Killing Keiko

by Mark A. Simmons

  Upon Robin’s arrival, he and I spent our entire two-day overlap talking mostly about staff roles and changes to the rotation schedules. Much of our time was dominated with growing dissention within the ranks; specifically Jeff’s chosen few who routinely maintained the same schedule as Jeff. Whether they were actively in Iceland or home on their off-schedule, e-mails were flying, and Charles made us aware of the sentiments being exchanged among the staff. He wanted the new additions to the release team to succeed and took every opportunity he could to smooth out the wrinkles. By giving Robin a “heads up” on the most glaring under-currents running afoul within the staff, Charles hoped that Robin and I could selectively ease up on some of the more difficult changes and thus lessen the complaints.

  But it was not to be. No matter how hard we tried, there were those on staff that wanted nothing to do with our management of the operation. Specifically, there were those who believed we were pushing Keiko too hard. No amount of education on the science of behavior or the finer points of the release plan changed some opinions. It was a cancer within the ranks of the release team that would eventually have to be cut out.

  5

  Eternal Daylight

  I returned to Iceland on my second rotation after only three short weeks at home. It felt as if I’d never left. If there was any silver lining, it was that Alyssa and I were trapped in the extended twilight of our honeymoon and each short rotation home rekindled the excitement of our recent marriage.

  I had only just started on the project in April and here it was already teetering on the brink of July. It was full-on summer in Iceland. One unmistakable characteristic of this far-north summer is that the sun never truly sets. By the middle of that next month, direct sunlight kept us company twenty-three hours a day. There were only a few minutes each evening where the sun momentarily dipped below the horizon, dimming the otherwise eternal daylight. The never-ending day was operationally beneficial, allowing us to make much progress in pursuing our goals with Keiko. By extending and alternating our shifts on the bay pen, we could focus attention on Keiko’s behavior around the clock.

  It also meant the staff would not get much sleep. Evening festivities (late-night drinking binges) routinely bled well into the next day, rendering the occasional team member incapable of making early morning shifts on the bay pen. Looking back, I suspect that some of the increase in extracurricular activity might have been avoidance of Robin and me. We had taken all the comfort out of being on the bay pen. Being with or around Keiko now required thinking and work. The days of sitting on the pen dabbling on the computer or sleeping off the previous night’s festivities were gone. During this period in the summer of 1999, many staff members became increasingly apathetic toward working with Keiko although I did not see it this way at the time. I attributed the disinterest to a historically lax work environment and a direct challenge to what Robin and I were implementing. I suppose a little of each was true.

  Though symptoms varied, at the heart of the matter was the simple human resistance to change. A select few felt as if they had been pushed aside, their authority diminished and their opinions worthless. That Robin or I maintained a constant presence on the bay pen was perceived as distrust in the staff. In reality, close supervision was necessary to ensure that the exacting requirements of Keiko’s program not suffer from inexperienced application and, with some, the outright inability to comprehend various elements of the rehabilitation process.

  Behavioral conditioning requires consistency, which in turn requires patience. Like many novice animal trainers, the lack of immediate results often led to open season on suggesting changes in approach, many of which were based on an emotional need to coddle Keiko. Try as I might, many attempts at explanation seemed wasted on unwilling ears. The drawn-out effort to educate did little more than fuel my growing impatience. I was hell-bent on investing our collective time in forward progress and the never-ending need to validate every component of Keiko’s daily plan was exhausting. I often shared these frustrations with Alyssa, who always talked me back from the brink of disaster. She reminded me that lacking other means to contribute, the staff’s affection and commitment to Keiko would materialize in other ways, ways that I was too quick to accept as belligerent resistance.

  Although I took her guidance to heart, isolating the person from the problem, the merging of multiple tiers of incompetence surrounding the project would at times bury me alive in trepidation. Nonetheless, had we been left to our own in Iceland it would have been almost easy. Instead, Robin and I often spent as much time educating the FWKF board through our interactions with Charles as we did rolling up our sleeves and guiding the more important work with Keiko himself.

