Paradise Lost: Complicit (Part 2 of 3)

I am Elmyra Duff

American viewers who grew up in the 1990’s will remember an obnoxious cartoon character named Elmyra Duff from Tiny Toon Adventures. Her well-intentioned love for animals always resulted in abuse (because that was the gag). Her famous line: "I'm gonna hug you and kiss you and love you forever!" The loved animals in question spent most of their time attempting to escape. Then as now, she was my least favorite character in the series… yet I am her.

I am Elmyra Duff-lite with an environmental bent. I usually refuse to feed animal exploitation. For example, I would rather not go to zoos and Sea World. Making animals turn tricks for food? Speed dating pandas in hopes that they will like each other? Penning up anxious polar bears? Not for me. Supporters say that zoos and their ilk educate the public and house animals that would never survive in the wild. This is true. Yet they are every bit a self-fulfilling prophecy. Despite the self-fellating walruses, I give aquariums a pass because I am weak. My hypocrisy unfortunately extends past the deep blue.

It turns out that I willingly cross my lines for proximity. The best gift one could give me in my older age is a few hours in a dog cafe with a big fluffy dog (and a de-linter afterwards). Yet the rule is also true for non-domesticated animals. Increasing closeness to an animal leads to increasing willingness to pay for it. My paradise is full of animals to momentarily love. Others exploit the original to build mine. And I reward them.

Catch

We visited Bidadari Island Resort near Jakarta in 2015. The resort comprised shoreline villas interspersed with dense inland jungle. We came during the lull between tourist seasons, so the island resort was empty save for its employees. Its listed attractions included: (a) dinner at the resort’s restaurant, (b) billiards at the bar, (c) karaoke on the beach, and (d) “Fun with Dolphin”. This last one piqued our curiosity. Its attendant picture had a little White girl with a floatie patting the dophin’s nose. We could enter the pool with the dolphins! That sealed the deal. We headed towards “Fun with Dolphin”.

I confess that I expected something like a smaller version of a sea world dolphin/orca stadium. In their defense, my expectations were not founded on anything concrete. We arrived at a 7-foot tall bamboo fence with an inset bamboo door. This was clearly not a stadium. We entered and saw a swimming pool. Its size was what I imagine was the dolphin equivalent of a prison cell. We felt instantly dubious about the “fun”, but we had already trekked here.

A wetsuit-clad trainer greeted us. He held a whistle in one hand and a stick-and-ball in the other. He explained to us that the dolphin’s name was Unggul (”Superior”). He would lead Unggul through some tricks. We might later enter the pool do a meet and greet with Unggul afterwards.

I forget which trick the trainer tried to perform first. It ultimately did not matter since Unggul refused to do any of them. He swam halfheartedly, listing from side to side. The trainer tried to bribe Unggul with a fish. Unggul refused to eat. The trainer turned to us and apologized four attempts later. “He’s feeling a little sensitive today.” Undeterred by Unggul’s failings as a show animal, I asked if we could still enter the pool. “No, he might try to hurt you if he’s feeling too sensitive.” Unggul looked far too depressed to care about us. Then again, I also would probably want to hurt someone if they tried to touch me while I was depressed.

The trainer looked a bit puzzled at our sudden flurry of questions. Questions regarding the dolphin’s provenance were not normally part of the show. Then again, neither was a “sensitive” dolphin. Dana muttered to me as we departed, “The show should be called, ‘Sad with Dolphins’.” I replied, “Unggul is the only one, dear.” She frowned. “Then ‘Sad with Dolphin’.” Dana vowed to avoid Indonesian dolphin shows thereafter.

We left Bidadari in a funk. As we sped back to Jakarta, I was tasked to hold down the speedboat’s roof because one of its bolts was dislodged by a strong headwind. I held down the roof and fantasized that Unggul would one day jump over his prison walls. He would rejoin his pod and lead a guerilla campaign to depose the capitalists and their rickety boats. Then Unggul and friends would pass the pufferfish to celebrate their victory. We’ve not been back since.

Release and Catch

My friend and I took two little boys to the local amusement park while Dana entertained their parents. The boys (as little kids do) entered wide-eyed, ready to play on/in everything they saw. We puttered around a lake on a miniature pirate ship with an undersized outboard motor. They slid down a huge rubber slide. They descended on zip lines (twice!). They enjoyed massive helpings of sugar and salt. Yet nothing compared to BUNNYLAND.

Bunnyland was a small outdoor area with an island running through its length. The island was lined with trees and small structures for the bunnies to hop through. Chicken wire ran the length of Bunnyland’s sides to prevent braver bunnies from exploring the park. The entrance housed two bored employees diligently carving carrot sticks. Visitors might buy ten carrot sticks, feed, and pet the bunnies for a handsome price.

It was a fairly sedate and pleasant experience. The two boys ran around offering food to all the bunnies. Bunnies crowded around them, shouldering their way to diabetes and obesity. They begrudgingly tolerated concomitant petting. Then the bunnies would hop away to other children offering tasty diabetes. Our boys then bought more carrots because they were blissfully unaware of their parents’ budget. The cycle began anew.

Meanwhile, my friend and I espied a lone bunny in a house perched on a high post. The house was a Victorian model, its front door replaced with iron bars. We joked that this bunny was in jail for poor behavior. We contemplated its crimes and the extent of its confinement. We imagined this bunny’s inner monologues as it watched its friends become fat and happy.

