The Most Famous Whale in the World | Translation

► Click here to return to the episode official page, or here to see all the episodes.

► Join Deambulantes. Our membership program help us continue covering Latin America.

►Do you listen Radio Ambulante to improve your Spanish? We have something extra for you: try our app, designed for Spanish learners who want to study with our episodes.

---

Translated by MC Editorial

[Daniel Alarcón]: This is Radio Ambulante. I’m Daniel Alarcón. 

In the 90s, a killer whale lived in Mexico City. His name was Keiko, and if you turned on the TV or radio back then, sooner or later you were going to run into him.

[Archive soundbite]

[Lucerito]: Keiko! Keiko! Keiko, long live Keiko, deep sea whale!

[Daniel]: Songs were composed for him. He appeared in soap operas here and there:

[Archive soundbite]

[Malo]: There you go with Keiko again! It seems like you care more about him than your own family. Look, one of these days I’m going to get really jealous and something is going to happen to your friend Keiko, eh?

[Kate]: Don’t even joke about it!

[Daniel]: In science fiction movies:

[Archive soundbite]

[Man]: Keiko is calling. There is danger on the surface.

[Daniel]: And in commercials for the largest amusement park in the country, Reino Aventura, where his tank was:

[Archive soundbite]

[Commercial]: For our vacation, we’re going to Reino Aventura. We’re going to see Keiko! What fun! Vacation is more fun in Reino Aventura with Keiko. Games and shows included… 

[Daniel]: Even outside of Mexico City, people knew him by name, as if he were a player on the Mexican national team or a singer. One person I spoke to described him as the Mexican Mickey Mouse. And in fact, many believed that Keiko was Mexican, that is, really from Mexico. It never occurred to them that he could have come from anywhere else. He was simply theirs.

The thing between Keiko and Mexico is essentially a love story. A complicated love, of course, because an orca should not live in a tank in a polluted megalopolis more than 2,000 meters above sea level. But that wasn’t an obstacle to people loving him. An entire country, millions of children in love with an orca, a local hero who would soon be known around the world. And the more people knew him, the more complicated that love would be.

What was an orca doing in Mexico? And would the love that so many Mexicans felt towards Keiko be enough to keep him there?

We’ll be back after a break. 

[Daniel]: We’re back with Radio Ambulante.

So, this whale had a story. Before arriving in Mexico, at the age of six or so, Keiko was in a marine park in Canada where he was bullied by other orcas who were older, stronger, and bigger. They pushed him, scared him, frightened him.

Before that, he was in Iceland, in a tank inside a huge concrete warehouse, waiting for his captors to find someone who wanted to buy him. He didn’t see the sky for about three years.

And before that, when he was only about two years old, he was in the North Atlantic. There he was captured and separated from his mother and the rest of his family.

If I tell you this unpleasant past, it’s because you could possibly argue that Keiko’s life in Reino Aventura was not so bad. We could even say that it had some advantages, starting with the people who worked there and who, for all practical purposes, were his family. And those people really loved Keiko. 

[Renata]: I mean, I lived and breathed, and everything was Keiko. My whole life revolved around Keiko. 

[Daniel]: This is Renata Fernández. She worked with Keiko at Reino Aventura.

[Renata]: I can say it without a doubt that it was one of the best times of my life. It was a great relationship. I mean, I was, well, very, very, very, very close to Keiko.

[Daniel]: Renata started working there when she was 20 years old. At first, she cut fish, mopped the edge of the pool, and over time became one of Keiko’s trainers. When she talks about him, she sounds almost maternal, as if she were remembering her son’s childhood. His favorite games, his favorite toys, his best friend… 

[Renata]: He was playful with his dolphin friend, whose name was Richie. He hated the sea lion, the male that was in Reino Aventura, whose name was Popeye. He hated him; they hated each other. He always surprised us, you know? For example, one day he was in a good mood and everything made him happy. And that day, you knew it was a good day. So you went into the water and he played with you and he played with the dolphins and he was happy, right? But sometimes he woke up like, well, like he didn’t want to be with anyone. He would move to one side, turn his back on you, and that meant that that day was… Well, it’s just that, like everyone else: We all wake up from time to time feeling lazy or not in the best of spirits. 

