On Big Pictures and Finer Details

As many of you probably know, the CAOS program for which I work was founded by a Famous Oceanographer, son of an Even More Famous Oceanographer. Well, this past week Famous Oceanographer's right hand man, Raab, was on the island to see how the program is running, and to give us critiques and teach us a little more about the program's philosophy and how best to teach our guests, young and old. Raab has been with the Oceanographers' family for over 40 years, so he was full of all sorts of interesting stories about working with them and traveling the world. He is also quite possibly one of the most inspiring people to listen to. On one of our last days with him, we all sat down with him and talked about the program, its origins, and most importantly its future. By the time we were done, a very short four hours later, we all wanted to jump up and save the world, one child at a time.

His approach to teaching the general public about the environment was also very cool to see in action. Because many of the guests that come through our programs have not been exposed to much of the harder sciences and frankly are not all that interested in a bunch of tree-huggers preaching at them, we opt for a much softer, more subtle approach. People remember things better if they can connect them to something they know, such as life back home, so we try to relate everything in this alien coral reef back to the known world. Raab showed us techniques to make this more effective and gave us interesting insight into the big-picture role of environmental education. It was really quite refreshing and encouraging to hear what he had to say, and I think it cemented even more in my mind the idea that this is what I want to be doing. Not that I had too many doubts.


This picture is from last week's jellyfishing excursion. I like it mostly because of the lighting, but the coral's pretty cool too.


Another type of comb jelly from last week's snorkel. Note that the jelly's transparency allows you to see right into its gut, so you can see the plankton it's been munching on.


From the same trip as the previous two pictures, this photo shows the top side of a Yellow Tail Damselfish. These fish start their lives a brilliant blue color with iridescent blue spots across its back and sides. As they grow and mature, their body turns brown, the tail turns yellow, and their iridescent spots gradually disappear. What I like best about this picture, though, is the pattern you can see in its fins - until I looked closely at the photo, I didn't even realize it existed. And that's really the story of the ocean: you don't realize how much is truly there until you start paying attention to the details.