Where-poppa-pee-oo

 Where-poppa-pee-oo!

Where-poppa-pee-oo!

Wiii-poppa-pi!

   There's a bird that lives here in this country, right where the edge of the Western Desert meets the borderland of the ocean. When the dark red dry season sunrise begins to creep over the land, shedding its first tentative forays of light into the world, the bird is awake, and heralds the breaking of the dawn to the world. You can hear him, if, like me, you're awake well before daybreak, and are getting ready to start the day.

   He goes by a variety of names. Wherepoppapeeoo-bird is one of them. As far as onomatopoeic animals names go, i.e. names that mimick the noise made by the animal, such as cuckoo, kookaburra and boobook-owl, it's not the most catchy one around, nor the easiest one to get rolling off the tongue. It's no surprise therefore that the bird is known by a swathe of other names. Chief among these is What's That Bloody Thing Outside My Window When I'm Trying To Sleep In the Morning, Wring The Fucker's Neck and Pass Me The Shotgun. The enthusiasm of bird-fanciers for observing the Wherepoppapeeoo in his wild habitat is only matched by the ferocity of the desire of would-be morning-sleepers to send it to the taxidermist, and add its name to the long list of species forced into extinction by us whitefella mob since we came here.

   I don't mind. I'm up before, or at least at the same time, as the Wherepoppapeeoo. I fall out of bed, and drag myself out the door, grabbing the equipment I need for the morning's exercise. Snorkel, mask and fins. With the desert sky behind me turning from red to orange I make my way down to the beach, half-leaping half-stumbling down the dunes, till I reach the water's edge. The song of the Wherepoppapeeoo is in my ears as I get ready, fumbling with my gear. It's a curiously melodic song, and has two parts. The first part starts high on the "where", which is drawn out, more like a "wheeeere", then drops down low to the rhythmic and percussive "poppa", before jumping up high again on the "pee" and dropping half-low again on the "oo". Like a musical seesaw. This, it would seem, is the call of the horny male, singing out in the dry season air looking for a female to mate with. It is, for all intents and purposes, the bird equivalent of a dating app, but cheaper and without photo-shopped unrealistic pictures and descriptions full of lies. The female, here today, hiding in the trees lining the tracks to the dunes, responds with a higher pitched "wiiii", a similarly percussive and low-down "poppa", and a final short, sharp and loud "pi" that scales heights of pitch that are the envy of and can only be fruitlessly dreamed of by aspiring opera divas, shower singers and torture victims the world over.

   By the start of the build-up to the wet season their courtship will be over. The eggs will be fertilised, the divorce papers will be signed, the girls will have got the house, the boys will be sleeping in their cars, all sad, lonely and bankrupt, and the morning air will be quiet. Twitching highly-strung nerves of would-be sleepers-in will relax, boxes of shotgun shells will be shelved, and the doors of the lock-up in town will be opened, coppers returning firearms to sheepishly feet-shuffling and embarrassed and harassed sleep-deprived family fathers with a friendly word of admonishment that next time it'll be their shout in the pub, if they know what's good for them.

   Where-poppa-pee-oo!

   The call rings out as I slip my feet into my fins. I spit in my mask, rub it around, and stick it on my face. A few quick stretches and I'm off.

   It's important to keep upping the challenges of exercise and workouts.

   Try running along a beach in fins.

   So I run, feet lifting up high with clown-like movements. I am gripped by a sudden new-found respect for ducks and geese. Imagine living like this full-time. I breathe heavily through the snorkel, and within seconds the mask is completely fogged up. I am now running virtually blind, stumbling through the early morning twilight, splashing through the puddles left behind on the wet sand by the retreating tide. A huge flock of seagulls, sitting sleeping on the beach with their heads tucked under their wings squawk hysterically and take off in a roar of rustling feathers and wings as I barge straight through them. I try to catch one for breakfast and fail. It's too fast for me. I lunge at it violently, catch the tip of my fins on the sand, and fall flat on my face. No seagull breaky today.

   I pick myself back up again, and force myself up and over a big sand dune standing between me and my destination. There's a look-out platform on top of the dune. When I first got here, a few months ago, it had a wooden floor and a handrail about one and a half metre or so above the ground. Now it's covered in sand, and only about ten centimetres of the rail sticks out above it. When it comes to shifting, the sand and the wind around here don't muck around.

   I half-roll down the far side of the dune, and my destination is now coming into sight. The lagoon is beckoning in the distance. I round a headland, bounce over sharp rocks and jagged reef edges, then finally get to the edge of the water. This is what I came here for. The water is shimmering a mysterious, inviting deep dark blue in front of me. Will there be ...? You never know.

   I wade into the water, momentarily caught off-guard by the morning chill of the cold current running south to north inside of the lagoon, and dive headlong into the sea. With big fin-kicks and slow arm movements I draw past the coral in all its shapes: brain coral, like a big, round human brain full of deep veins and arteries, in pink and orange and green; staghorn coral or branching coral, growing shoots and branches like a miniature forest under the water, brown and dark blue, and plate coral, huge, flat oval dish-shaped coral platters that sit invitingly on the sea floor, green and ochre, waiting for a packet of chips to be poured into them, or, possibly, a collection of keys from a swingers party.

