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| Remembering Madonna by Ila France Porcher (February 5, 2008) |
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 I know that working in various ways to get finning banned is discouraging. We rarely have a sense of accomplishing anything, and most of us are far from the animals we are trying to help. For that reason, I'm posting this story I wrote upon the death of one of my most loved sharks, Madonna, who was among the first finned when a company from Singapore set up its filthy operations on my island. Never a day passes that I do not remember her and the others I knew, and the period during which they were finned, one after another, remains in my memory as one of the most nightmarish of my life.I hope that her story will help to inspire you to continue the fight for the conservation of these unusual animals. Madonna was the first shark to meet my kayak when I arrived in her area of the lagoon. She was nearly six feet long, steel grey, and heavily built. When I dove down and swam to her, she would come to meet me, and I was amazed by her responsiveness and curiosity. She would come when I called to her, and circle, spiraling towards me till she was within arms' reach. But she did not like me to swim with her. She would set off on a sinuous path through the coral, and when I followed, she would come back, turn sideways as if I was bothering her, accelerate and stop, or just accelerate into the blue, but not usually before we joined up with one or two of her friends. Never could I detect the slightest sign between them as they closely passed each other, but I didn't think it was chance that we met them, knowing that they were her friends. Beautiful Madonna was not one of our brightest lights. When I brought a treat for her, as I did when she returned to her home range after breeding or birthing, I sometimes had to throw it to her time after time before she could locate it. Unfortunately, often one of her swifter friends would snatch it the moment it left my hand, a trick poor Madonna could never manage. Once, I spent 45 minutes in terrible current just trying to get her treat to her. Nevertheless, she would sometimes come to me hopefully for a bite. When I was promenading in the lagoon with another more cooperative shark, she would come charging in, and we would end up swimming nose to nose, me on my back and her above me, belly to belly, while the other shark circled us, watching. Madonna would soon realize I had nothing to eat, and depart, and me and the other shark would go on alone. She did this one evening, when it was almost too dark to see, having arrived with a group from the ocean, including some macho males I didn't know. (The males live in the ocean, the females in the lagoon.) I didn't see her until she passed over the slate I was writing on, inches from my eyes. Then she turned and soared up to my face. She had just had her babies, and was intent on convincing me that she was starving to death, and was counting on me for a treat. Her companions flew with her, and I didn't have enough hands to push away half a dozen sharks at once, and didn't want to be rammed by the strangers and have my mask knocked off in the dark. So I left. Feeling sorry for my poor shark, who was, indeed, very thin after birthing, I returned when conditions permitted, a couple of days later, and trailed scent through her home range, followed by a tiny juvenile, who habitually followed me around, just out of sight. Finally, Madonna glided up to me, the little shark flitting excitedly at her side, seeming more confident in her presence. As they circled, I tossed the food so it fell to the side of Madonna's swim way, and saw her target it, but she allowed the youngster to get it first. Luckily I had brought enough for both. She was no longer behaving as if she were hungry, and once again I had the impression that sharks have no trouble catching something to eat when they wish. I spent so much time with her, I can remember every gesture, every movement she would make in different moods. So when she disappeared soon after massive shark finning efforts began in my area, it was a terrible personal tragedy. We all read all the time about hundreds of thousands of sharks being finned, massacred, all over the world, for the luxury dish known as shark fin soup, but when the sharks meeting this shocking end are ones you have come to know, and with whom you have spent time for many years, sharks of whom you have grown fond, the psychological effect is more intense. Just as it is disturbing to read in the paper that some dogs elsewhere were poisoned, but if it is your dogs who are poisoned, you reel. Me and many others begged the government to make Polynesia a sanctuary for sharks, and stop the finning, but years passed before sharks received legal protection. While we waited, one of my sharks after another vanished, until nearly all the residents I had known and loved were gone. Each night I sat looking out to sea, while the waves lapped gently upon the beach, a trill of sound, a pause of silence, another trill, measuring the time. Outside the reef, lights slowly passed. Always there was a tension. I never knew who would die next. But, alas. No one weeps for sharks. 
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