Sea Turtle Emergency

A lazy Sunday morning in Porto dos Barcos, turned into a sea turtle emergency almost at the drop of a hat. I had been lounging in my hammock for a post-breakfast snooze with nothing seemingly to do since the tide was too early or too late in the day for seahorse research (5 AM or 5:30 PM), when Glais (head of the Fishing Cooperative) came in to get me and said there were sea turtles down on the dock. I, thinking this would be a cute photo-op grabbed my camera, wondering if the turtles would still be there in the water once I got down to the dock.

However, my whole concept of sea turtles down at the dock was horrifyingly wrong. What I saw when I got to the dock were three sea turtles, out of the water, lying on their backs, bleeding. To my shock, astonishment and horror nobody seemingly was doing anything about it and some of the kids were poking at the turtles as they flailed about.

There was a fishermen standing nearby and I tried to gather information from him. He had caught them in his fishing net and he was trying to get a hold of the sea turtle group (Project Tamar), located in the next town, but of course the cell service was down in Porto dos Barcos at that moment. He instructed me to take pictures of the turtles and even wanted his picture taken with a turtle much to my astonishment. The marine biologist inside of me was horrified. These turtles were baking out in the sun and nobody seemingly knew what to do. I remembered the posters, campaigns, classes and experience I had in sea turtles, and quickly moved the sea turtles from the sunny dock into the shade by a tree. I instructed a boy to go and get me a bucket of sea water to help keep these guys cool and asked Glais to go get me some towels. Since the phone service was down, Glais suggested we flag down a truck and have someone drive them to Project Tamar. That sounded like a good idea to me, and with my knowledge that they needed to be covered with wet towels, shading their eyes and shells for the journey, I knew I could get those turtles safely to Amofala (the next town) and into the caring hands of the sea turtle vet.

I quickly rushed home to change into field clothes while Glais flagged down a truck. I ran back, thinking I really needed one other person to come with me to keep these turtles nice and cool and well-behaved in the back of the truck. But it’s Brazil, and nothing goes as planned, so once the truck got there, I had a teenage guy help me load the turtles into the back of the truck. All three turtles got placed on their backs in the truck, leaving me to try and right them, and cover them with the wet blankets as the truck started moving. Let me say trying to be an operational vet / marine biologist / sea turtle emergency responder in the back of a flat bed truck down bumpy dirt roads with speed bumps and a couple of crates sliding around the back of the truck isn’t easy. The littlest turtle, was quite happy to be on his stomach and quite content to lay happily (seemingly) in the corner of the truck and not move too much. The loggerhead turtle and the larger hawksbill both proved to be difficult. The hawksbill who I flipped over onto his stomach second, proceeded to try and crawl all over the back of the truck from the second I turned him over making it difficult to keep the towel over his head. I had to resort to holding him and the towel in one place as the loggerhead slid around the back of the truck at least with the towel covering his head.

The journey seemed endless. Ok it didn’t. But as I was also sliding around the back of the truck, trying not to be bitten by the turtles who were unhappily out of the water and injured, I thought the 5 KM ride was taking quite a long time. When we got to Project Tamar, the sea turtle vet came out with a wheel barrel and we took one sea turtle in at a time from the back of the truck into the covered pools used to treat injured turtles. I guess that Sunday morning had been quite busy and two other sea turtles had also been brought in, accidentally captured by fishermen. Project Tamar seemed under-staffed, as there was one vet for all these turtles, and the two interns assigned to her for the day didn’t know how to pick up and move the turtles safely from the truck to the wheel barrel, or even how to secure them for the wheel barrel ride. Once again I happily lent a hand, and realized that this was what I liked about being a marine biologist; being able to spontaneously help out with injured marine creatures. It made me remember the Seinfeld episode where George says he’s the marine biologist to impress a woman and then they stumble upon a beached whale. Well I chuckled to myself, I’m glad I had more training than George Castanza for this one. I went back to check on my turtles a few days later, and all are still alive! I’m not sure if they’ll stay that way, or if they might wind up captured in a fishing net another day, but I feel proud that I can say I helped save three sea turtles today. One day at a time, one sea turtle at a time, one seahorse at a time- that’s all it takes to make a difference.

Tercer Edade

I did my good deed for the week. The owner of the pousada in Amofala where I am currently staying, invited me to go with her while she volunteered at a school every Saturday. She told me it was to work with the tercer edade. Because she had said school, I immediately assumed tercer edade was the equivalent of 3^rd Graders. She told me there would be forro dancing, food and drinks and I could go and watch the dancing and help serve food. I readily agreed as Amofala is a small town, and I had nothing to do after my third day of research here. My research assistant, who was currently down with the flu, but also with me in Amofala, chuckled as I explained what I thought, I was going to do. He however, knew that the “tercer edade” group was the elderly people of the town and not the 3^rd graders.

So you can imagine my surprise and self inspired humor, when I reached the school and found the courtyard filled with elderly people mingle-ing about. But there was a live forro band, which I was not expecting, live with acordian player, tamborine man and let’s not forget the ever important triangle player! I sat and watched several old people dancing forro with each other before the pousada owner pointed out a man in the corner who she said lived alone. Feeling brave about my Portuguese skills, I wandered over and asked if the seat next to him was taken. He said no, and we started chatting. Dear old Francisco was cute as a button and used to be a fishermen. He said his favorite place to be was the sea, but he was sad that he doesn’t fish anymore. He was sitting around a group of people that were the “watchers,” those people that don’t like to dance, or don’t know how and just like to watch the people dancing. While I was chatting with Francisco, one bold elderly gentleman asked if I wanted to do a little “forro-zinho” aka would I dance with him. So I excused myself and tried my best to keep up with his forro. After I agreed to the first dance, I wasn’t allowed to sit afterwards. Every elderly male of the “tercer edade” wanted a chance to dance with the foreigner. It was so much fun and such a surprising afternoon. Normally when dancing forro with Brasilians my own age, I struggle to keep up and I have to concentrate often times intensely to try not to screw up the dancing…..one, two, one, two, one, two. But with the old guys it was so much fun! They didn’t move that fast so counting the one, two step was much easier, even when the musical rhythm sped up, their dancing did not, so it was perfect for me to feel comfortable with my novice forro dancing skills.

After the music was over, I helped serve some refreshments- chicken soup and a cup of cashew juice. Yes quite the interesting combination. Most of the people there lived with family members, they have no nursing homes here in Amofala. But my dear old fishermen buddy Francisco lived by himself. Apparently his family moved to Fortaleza, the big city, but dear old Francisco couldn’t bear to leave his sleepy fishing village. One of my dance partners asked if he could walk me home, and I had a lovely stroll through downtown Amofala (think the distance of two city blocks and just one street) with a gentleman wearing a fedora hat and missing a front tooth. But it was an interesting and culturally enriching experience for me on a Saturday afternoon in the sleepy beach town of Amofala.