   I push past all the coral till I reach my target zone. Nothing to see here. Flat, featureless white-yellow sand, sitting morosely and unimpressively around on the ocean floor. I dive down and hold my breath. I know this is where they like to hang out.

   A shadow appears from out of the darker screens of the deeper water. Big, black, wide. NOT a shark.

   A huge, wide wing, with a span of over six metres. A black coat on top, and a lilly-white belly underneath. Two big round black eyes set into the top of the head at the front, on the outside of the wings. There's two strange-looking rolled-up flaps on either side of the eyes, and an embarrassingly little and short tail dangling from the arse end. No barb, no sting. No threat to humans, no danger. They eat zooplankton, tiny microscopic lifeforms that float around in their gazillions in the ocean.

   It's a manta ray.

   One of the largest creatures in the ocean, and one of the smartest. Tests have shown them to be possessed of high intelligence. Conversely, the creature that is undisputedly the largest, the whale shark, which lives just a bit further north from here, while being physically the biggest, is also incontestably the most stupid of the marine animals around here.

   I float gently up to the top of the water for a breath of snorkel-fill, and watch in awe as the manta ray drifts slowly below me. It's like watching a moon eclipse. Unhurried, deliberate flaps of the wing tips drive it forward, almost without discernible effort. Their slow gait is deceiving: if they get it in their head to give you a run for your money they'll leave you behind in a flash.

   I drift a couple of metres above it, when an extraordinary thing happens. Out of the twilight zone of the deep water appears first one other shape, then a second. They bank to the side, dip their wings, and all of a sudden I find myself inside of a triangle of manta rays. I do a double take, but there's no cause for alarm. They've got no teeth.

   All three manta rays are accompanied by their remora, sucker fish that attach themselves to the belly of their host by suction caps, and float around through the seven seas with them. The world's original freeloading spunging bludgers, they used to be thought to feed on the left-overs of their host's meals. Recent research has found out however that, in actual point in fact, what they do eat is their host's shit. In terms of sycophantically and slavishly making a living off the richer and bigger people around, you can't sink lower than being a shit-eater. Occasionally a break-away rebel group of remora fish get together, detach themselves from their hosts, and swear never to eat shit again. They host fervent spiritual gatherings for their brethren, sing deeply moving and inspiring under-water hymns of salvation and redemption, and are generally widely shunned by all of their fellow species members, on account of their predilection for hammering on and on about the Great Evils Of Eating Shit, bending other fish's ears until they bleed from their eardrums, and ruining dinner parties. They call themselves Remorsa. Occasionally they make unannounced and unsolicited house calls, during which they try to force Pamphlets Detailing The Struggle Of The Shit Eater upon the unsuspecting. The more extreme members of the sect have, for a reason never satisfactorily explained, recently taken to wearing headscarves and sleeves with long shirts, believing, as they do, that this somehow increases their moral worth and standing, and that it is Wrong And Sinful to show naked scales to the world. While it is debatable whether this is so or not, one irrefutable and presumably unforeseen side-effect of this trend is that these items of clothing, poorly adapted to submarine living conditions, get water logged, wrap themselves around the creatures, block up their gills and drag them down to the ocean floor, where they choke and die for lack of oxygen. This is widely considered as a practical application of Darwin's famous Principle Of Suicidal Stupidity, and is universally welcomed and applauded by all the other fish not in their sect.

   I float around inconspicuously, and clearly my lack of dangerous vibes has put them at ease, because all of a sudden the first manta on the scene, who is now in the middle and appears to be larger than the other two, arches its back, rears up its head and performs a backwards somersault in the water. It comes full circle, but, having done so, by all accounts is not satisfied with one flip, and launches itself into another backwards roll.

   And then keeps going.

   The manta ray rolls over again, and again, and again. Over and over and over. The skin flaps on either side of its head unfurl themselves, and I realise, stunned, that this manta ray is now actually binging on a feeding frenzy. This is what they do: they roll over backwards, scoop plankton into their mouths with the skinflaps on the sides of their heads, and suck like a vacuum cleaner while they roll. Meanwhile the remora stay firmly attached to their belly, and, presumably, enjoy the ride. Occasionally they get seasick and throw up. When this happens the manta ray, who don't realise what's going on, suck up the remora fish's spew into their mouths and swallow it down happily. This manoeuvre is commonly known as the Revenge Of The Shit-Eaters.

   The central manta ray's feeding barrel-roll has clearly given the other two ideas because, as I watch, mouth wide open at this spectacle, the other two start rolling as well. Arching their backs, belly up high to the surface of the water, remora firmly stuck to their gut, they roll backwards, and feed. And roll. And roll again. And again, and again, and again. It is a display very rarely seen, and I am gobsmacked at the sight of it. I just float on the surface, concentrate on breathing slowly through my plastic pipe, and feast my eyes on the spectacle. Oblivious of my presence, or uncaring of it, they roll on and on and on.

   In the end they will roll for a full three quarters of an hour, right in front of me.

   I hate to say it.

   But they were clearly on a roll.

   Where-poppa-pee-oo.