  Within days of my return, a board member visited the operation. During a short spell on the bay pen, the board member proceeded to “talk” to Keiko as if she were having a conversation. At best it provided nothing more than novel material for short-lived levity, until I learned the person believed that Keiko was a member of an Intergalactic Cetacean Spaceship and that whales were here on earth to plea to humans for better treatment of our world. Beyond the sinking feeling in my stomach, I became intimately aware of how unrelenting the battle of continual education would persist throughout the organization. This, of course, placed the challenges on-site in a new light and if nothing else made them seem trivial by comparison.

  Lundinn

  Whether or not escape was a motivator, there were ample reasons for the staff’s allure with experiencing nightlife in the small village. The town of Heimaey is a vastly intriguing place in which to socialize and the cultural “aggressiveness” of the Icelandic people is just too good to miss. I’m not talking about “fight-night” at the local pub. By aggressiveness I mean that Icelandic men and women are very outgoing with their social affections.

  On one of my first forays into island nightlife, I was asked to dance by a local Icelandic woman, repeatedly. It happened in the nearby watering hole, Lundinn. A pub half submerged beneath a two- or three-story building, the quaint and somewhat rustic interior along with the small floor space, imparted a very cozy atmosphere conducive to meeting new people. An attractive woman sat across from me at one of the tables lining the dance floor. She was in her early thirties and her blonde hair, blue eyes and thin figure placed her right in the middle of the bell-curve of Icelandic women. Iceland has the most beautiful people congregated in one land I’ve ever witnessed.

  “You here with Keiko whale?” she said, making Keiko (cake-o) sound more like Keeko (ceek-o). Icelandic accents are very similar to native German accents when speaking English. The guttural pronunciations translated to hard consonants. She skipped the occasional pronoun and applied unique interpretations of the softer vowels in English.

  “Yes, I am,” I replied simply.

  “You like Iceland?” she continued.

  I could tell she had been drinking heavily, but her happy smile elicited the same in me. I felt a little silly really. I knew she was flirting, but I wasn’t looking for anything in that department. “I love it,” I said, trying hard not to encourage her.

  “We dance, yes?” But it wasn’t a question. She said it as she was grabbing my hand and lifting herself from the chair.

  “Oh no, thanks. I’m not a dancer. I’m just enjoying the music and watching my friends there playing the slot machines,” I replied while resisting her pull on my arm.

  She sat back down. “You’re new with Keiko, right?” she asked. Doubtful any locals on the island did not know the project staff well by now.

  “I started in April, but this is the first time I’ve been to Lundinn.”

  Stephen Claussen had seen me talking to her from across the room. Standing by the slot machines, he gave me a wink and a suggestive smile. Now I felt really silly.

  “Come on, I show you good dance. You will like it,” she pushed. She never released my hand.

  “No really, I’m sorry but I’m just not into dancing.” This was going nowhere fast.r />
  Before I knew it, she had pulled her blouse down just above the most private parts of her breasts. “You don’t want to dance with me because my breasts not big enough.”

  A rather innocent prude, I was shocked and let it show on my face all too easily. She laughed. “No, of course not,” I shot back. “I’m a terrible dancer, I just don’t like dancing. There’s nothing wrong with your breasts.”

  At that, she feigned a small pout, touched my cheek with the back of her hand in a caressing manner, smiled warmly and left the table. I felt like a schmuck, but a safe schmuck.

  Later that evening as the few of us from the project were leaving, we stood around in a semicircle waiting for the last conversations to wrap up. The woman returned and placed herself next to me and was holding my hand. She stood uncomfortably close, leaning into me with her shoulder. On her right was a man I hadn’t seen before. She was holding his hand also.

