Here is one last post on the Namibian trip I took in August with my family. This one will focus not on Namibia itself, rather on a person whom we briefly met there, in Walvisbaai.
This is a small port town that was founded in 1840. The waters in front of the town are rich in plankton meaning that the sea life is lively. In fact, although we didn’t visit much of the town itself, we saw flamingos, seals, pelicans and whales.
To encounter these animals we took a catamaran from the town’s touristic harbour. The voyage lasted about two to three hours and unfortunately we had to quickly go back to the harbour as a sand storm was approaching.
The person I want to talk about was the capitan of this catamaran. Let me make something clear, I am not going to write about how handsome and charming he was. No. I’ll write about the love he had for the sea and its creatures, as such raw love is something very rare to witness.
This man, a very tall man, had the aspect of a real sea dog. Dark skin of a sun shade but red in some parts (probably due to his European ancestry), a long and full but well-kept beard, unruly golden hair hidden under a baseball hat. And he was barefoot with his ankle adorned with a few anklets.
He presented himself as the captain of the catamaran and as our guide. He explained that if a pelican tries to bite you, you just “have to let it finish”; but if a seal bites you you should escape from its jaws as fast as you can. While giving us this basic information, his tone was not tedious, or robotic, like when people have learnt something by heart and say it without any passion. His voice was alive, and in his eyes (not covered by dark sunglasses, unlike us) you could see something that resembled excitement. It somehow surprised me. Could it be that this sea dog, who goes out every day with his catamaran to show tourists like us whales and dolphins, would still get excited to do it?
The answer was yes, he was still excited. I don’t think his happiness on that day was due to any particular reason. I believed that his child-like joy and awe were something that he carried with him on a daily basis: when he woke up, when he arrived at the harbour, and each time he set sail out in the ocean.
My suspicions were confirmed when a seal jumped on the boat: a male, a very big, fat male in the middle of his mating season. As soon as he landed on the catamaran, our sea dog announced his name, his weight and that his hormones were “crazy” due to the mating season. After a small walk around the catamaran, our sea dog made the seal dive back into the ocean, but not before having offered a few fish to the starved animal.
After the seal got off, another two of the sea dog’s friends came on board: a female and male pelican. The beautiful pink lady was less relaxed around our sea dog, while the male, a juvenile, behaved like him and the sea dog had been best friends since their childhoods. After a while the sea dog said that he simply adores working with juveniles, which explained why the pair looked so close. Of course, some fish were given to these big birds too and, of course, they appreciated them very much.
After having shown the pelicans around, the sea dog finally sat down and the juvenile pelican went to stand by his right side. As we, the tourists, kept looking at the ocean, the pelican and the sea dog simply sat there, talking to one another. Giving each other caresses. The sea dog kissing the pelican on his head and the juvenile lightly and gently biting his hat and forehead. The sea dog’s eyes were not showing excitement anymore, but pure love. From that one gaze (directed to the pelican only) we could all understand the deep admiration and respect the sea dog had for nature.
Maybe we shouldn’t have been there on the catamaran. Maybe we should have left the two friends alone, in the habitat they love.
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