The Dolphin Show
Grace, having passed my request along to the people assisting her, guided our family to Beach World on the Gold Coast.
We arrived in high spirits on a fine day with few clouds and a cool breeze stirring, and the place that greeted us was a theme park of staggering size — famous for a handful of rides, an aquarium packed with every sort of marine life, and a full slate of shows.
"Wooooow!"
The moment we reached the entrance of that vast park, So-eun started bouncing in place, looking ready to bolt straight inside if Noona and I hadn't held her. Beach World didn't allow pets, and the disappointment of leaving Bboni, Cheongho, and all the other animals behind had vanished without a trace. Just a child who couldn't resist the candy dangling right in front of her face, I thought, as we headed in.
The first thing that met us inside was a broad lake. Grace, along as both interpreter and guide, began to explain.
"That's an artificial lake where they put on stunt shows with things like jet skis. It's a decent spectacle, in its own way."
She added that the water-skiers being towed behind the jet skis, cutting this way and that, were well worth a look, then took the lead and guided us on.
Following her, each of us with a drink from a nearby snack stand, the first animal we came across was a dolphin. One of them, set loose in a fairly spacious artificial lake, kept bursting up through the surface and delighting the visitors.
"Wooow! Appa, a dolphin!"
"Yeah. A dolphin."
I lifted So-eun onto my shoulders so she could see better, and she waved both hands wildly at it. And her superpower proved every bit as effective in Australia as it had in Korea.
"Ooh! A human I like!"
The dolphin, which had been paddling about, spotted So-eun and came gliding right over.
"Hi, dolphin!"
She waved at the approaching dolphin and burst out laughing, delighted.
"Wow, I really like this one. I hope the human who comes in later is you!"
Those words left me puzzled. I turned to Grace.
"This one says there's someone coming in later. What does that mean?"
"So you can communicate even in another country? Well, I think what the dolphin means is Animal Adventure. Beach World has an experience where you can swim with the dolphins yourself. It's quite expensive, but it's popular."
"Appa!"
At the word experience, So-eun squirmed and latched onto my head. It was written all over her — she wanted to do it. I let out a short laugh and nodded.
"Sure. An experience like that would be nice to have."
"But will it be all right? Those things usually have height limits, or age limits..."
At Noona's words I looked to Grace. We'd already said yes; if some rule or other kept So-eun from going through with it, she'd be crushed for certain.
"There is an age limit, but please don't worry. They put the restriction in place for safety, so if you take part as well, Druid, you'll be able to do the experience without any trouble."
Grace's reliable promise — that she'd make it happen even if it wasn't allowed — earned a nod from us, and we went back to sightseeing.
"Bye-bye, dolphin!"
Waving as we left the dolphin behind, we got to see all kinds of marine life: stingrays like wrapping cloths with tails stuck on, and seals clapping with loud, barking applause. We laughed when So-eun tried to make a stingray's face with her own, and when she clapped, the seals clapped back as a group — a rare sight indeed.
With the odd feeling that more people were trailing our family every time we moved, we entered the aquarium. Dark corridors stood in contrast to the blue-green tanks, and the place was full of marine life — fish of every kind, the stingrays we'd just seen, and sharks besides.
"A shark!"
I set So-eun down from my shoulders, and she ran straight to the tank and plastered herself against the glass. Then she called to a shark that had been swimming along at its leisure.
Thick, solid glass stood between them, but the shark answered her call. It glided over and bumped the tank with a solid thunk. It thrashed a little, maybe from planting its nose so hard, but soon it was staring straight at So-eun. Noticing the shark watching her, she suddenly started waving her hands around.
"Oooooh!"
A few of the people who'd been trailing behind us let out gasps. No wonder — the big shark in the tank was spinning in circles, matching So-eun's gestures.
"...Does it think it's an orca? Or a beluga?"
It looked like those videos you see all over the internet, where orcas or belugas — the white dolphins — seem to copy what people do. But the absurdity only grew from there. Drawn, perhaps, by the shark's strange behavior, other sharks and stingrays gathered and started imitating So-eun the same way.
"Is this because of me? Or because of So-eun?"
Watching the sharks and rays lock their movements together with not a hair of difference between them, like some kind of group dance, I went past baffled and into genuinely confused. A few of the people watching muttered that it was better than the dolphin show and started taking photos and videos.