  Walking out of Lundinn I shared, almost confessed, what had happened with our Icelandic host (a coworker on the project) and asked him who the man had been. He informed me that it was her husband. I couldn’t contain my incredulity. My first instinct was to fear conflict with this unknown man over my interactions with his assertive wife. Mercifully I was let off the hook pretty quick as everyone in our small group had a good laugh and explained that this was normal behavior for Icelanders. They told me not to worry, and that many Icelandic couples stray. In an almost nonchalant manner, they described the ritual of many spouses walking back to their homes in the early mornings following an adventurous night in another’s bed. This was hard to understand, especially for a prudish newlywed. Although not a customary norm in Icelandic society, I would learn that this practice was certainly not uncommon, at least not on Heimaey.

  Lundi Pysja

  Nightlife in the small town was far from the only novel attraction that offered a brief escape from the pressures of the project. Klettsvik Bay is a colossal bird sanctuary. There, an unusual aerial display often commanded our attention. Among the many species of birds that frequent the bay, one of the most memorable is the puffin. Small seafaring birds, puffins almost looked phony, like plastic children’s toys. Their distinctive black and white coloration appears as the avian version of a killer whale’s disruptive camouflage. Puffin, or “lundi” in Icelandic, are black on their backs and wings and white on their breast and underside. The two colors are divided perfectly in clean lines, giving them a man-made appearance. Contrasting with the simplicity of this design is a very colorful orange-white-black striated bill. They have larger heads than appear proportional to their little bodies. The puffin’s eyes are framed by black triangles that makes them seem “concerned” or “sympathetic.” In flight, they are fast and hyper, legs trailing to the sides of their short butts and jerking to and fro, making their way through the aerial mob over Klettsvik. During the spring season, many of us took great pleasure watching lundi flying and diving throughout the bay.

  I loved watching the puffins landing on the water. They zoomed in, full of confidence as if little airborne mavericks and just as they reached the surface on a long, low trajectory, the feet went out like landing gear catching the water at high speed and sending them tumbling across the surface. It was one of the funniest things I had ever witnessed in the animal kingdom. Those hysterical landings never became commonplace. We always stopped to watch the puffin’s signature “crash-and-burn” style landing.

  Perhaps a less popular scene, but comical nonetheless when witnessed from afar was puffin hunting. High up on the grassy tops of the Klettsvik cliffs, puffin hunters would hide behind large rocks or unusually sizeable grassy knolls. Huntsmen used long poles with hoop-nets on the end. We could never see the hunters, at least not until they lurched up and netted the unsuspecting puffin right out of mid-flight. Viewed from hundreds of feet below on the bay pen, it looked like an aerial version of “whack-a-mole.”

  In August a fascinating event, aptly titled the “Puffin Patrol,” takes place on Heimaey. Young puffin, called “lundi pysja” (LOON dih PIHS-yah) leave their nests, holes high in the hilltops and cliffs surrounding the island. At night, the lights of the town attract them, and they glide into the streets, yards and gardens of Heimaey by the hundreds. Townspeople allow their children to stay out late in August to collect the little lundi pysja into cardboard boxes, shoe boxes or anything that will suffice for the short visit. Some children might collect as many as ten or more young puffins in one night. The next morning in the daylight, the children take their catch to the seashore where the puffins are then thrown high into the air, gliding off toward the sea and back to their intended destination. It is a very charming tradition to witness and one that deserves a place on the bucket list.

  E-mail: August 11, 1999

  Subj: Had to go

  To: Alyssa

  Here is one of the perks of the job … last night we had an Italian millionaire (who had donated to the project) tour the facility and watch a training session with Keiko. They then went out and watched wild whales. It was a beautiful day and around 7–8 o’clock in the evening the sun was spectacular on the Iceland glacier and surrounding mountains. The millionaire invited us to dinner on his 250-foot private ship. I have never seen anything like it. It is impossible to describe the amount of money this guy must have. The ship was everything you can imagine and more than I can tell … endless teak, brass, stainless steel, helicopter pad, two 40-foot tender boats on deck (with a crane lift to put them in the water) … six jet skis, four ATVs (four-wheelers), bicycles, two motorcycles, ocean kayaks, a dive room with all the equipment you could ever wish for. I will have pictures to send but they will not be digital so it will take a little longer. It makes you realize that nonprofits are the benefactors of “extreme profit.”