Then the second wave of children came. Enter fifteen more children of elementary age. It was clear that none had been taught how to handle cute, fluffy animals. Carrots became bait rather than food. “Meet and greet” became “Snatch and Tell”. Some tried their best godzilla impressions as bunnies ran for their lives. A few boys picked bunnies up by their ears. Girls repeatedly picked up bunnies whilst said bunnies repeatedly jumped out of their grasp. The sheer amount of rampant well-intentioned abuse evoked much pity though I usually care little for bunnies. They probably die quicker in Bunnyland than in the wild.

I wondered where all the supervision went. The parents sat outside, looking at their phones or talking to their friends. They were quite content to let the bunnies babysit their children. The workers maintained their nonchalance, perhaps too focused on resupplying their carrots to think about bunny welfare.

The only calm bunny in the bunch was the prisoner in the Victorian house on the post. Perhaps it was imprisoned because it finally snapped under the mental strain. Perhaps it learned that psychopathic behavior could buy peace. Or perhaps this bunny had not been imprisoned. Maybe it had accrued time off. Maybe it won a lottery. However its solitude was gained, today was its day to recoup from the daily terror of little children. This bunny was the lucky one.

Catch and Release

We had just landed on the biggest island in our “island-hopping tour” of Belitung. This island was essentially jungle with a small beach-side seafood barbecue spot. Rough tarpaulin tents hung overhead, supported by steel poles anchored in concrete. Every table was long with bench seating and lined with heavy-duty plastic tablecloths. Tangy pineapple, fish broth, sweet chiles, and kaffir lime juice covered everything all our food. The fish was fresh, the shrimp enormous, the crabs sweet, and the sauces plentiful and messy. It’s that kind of place.

Cleanup involved the sink in back or the ocean in front. Upon returning from the ocean, I saw a transparent, plastic box 2/3 filled with water. Inside were 12-15 baby sea turtles. A sign on the side read (in translation), “Set them free! 25,000Rp”. I was unsure I read that correctly, so I read it again. I approached our captain about this.

I returned to the box and peered in. They were really cute. I was not going to feed a corrupt system that exploited sea turtles. I returned to our table and sat down. The cute turtles stayed in my mind. I relayed my conversation to Dana. Then I caved to my baser desires and decided to release just one. The entertainment was immoral but tolerably so, and cheap. They were just too damn cute.

I slipped the owners my 25,000Rp and scanned the turtles. The one that caught my eye had a red triangle on its shell with a scar running through it. It’d seen some action in its short life. Since it became mine, if only for a moment, I named it “Yakuza”. I want to say Yakuza was a male (and so I will).

I brought Yakuza about one meter from the tideline and set him down. He proceeded to go nowhere. I squatted behind him for a few minutes, cajoled, wheedled, encouraged him to head towards freedom in the open ocean. When all else failed, I poked-pushed him with my finger. Yakuza’s flippers touched the wet sands.

Some instinctual drive ignited within Yakuza. He plodded ahead towards freedom at full steam. All of us watching cheered him on. The tidewaters flowed in and engulfed Yakuza…. then firmly deposited him back on terra firma. Yakuza was undeterred. He tried again, and again floated in with the tide. He rested. Several attempts later, I wondered if it might be more helpful to simply toss Yakuza overhand into the water past the breakers.

My lack of faith was unjustified. Yakuza floated away happily (at least, I like to think so) on the next attempt. I was satisfied that I had done some good on the earth and had fun doing it. On the other hand, I fed the system that necessitated my good deed in the first place. Then the captain noted, “It’s usually better to release multiple ones at once to give them a higher chance of surviving. It’s hard for single ones to survive alone.”

He was surely baiting me to pay for more turtles. He was also telling the truth. Yet I’d already hit the upper bounds on my willingness to transgress my principals. Yakuza’s brethren were not cute enough to warrant paying $25 USD to free all of them. I shrugged, resigned to the fact that I most likely paid to send my little guy to his solitary doom. We headed back to the boat to resume our island-hopping tour. Yakuza and I had shared ten minutes of good memories (for at least one of us). That would have to be enough.

The Forbidden Fruit

The problem with paradise is that I want to be a part of it. I want to enter, experience, and enjoy it. If I cannot enter it, I will pay others to bring bits of paradise to me. Yet inevitably the human condition as-is usually does not allow the paradise to continue as-was. More often than not, paradise is disrupted and inevitably changed, if not lost. Unggul’s pod is one dolphin down and less likely to return. Whole turtle nests are disturbed and later released turtle by turtle, thus thinning out their chances of survival. The bunny fluffle suffers chronic stress from daily manhandling.

It is easy to shake my head in disapproval and disbelief. Yet that would be unfair because I had everything to do with it. Domestic tourists typically vacation in other cities. Indonesia’s nature tourism industry is heavily dominated by Western tourists or Asians from heavily developed (read Westernized) nations. I and people like me flock to come face to face with dolphins, sea turtles, and cute furry animals. In other words, Indonesia’s natural tourism industry picked up their cues from the West.

I am perfectly willing to say that Indonesia should greatly improve their animal-care practices and land management as they seek to meet Western demand. More research should be done. Yet urgent economic need coupled with a general can-do attitude often leads Indonesian workers to take on jobs and learn on the go without much training or forethought. It also means they often face situations far outside of their knowledge and skill capacity. I admire their hustle. Their results could use some work.

Yet the truth is I and people like me cause the demand. We willingly pay for that transitory moment of magic. Without us, Unggul would most likely be out with his pod passing the pufferfish. The sea turtles could enter the seas unmolested. The bunnies might not stress eat their way to diabetic obesity. I am complicit in burning down Paradise.