[Daniel]: Keiko had his own personality. But he got along well with the trainers and the team. They were all very young. None of them was over 30. This is José Luis Solórzano, his vet:

[José Luis]: I missed many occasions with my children because I was taking care of Keiko. I missed many occasions in my personal life to be with Keiko, and he became a part of the family. We were going on a trip and I would get a call: “Hey, listen to what Keiko did… he goes around… he refused to work in the last show.” Well, I was returning from vacation that day. I left my children alone and I came here to see what was going on with Keiko. So he became an important character for everyone.

[Daniel]: Keiko was the center of their lives. They fed him by hand, they gave him belly rubs.

[Renata]: He was spoiled. Very spoiled.

[Daniel]: It’s that, for many people, killer whales just have something magnetic, something enchanting. And Keiko was no exception…

So you didn’t feel a mystical connection with Keiko right away, either towards him or from him? 

[Renata]: I did towards him, of course. I mean, but he, well, he always seemed to take his time with everyone; he took his time. And suddenly it seemed like he was slowly getting closer for you to touch him…

[Daniel]: And if you touched him, you were one of the luckiest people.

[José Luis]: This species has a spectacular appearance—the size, the colors, the skin. They are beautiful animals. And people loved him. 

[Daniel]: During the off-season, when there were no midweek shows at Reino Aventura, Renata and the other coaches would swim and play with Keiko for hours. If he wasn’t feeling well, they stayed overnight to keep him company. And as far as Renata and the other twenty-something-year-olds knew, Keiko actually enjoyed spending time with them, no prizes or fish involved. 

[Renata]: We got in some small boats that had a rope and that were part of the dolphin show. Well, Keiko would pull the little boat and we would all pile in, and he would tow us, and then he would push us again, and then he would wait for us to get on again, and he would tow the whole boat again for everyone. And that, aside from the training, was just because he enjoyed it. 

[Daniel]: Now… the love for Keiko did not come only from the Reino Aventura team, but from all the people who came to visit him.

[José Luis]:  When Keiko arrived, he became the favorite pet, he became the most visited one. The park, that was designed to receive 12 thousand people per day, saw up to 34 thousand per day. 

[Renata]: In other words, Keiko kind of became the… well, you know, Mexico’s… pet. 

[Daniel]: A statement like this is difficult to verify, but we tried. We spoke to many people who grew up in Mexico City in the 80s and 90s, and they told us again and again that Keiko had a very special aura. Seeing him at Reino Aventura was like spending an afternoon with your three-ton best friend. He was the killer whale you told your secrets to: how you were doing in school, whom you had a crush on. It was that kind of relationship.

And then there were the shows in the park, where visitors could see their favorite pet up close. At the height of Keiko’s fame, there might be 200 people waiting two hours before the doors opened. To entertain them, a couple of clowns came and went, blowing their trumpets, making jokes. On weekends there were three shows daily, and the more than 3 thousand seats in the theater were always filled.

The performances were legendary. First the sea lions came out, then the dolphins, including Richie, and then… Keiko.

[Archive soundbite]

[Presenter]: Let’s hear a round of applause for Keiko!

[Daniel]: Children sat in the front rows to get soaked when their huge friend jumped. The trainers rode on Keiko, held onto his fins, and crossed the small pool waving to the crowd. 

[Presenter]: And you also need a lot of strength to hold on to Keiko’s fins…

[Daniel]: There was a platform for Keiko to get on, and people could see his full body and admire his size. And sometimes he would also go to the edge of the water, open his huge mouth and a trainer would put his head in while the audience held its breath…

And then, even when the show ended, Keiko’s visibility continued.

[José Luis]: I remember that on many, many, many occasions, people stayed after the show, or went to the pool… And there were people who asked, “Hey, how do you handle that robot?” Because they didn’t believe he was real. I remember I let a woman and her son in because she told me he was a robot. I said, “No, ma’am, come see him.” And when she saw him up close and he blew on her face, the lady started crying and said, “It’s not possible that there is something so beautiful in the world.” 

