £££££££’s of meat, with a mercury garnish,  were trapped there … we’d be arrested…..scary hey?? I mean they can hold you here for 28?days……
Hmmmm well did the police ended up looking really silly or what??… ‘cos when Steven Thompson dived into the waters and swam out to the dolphin the police could not arrest him as he’s done nothing wrong (??!!?!). As SSCS drove away there were at least 12 of the fishermen’s Tonka Trunks  = apx 24 fishermen who’d been told what Steven had done and dashed up for their little victory,… probably all wanting to know why Steven was not under arrest.. Lol .. Explain that one…please …  and explain, at the same time, why a Sea Shepherd member is in Japan and not under arrest .. You start to think…., well you start to…how do I put this this, I’m a Mom and if I lied to my kids well, I’d lose control as they’d have no respect. So what I’m asking the police is,  if you have a request, ask…don’t dress it up as “The Law” and make it scary… 28 days detention, when it’s not. Be honest.
Steven is not Sea Shepherd but has been spending time with us. This guy is still at the beach now, cold and hungry, I’m honoured to have him as a friend. His intention is to remain their all night on watch.
We’ll be back at The Cove in a few hours and are in phone contact with Steven. When we join him, at dawn, we expect to watch these dolphin be slaughtered … nursing mothers and babies too…

I feel like I have lived a week in this one day, from our first sighting to sitting here now it seems so long ago.. I want to sleep but ..well could you?

For the Oceans, with Sea Shepherd,… our little bit….
Jackie