semana del tiburon

it’s shark week, and the whole world rejoices (or plays silly drinking games that deal with sharks breaching the water and Australian accents).

I don’t know why other people get so excited. I’m pretty much this excited about sharks all the time. When Shark Week on Discovery channel rolls around, I get downright jittery. I love watching exciting nature footage (kind of like how I love watching Planet Earth). Technology has evolved to the point where they can slow motion a White Shark breaching the water to span almost a whole minute! It’s awesome. I really like that all the footage they show is of sharks, because as a diver, I don’t see enough of them. Very often they are pelagic, they are solitary, and they are so, so well evolved that they don’t need to see you if they don’t feel like it. (more on this later)

In past years, Shark Week has annoyed me. They used to be really big on sensationalized shark attacks. I get it. There are shark attacks. There are also lion attacks, and polar bear attacks, and people attacks. Fuck, my cat attacks me when I don’t pet her correctly. I have no interest in watching a shark attack, or hearing from survivors. It’s not that I don’t feel for them, it’s just that I don’t think that’s the story we should be focusing on.

The story we should be focusing on, is that we don’t see enough of them. And the truth is, a creature that has been alive since the dinosaurs is going extinct on our watch. Which is why I celebrate shark week’s shift from sensational to conservation.

I have gone on 5 dives this week. My chances of seeing a real live shark in the wild are much higher than a lot of people’s. Lower than others, but let’s just say, higher than the average person. And this week, I’ve seen only 1 shark.

One lonely, beautiful angel shark.