[Renata]: And then there were others who thought Keiko was part of the cow family. Because, well, he was black and white, and there are sea cows. So there was a mix of funny and tenderness and fear—all the things they felt about him.

[Daniel]: So there you have it: Keiko, occasional TV star, sacred orca, telepathic confidant and best friend to countless Mexican children. And this was his life—constant cuddles from his trainers, play sessions with his dolphin friends, and shows for thousands of fascinated fans.

But everything was about to change.

In 1992, Reino Aventura closed for a season for renovations. And Keiko, who was a teenager by then, had some free time—about six months with no shows or spectators. It was then that a production company came with a proposal.

[Óscar Porter]: They wanted to make a short film of Keiko’s life. They did not identify themselves as coming from a large company. Instead, they said they were a company that made short films.

[Daniel]: This is Óscar Porter, the park director at the time.

[Porter]: For us, it wasn’t a great business deal, but it helped to keep Keiko entertained. We didn’t know the impact this was going to have, or even how many people were going to take part in  it.

[Daniel]: Porter told me that he was so busy renovating the park—installing new rides, settling contracts, coordinating more than 600 employees—that he didn’t even read the script he was given.

But that script is the reason I’m telling you this story and the reason you may already know who Keiko is, even if you know him by another name. The company behind the proposal was an American film studio: Warner Brothers.

And they didn’t want to make a short film. They wanted to make a feature movie. In that movie, Keiko would have the name that you may know him by: Willy.

As in the movie Free Willy.

If you’re in your forties like me, chances are you’ve seen it. But if you aren’t, or if you’ve forgotten what it’s about, I’ll tell you.

One of the producers told me that the film can be summarized as follows: Rebel child, rebel whale. The rebel child is twelve-year-old Jesse, and he lives with his adoptive family in Portland.

The rebel whale is Willy. Captured and separated from his family, then put in a small pool in a dilapidated aquarium. He has three black spots under his jaw and his dorsal fin falls to one side, that is, he has the orca version of an emo hairstyle.

So the boy decides that he has to save Willy. 

[Archive soundbite]

[Jesse]: Come on, Willy. I know you can do it!

[Daniel]: Take him back to the sea and to his family.

[Jesse]: I believe in you! You can do it!

[Daniel]: And somehow, against all kinds of obstacles…

[Jesse]: Come on, you can jump it!

[Daniel]: He makes it.

What most people remember is the movie poster. It’s iconic, the one in the story: Willy is in the air, jumping over a seawall at sunset. The sea awaits him. And the boy is standing just below, sprayed by a crystalline stream of water, with one arm triumphantly raised toward the sky and almost brushing the whale’s belly.

And below the image there is a phrase that says, “How far would you go for a friend?”

When Warner Brothers needed to find the killer whale who would play Willy, it’s not like there were a ton of killer whales to choose from. Of course, the producers went to SeaWorld, the emblematic marine park in San Diego, California. But apparently, the park asked for some changes to the script. Instead of Willy escaping into the sea at the end of the movie, they wanted him to simply move into a larger aquarium.

In other words, no longer Free Willy but Move Willy. Clearly, the idea did not prosper.

So the producers kept searching. For the film to work, they needed something specific: a whale that looked sad and lived in… less than ideal conditions. They needed a whale that children would feel sorry for. A whale that the children would like to save.

And then they found Reino Aventura and Keiko. And the truth is, while Keiko may have been happy in the park, he wasn’t very healthy. He weighed a thousand kilos less than recommended, not because he was not fed, but because the warm water affected his appetite. He also had a part of his skin irritated with something called papilloma. He looked bad, but according to the vet, it was nothing serious.

But the most disturbing thing was his tank. It was small—distressingly small. One of the film’s producers told me it was smaller than some pools in Beverly Hills mansions. The water wasn’t even sea water. It was fresh water with added salt. Renata, the trainer, told me they checked the salinity levels frequently. And although they did everything possible for their favorite orca, everyone knew that Keiko’s conditions were not ideal.