I'd grown used to that by now. I gave a hollow laugh and waited a moment, and So-eun came back, having had her fill.
"So-eun, was that fun?"
"Yeah! They're cute!"
She collapsed into Noona's arms with a bright, sunny smile, and we moved on again. The aquarium still had plenty to see, but there was plenty left elsewhere, too.
We rode the children's attractions and the ones that amounted to water play, and even stopped to look at a polar bear flopped out flat on the ground. We were still making our way through the park when Grace let us know it was time.
"The dolphin show is about to start. Shall we go?"
Still a little damp from the rides, we headed for where the show would begin, bought something we could eat while we watched, and took our seats. I waited a while, feeding So-eun bites of salad, and before long the trainers who would run the performance appeared in full-body swimsuits. They introduced themselves in English, and the show started at once.
Dolphins leaping high into the air was only the beginning. Trainers rode them, sweeping all over the performance pool. Several dolphins leapt in sequence like synchronized swimmers and spun in circles besides, and they even matched the trainers underwater well enough to launch them into the sky.
"Wooooooow!"
"Wow, they must've trained those things like crazy."
So-eun and Noona were gasping in the exact same way, and the dolphin show really was something to see. Unlike the two of them, though, I couldn't focus on it. The problem was the conversation the dolphins starring in the show were having among themselves. They were a little far off, and it got hard to hear whenever they went underwater, but I could still make out enough.
"Hey, how much is left?"
"We've done this how many times, and you still don't know?"
"No clue. Maybe chewing that pufferfish last time messed me up? My memory's been kinda shot lately."
"You lunatic. I told you to ease up on the pufferfish, didn't I?"
"Hey, hey, hey — you got any pufferfish left? Mine got swiped last time."
"I'm out too. Chewed one wrong last time, passed out, and they cleaned me out."
"So them getting taken was all your fault!"
"And these guys are supposed to be my friends. Makes me wanna bust out of here."
The chatter they kept up while working so hard was a little off.
They say dolphins chew pufferfish to get high on the toxin... so that was actually true?
The stars of the show everyone was cheering for were junkies. I couldn't bring myself to cheer along with the rest. I was watching the dolphins with an awkward smile when Noona looked at me, puzzled.
"Suhwan, what's wrong?"
"Huh...? Ah, no. It's nothing."
I couldn't bring myself to shatter the illusion while she was still cheering at the show. Forcing my eyes away, I started to worry whether I ought to let So-eun do the dolphin experience at all.
The show, however, went on without a hitch despite my worries, and by the time it ended there was no turning back. So-eun had watched it and gotten her hopes all the way up about meeting the dolphins, and the reservation was already made. In the end, I had no choice but to go through with Dolphin Adventure.
And when we did, the incident I'd been dreading happened.
"Wow! I really like you! I'll give you a present! Wait just a second!"
With Beach World's cooperation, our family went in to meet the dolphins, and one of them — overjoyed at the sight of So-eun — brought out a pufferfish it had hidden somewhere.
"Holy...!"
A pufferfish, blown up tight, was clamped in the dolphin's beak. The trainer panicked and snatched it away, and I grabbed the dolphin by the snout.
"You little punk. Why would you bring something like that."
I shook its snout, and it slapped its tail, spraying water everywhere. So-eun, who had no idea what was really going on, thought even that was wonderful, and with a bright smile she climbed right onto the dolphin's back.
There'd been a brief problem, but in the end she got to enjoy a Dolphin Adventure she was thoroughly happy with. The dolphin that had been sulking over its stolen pufferfish perked right up once she was aboard, swimming all over the place and playing with her.
We did the seal encounter and the penguin encounter as well, and by the time we were finished So-eun had played herself out. Snuffling softly in her sleep, she was in my arms as we started back toward the lodging.
Then the car, which had been rolling along smoothly, stopped dead. There were no other vehicles around, and we weren't at a light, so the sudden halt left me puzzled. Grace seemed just as confused. She exchanged a few words with the driver up front, then told us what was going on.
"...Apparently a parrot has taken over the road, so we stopped."
I had no choice but to revise my opinion of Australia. A country losing to rabbits, losing to camels, losing to emus — and now losing to parrots, too.
Maybe the weakest animal on this continent is the human.
I let out a small sigh, opened the door, and stepped out of the car.