Dear All,

We had a good demo outside the Vancouver Aquarium yesterday, although we had to brave torrential rains! Of course, we're used to that here in Vancouver, but the problem is that yesterday we had sensitive electronic equipment to worry about.

The Vancouver Humane Society had kindly allowed us to borrow Ashley Fruno who wears their "body-screen" (I didn't make that up). The "body screen" is a very thin monitor that you hang around your neck while playing closed-looped DVDs for all to see and hear. It's way cool. Anyway, it was raining so hard today that poor Ashley had to stand wearing the "body-screen" under our old and leaky gazebo while holding her umbrella open, too. She looked pretty funny, but it was very effective. We played a DVD with footage of the bloody dolphin drive with Ric O'Barry narrating and his voice was heard all across the aquarium plaza, drawing attention to the scenes on the screen.

A big thanks to No Whales In Captivity Volunteer Coordinator Ericka Ceballos, who organized this protest and made laminated signs and brought the gazebo with Chris Carter's help (thanks, Chris from A Better Life Dog Rescue in Surrey). Thanks to Jan Olson for producing more great banners for this protest. Also, many thanks to Rob Light for bringing other banners to the protest and organizing the erection of the gazebo (not an easy task, I tell ya!). Thanks to other No Whales In Captivity volunteers Doris Imbeau, Laura Sorg, Becky Clark, and Ann of the Anti-Vivisection Society, for getting wet holding the banners and handing out flyers with a smile. A super special thanks to Judy Stone of Animal Advocates for posting our action alerts on her website because two of her volunteers Ana and Hiroko, showed up and instantly became invaluable at yesterday's protest. Both women are Japanese and they spent a lot of time speaking to Japanese people that were visiting the aquarium in Stanley Park. At one point, a whole busload of Japanese tourists showed up, and while we handed out flyers as fast as we could, both women who were holding banners, spoke out loudly and non-stop to these people in Japanese, and they listened!

FYI: I did not meet one Canadian coming or going into the Vancouver Aquarium yesterday, just tourists from all over the world.

I have already heard from many other of the 60 groups that held similar protests yesterday in 32 cities around the world and it sounds like the message was driven home all the way to Tokyo, no problem.

No Whales In Captivity was the only group out of the 60 ENGOs on the list that did not hold a protest outside the Japanese consulate or embassy yesterday. Instead, we sent a letter to the Japanese Consul in Vancouver with copies of our press release and more info on the horrors of the dolphin drive. We're certain the Consul will forward our message to Tokyo, too.

One of the reasons we held the demo at our local whale jail yesterday is because we wanted to bring attention to the connection between the Vancouver Aquarium and the dolphin-drive. As you all know, the aquarium recently bought three wild-caught Pacific white-sided dolphins from Japanese aquariums that bankroll the bloody dolphin slaughter..

So the protest went great. Thanks so much to all of you who took the time and trouble to participate.

Annelise Sorg
COALITION FOR NO WHALES IN CAPTIVITY
Vancouver, Canada
www.nowhalesincaptivity.org