[Renata]: We did what we could with what we had, and the intentions were always the best. We brought trainers, the best vets. The fish was top quality. I mean, it wasn’t like, “Oh, well, let’s give him something cheaper to save money.”

[Porter]: Reino Aventura was not a rich park; it was not a millionaire park. It was a nice park, big for the city, but really, building a dolphinarium to have a whale doing the show was too much investment for such a small show, you know?

[Daniel]: So forget almost everything I’ve told you so far—the love and the cuddles and the games and the fans. And look instead through a movie camera. Keiko, a wimpy whale, with a notorious virus and a drooping dorsal fin, swimming in a tiny pool.

It was just what the movie needed.

Free Willy premiered in the United States on July 16, 1993.

It was a hit that summer, and the reviews were positive. Everything was going great, until some journalists began to wonder about the star of the film, and news began to come out in the United States about his health.     

[Archive soundbite]

[NBC]: Keiko is very sick. At three and a half tons, he’s severely underweight by two tons. The teenager paces in a dirty pool that’s much too small.

[Daniel]: All the reports said more or less the same thing: That Keiko was sick, skinny, and living in a pool that was too small. This report even adds the adjective “dirty,” which Renata denies.

In any case, very soon Keiko went from being Mexico’s beloved pet to being its sickly orca. And the millions of children around the world who had fallen in love with Willy were not happy with the news that their favorite orca was still in captivity.

[José Luis]:  We began to receive money from American children, a little letter with $1, $2 to free Willy. And it became a chain; it became a problem that turned out to be so huge and big that we received visits from journalists who came from all over the world.

[Renata]: All the interviews and the magazines and the news programs began to pressure us, and we had a lot of bad publicity. 

[José Luis]: We had journalists who said that Keiko was already in his last days, that he was about to die, asking how we were reacting to that or when we were going to release him. Because the movie and reality were confused.

[Daniel]: And in Hollywood, Warner Brothers was also getting its fair share of pressure. Bags and bags full of letters began to arrive from children around the world, all demanding the same thing: Free Willy.

Or rather, Free Keiko.

So, if the film studio and Reino Aventura wanted to avoid a public relations nightmare and not break the hearts of millions of children, it was clear that he had to be released. And not in a movie anymore, but in real life.

We’ll be back after a break.

[Daniel]: We’re back with Radio Ambulante. I’m Daniel Alarcón.

So Warner Brothers understood they had a serious problem. Reino Aventura did, too.

What to do with a sick, malnourished orca, who some speculated could die at any moment? There was a lot of pressure. Little money. And no idea seemed to work. 

[José Luis]: When handling Keiko started getting so complicated with the media and the activists, the first thing we thought of was selling him.

[Daniel]: But who was going to buy him? At one point, SeaWorld was interested.

[Renata]: For me, that was the best option at the time. I mean, I said, “How great that he goes there, he’s going to have friends, he’s going to be with other orcas, he’s going to be thrilled.”

[Porter]: When we started talking about the possibility of SeaWorld being interested in Keiko, terrible attacks against SeaWorld began from environmentalists. To the point that there were threats that they should close the park, they wanted it closed, and how was it possible that they were keeping animals locked up. 

[Daniel]: And the possibility of a deal was ruined for fear of bad press. SeaWorld backed out. And well, this person was there, too:

[Archive soundbite: Michael Jackson’s song]

[Daniel]: Michael Jackson, then king of pop, had written the song for the film. And there were rumors that he wanted to adopt Keiko.

[José Luis]:  Michael Jackson appeared as a possible candidate to take him to his amusement park, Neverland—or I don’t know what his amusement park was called.

[Renata]: Well! So I was already picturing myself in Neverland, you know, enjoying the best of the deal. But it didn’t go that way.

[Daniel]: There was even a group that proposed taking Keiko to the Gulf of Mexico and training him to follow a ship and swim more than 7,000 kilometers to Iceland. A terrible idea for an orca that hadn’t been in the ocean for over a decade.

And then…

[José Luis]:  A man named David Phillips showed up.

[Daniel]: Better known as Dave.