  Love you,

  Mark

  A Million Dollar Solution

  July and August produced many more questions than answers about how the project would move forward. First we needed to consider how we would physically get Keiko to the open ocean. After all, we couldn’t just open the bay pen gate and hope for the best. Our location well inside of the shipping channel, and the proximity of a harbor bustling with human activity presented far too many variables. Lanny’s idea of airlifting Keiko to the first available pod of wild whales and dropping him in the ocean was analogous to tossing a family pet out the car door on a Sunday afternoon drive through the wilderness. Probably worse. Fortunately, there wasn’t a soul on-site that would give heed to such a farcical concept of release.

  This left us with little other means by which we could guide Keiko in the right direction. Charles, Robin, Jeff, and I agreed that Keiko would be escorted to the open ocean by training him to follow a special-purpose “walk-boat.” In other words, we would teach him to follow alongside a boat much like a dog trained to heel at its owner’s side without a leash.

  A few essentials would have to be addressed to make the designated walk-boat stand apart, but of immediate concern was when and where to introduce a walk-boat. It wouldn’t do much good to put the boat inside the bay pen and for reasons stated, we couldn’t take the risk of bringing Keiko out of the pen on blind faith that he would follow the boat. That was a behavior, and like any other behavior, Keiko would have to learn how to follow the walk-boat.

  Beyond our fears of what Keiko might or might not do once outside the bay pen, the prospect of having access to the open ocean also meant that every criteria required for release would have to be met beforehand. After all, a permit was required to release the whale. We couldn’t just wake up one morning and decide to free Keiko. Exposing him to the open ocean was by any definition a “release” scenario, even though the intent at this stage was only to train Keiko on heeling alongside a designated walk-boat. Obtaining permission to take him out of the pen would be predicated on evidence that Keiko had met the prerequisites for release. These restrictions were common sense. They were intended not only to protect Keiko, but also humans and the indigenous
whales that migrated around Vestmannaeyjar. To allow Keiko access to the wild before he was actually ready would be nothing less than unadulterated negligence.

  Exercise was certainly making improvements in his physical condition and by midsummer, he was routinely completing over a hundred minutes of strenuous exercise per day. Keiko was even looking much more alert and responsive than ever before. But despite any encouragement afforded by his improving physical prowess, we couldn’t just go straight from the bay pen to sending him off to sea. Yet it was impossible to address all the elements required for official release from inside the relatively small bay pen.

  Although masterful in design and function, the floating facility was limiting. We could keep Keiko fit and mentally stimulated in the bay pen, though only through continued human interaction and enrichment. It was time to increase his activity beyond training sessions. Likewise, it was time to begin reducing his interest in human activity.

  How could we prepare Keiko to meet the challenges required for release without the walk-boat? How could we train the use of a walk-boat without taking Keiko out of the confines of the bay pen? At the crossroads of necessity and constraint, our thoughts and discussions focused on an interim step.

  The million dollar solution was to give Keiko a bigger and more varied environment. To surmount the next hurdle in his move toward unrestricted ocean access, we would build a barrier across the mouth of Klettsvik Bay. In so doing, we could substantially increase Keiko’s habitat from the comparatively restrictive pen to the grand expanse of Klettsvik Bay. A gargantuan net would grant us the tool to prepare Keiko further. The solution would simultaneously allow us to develop each necessary component of Keiko’s rehabilitation, including the walk-boat, while also delaying the need for a final release permit. It would have been a simple solution, but for the raging currents and winds of the bay.