W E A V I N G A S P E L L
“
IT NEVER GETS OLD
…
It’s just…
different. It’s a different feeling. When
you’re in the water and you finally see
it…There are no words.” When the
person who tells you this is a marine
biologist and volunteer for the World
Wildlife Fund (WWF) — someone who
has gone out every day for the past
six or seven months and done this as
part of her job — you have to be left
intrigued. Getting into the water with the
whale shark is the kind of experience
that puts you at a loss for words.
Whale sharks, locally known as
butanding
,
have become one of the
top domestic-tourist attractions in the
Philippines, and word is getting out
fast to the rest of the world. Although
towns in other parts of the country
have begun to market their own whale
shark watching activities, Donsol coins
itself the “Whale Shark Capital of the
World.” And for good reason: although
the total world population is unknown,
the number of individual whale sharks
regularly logged in the Philippines
(399
to date, and growing) is the
largest in the world — and of these,
the plankton-rich waters off Donsol
seem to attract the highest number of
these gentle giants.
Things have changed drastically
from just a decade ago, when the
butanding were considered nothing
more than pests by the local fishermen.
Afraid that the whale sharks would
scare away their catch or, worse,
capsize their boats, the fishermen
would use long poles to shoo them
away. Butanding, says our guide Joel
Brion, used to be a disparaging term
fishermen would use for ugly boats.
Now the butanding holds a place
of honor in Donsol. Everywhere you
go, the whale shark’s big, blue form
is found on everything from T-shirts
and tote bags to key chains and
paperweights. There’s even a statue of
the creature by the tourism center, near
the shore where all the boats dock.
And why shouldn’t there be a
monument to the butanding? It has,
PHOTO
WWF-JURGEN FREUND