[Dave]: Whales are just so otherworldly, so majestic, so incredibly amazingly intelligent, social, powerful… 

[José Luis]:  I went to see him. A young man in jeans, sneakers, er, a shirt with holes, and I thought, “Well, he is an activist like so many others; I don’t think he has anything. We can’t go with the first nobody who shows up saying that he’s going to take Keiko.” 

[Daniel]: But Dave Phillips was far from a nobody. To begin with, he was a scientist, with a degree in biology. In the 1980s, he had left the laboratory to devote himself to environmental activism. He became known for leading the fight against tuna fishing boats, which killed thousands of dolphins in their nets. But he began his career with the Save the Whales campaign, the movement to protect whales from industrial fishing.

The goal was very quixotic, but in 1982 Save the Whales activists, including Dave, got the International Whaling Commission to ban commercial whaling worldwide. 

On his journey as an activist, Dave had learned two things. First: whales are brilliant, intelligent, magical. It’s that simple. They are one of those species that you fall in love with in an instant.

Second, when it comes to campaigns, the key to success is that your message needs to go everywhere. So, in the years that followed, Dave came to work with Hollywood producers, putting environmental messages in blockbuster films such as Lethal Weapon 2:

[Archive soundbite]

[Chorus]: Tuna!?

[Girl]: You can’t eat tuna.  

[Father]: I can’t what?

[Girl]: Dad killed Flipper.

[Mother]: We’re boycotting tuna because they kill the dolphins that get caught in the nets.

[Daniel]: Science, activism, and Hollywood. Dave moved in those worlds. He understood them. Beyond his hippie appearance, he had everything necessary to understand Keiko’s case and what it could represent.

I mean, if anyone could save Keiko, it was Dave.

Through his contacts in Hollywood, Dave had been commissioned by the producers of Free Willy to see how feasible it was to turn the film’s plot into reality.

He took a flight to Mexico and visited Keiko at Reino Aventura. 

[Dave]: I was completely freaked out. I was sitting up at the bleachers, looking down at this whale in this tiny pool, and he didn’t look good.  He swam in very small circles, and he could make it across his pool in just a matter of seconds. It was… it was very, very, uh, poor facility. 

[Daniel]: What he saw seemed shocking.

An orca swimming in small circles in a pool so small that he crossed it from one side to the other in a matter of seconds. So you can understand why it looked so terrible to him, keep in mind that a wild orca is used to swimming up to 160 km a day.

I asked Dave to give me reasons why Keiko was not the ideal candidate to return to the ocean. And he gave me a lot. To begin with, Keiko had to get stronger, healthier, and gain weight. And there was no way that could be done in a tank in Reino Aventura. But where, then? The idea of ​​sending him to another marine park was ruled out.

[Dave]: And where are we supposed to bring him? We couldn’t bring him into the captive facility. I’m thinking, “Where are we gonna go?” 

[Daniel]: They would have to build a completely new tank for him. An undertaking that would probably cost millions of dollars. And then they would have to spend years—and more millions—teaching Keiko the basic skills to survive in the ocean.

The thing is, Keiko had been living with humans and without his family since he was a two-year-old calf. He had millions of human fans, but no orca friends. There were so many things he had never learned, skills that no trainer in the world knew how to teach him.

For example, he didn’t know how to hunt, that is, he was incapable of chasing a live fish and catching it with his teeth. But the situation was even more serious. Keiko didn’t know how to eat live fish. Just imagine: If you tried to feed him a live fish flapping its tail, he didn’t even know what to do. As if it weren’t food.

And then there was the issue of language. Each orca family has a different dialect, and it was unlikely that Keiko remembered the dialect he spoke before he was captured thirteen years back. In fact, he had not made sounds for years. This was crucial to his survival, as killer whales almost never live alone in the open sea.

If Keiko was going to survive outside his tank, he would have to reintegrate into his family. But if he didn’t speak their language… it would be difficult. And on top of everything else, no one really knew what family was Keiko’s, or where was it. It was believed to be somewhere in the North Atlantic, probably near Iceland.

[Dave]: How are we gonna get him back to Iceland? It’s a whaling nation, are you kidding me? What? We’re gonna go over to Iceland and convince them that we wanna bring back this whale ‘cause the world wants to save him? 

[Daniel]: So? Were they going to return him to Iceland? A country that was still hunting whales?! Would they really accept Keiko just because the children of the world wanted to save him?

And then there was the issue of money. He calculated how much the entire project would cost, on the surface, a million, five, eight… When he reached ten million dollars, he stopped counting.

He returned to California, convinced that it was impossible.

But back home, Dave began to think about it. There was a way to look at Keiko as a killer whale that needed to be saved. But, little by little, Dave began to see another way: Keiko, the opportunity to tell a story of hope about the sea.

After all, Dave had experienced firsthand the power that whales exert over people. He had seen the power that advertising campaigns, like Save the Whales, could have. And this could be something much bigger. What if Keiko the whale became Keiko the symbol?

[Dave]: That’s what got me over my own view that this is only one whale. And then it’s like, yeah, he’s one whale, but he’s gonna be the most famous whale in the world.

[Daniel]: And so he overcame his doubts. Of course, Keiko was just a whale. But he was going to be the most famous whale in the world.

One of the first things Dave did was create an organization: The Free Willy Keiko Foundation. Then he had to get the money. The US Humane Society donated one million dollars. Dave also got a telecommunications magnate named Craig McCaw to give him another couple million.

For its part, Warner Brothers agreed to contribute two million dollars, which seems like a lot… until you realize that they had already raised 150 million with the original film and that, by that time, Free Willy 2 was already in production.

With all that money, Dave convinced a small marine park on the Oregon coast to let the foundation build a huge pool there, four times the size of Reino Aventura’s. A place where Keiko could begin his rehabilitation.

Now the only thing Dave was missing was the whale.

In principle, this was the most difficult part, especially taking into account how famous Keiko was in Mexico. But for Reino Aventura, the pressure was already too much.

[Porter]: For me, this had already become, frankly, a nightmare. Every day, I had to spend three or four hours of my job—which was managing the park and making the attractions work—attending to all the people who came to find out about Keiko. And especially the many environmentalists, who were sometimes… sometimes even unpleasant. And rude. And they said that we were killing Keiko. By holding him there in that…

[Daniel]: When Dave returned to the park to talk about his plan, it was clear that he was no longer a nobody, but a serious man, with the resources to sustain the ambitious project. 

[Porter]: And we never talked about them buying him, nor did we ever talk about us selling him. The idea we had was that if he stayed locked up with us, he was going to die there. And it was very difficult to convince people that we weren’t out to make money with Keiko’s departure. And both David and I talked about the possibility that we were going to do everything possible to take care of him very well and to make him a happy animal. 

[Daniel]: Over the next few months, they worked on a plan. The park would donate Keiko, without charging a single peso.

In February 1995, two years after the film’s release, it was announced at a press conference that Keiko would leave Reino Aventura for his new temporary home with a much larger pool, with cold sea water. It was his next step before returning to the wild.

Dave’s plan was to rescue, rehabilitate and release. But for the people in Reino Aventura, this was all difficult to take in. Let’s remember how much they loved Keiko. Letting him go wasn’t going to be easy. 

[José Luis]: I knew that the future was uncertain. Keiko was an animal that had transcended. But I had an orca, I had my Rolls Royce. And I didn’t want to lose him. 

[Renata]: It’s like your son comes to tell you, so you’re sending him off to college. Well, what if, if he goes to college, he’s alone and something happens, right? Something serious and he’s sad and… I don’t know, you always have fears. 

[Daniel]: But you still let him go, don’t you? You don’t let your fears take away your child’s opportunities. For Renata, saying goodbye to Keiko was a painful but noble thing. She had been asked to accompany Keiko to Oregon for a few months, to make the transition smoother. She accepted, of course, and swallowed back all her doubts.

[Renata]: I had to be on top of the project. I mean, I couldn’t say, “Yes, but it’s scary to think of taking him to the open sea, and then let’s see whether he makes it or not.” I mean, there was always that fear of them taking him away and things not working out. Always. 

[Daniel]: And in Mexico, many people had those doubts. Goodbyes are like that… especially when you don’t know what the future will bring. You feel guilty, as if you’re betraying a friend. Because long before Free Willy came out, Keiko was already a symbol. A subject of national pride. 

[Renata]: So, it was… tragic for Mexico at the time. The people—I would meet people, and they would start crying then and there. And they said, “It’s not possible, why are they taking him? And why?”

[Daniel]: They wanted him to stay. But many were willing to let him go because they loved him and wanted the best for him. And that is why it was so offensive for Renata to hear how in the United States it was being said that Keiko was being rescued from a terrible life in Mexico. 

When you read or heard about the international coverage, what did you feel?

[Renata]: Well, I felt anger, helplessness. Because, well, sure, of course we gave interviews and the report would come out completely edited in a way that made us look terrible, and I was part of Keiko’s care. 

[Daniel]: A few days before Keiko left Mexico, the Reino Aventura team organized a farewell party for him. It included his coaches, the team members, the people who cleaned the pool… even the clowns who played the trumpet. Keiko’s friends, his human family. 

[José Luis]:  Some of us got into the water to play with Keiko. Keiko, I tell you, was… he was a very docile animal and he let us play.

[Renata]: So everyone swam with Keiko, Keiko was with everyone and went from one side to the other, we threw the ball for him. So he had good moments. 

[José Luis]:  It was a very emotional party, and in the end we all ended up crying. Hugging each other…

[Renata]: Yes, yes, yes… Well, imagine the tears. Everyone was crying. No, no, it really was extremely sad.

[José Luis]:  Because we knew our pet was leaving. And our friend. Keiko wasn’t just a job for all of us.

[Daniel]: On January 6, 1996, it was time for Keiko to leave.

The transfer to the airport would take place at dawn to avoid the heat, the traffic, and also all the people who would no doubt try to say goodbye.

Now, moving a whale is not only an engineering problem—it is a training problem as well. Getting Keiko out of his tank in Reino Aventura and onto a plane required a good measure of cooperation from him. And for that, they had to practice.

They had been doing it for months. Keiko swam to a shallow part of the pool and there he climbed onto a kind of custom-made stretcher. It was a movement that Keiko had to repeat week after week, and one that he had to learn to be comfortable with. Because, if everything went well, he would spend about 14 hours on that stretcher. The challenge then was for him to remain calm, for him not to get agitated, not to resist. He had to trust his human friends.

The night of the transfer was noisy and chaotic. Keiko was used to shows, but not this. I’ve seen the videos and believe me, it’s crazy. The pool does not seem to be part of an aquarium—it looks more like a construction site, full of lights, beeps, yelling, and the movement and whining of motors. There is a crowd of people and machines. It’s stressful, even just watching it. And for Keiko, although he was an orca used to the noisiness of an amusement park, it had to be stressful, too.

When it was time to swim to the shallow end, Keiko refused, again and again. Finally, about twelve people cornered him with a net and directed him to the stretcher. They settled him in and covered his skin with a greasy cream, the same thing you would use on a baby. 

[Renata]: We were calming him down, we were talking and talking to him all the time, so he could hear our voices. He was like, “What’s going on?” Yes. I mean, his eyes were like that, just wide, wide open and he could not be having a good time. Definitely not. 

[Daniel]: And then a crane lifted him into a container with water and more than a ton of ice. And then, Keiko began to make sounds, something he didn’t do often. The container was on a trailer, ready to cross the whole city to the airport. A huge cargo plane was waiting for him there. Dave Phillips, Renata and Solórzano were with him. 

[José Luis]:  Finally, we got out and realized that when we got to the parking lot, there were thousands and thousands of people shouting for him not to be taken away. Excuse me? I was sitting on top of the container, on the right side. And when we saw people who wouldn’t let us leave the park because they claimed Keiko was theirs, it was truly very emotional. 

[Daniel]: There were so many people that the police had to help clear the way. And when they finally got out onto the street, around 2 o’clock in the morning… 

[Archive soundbite]

[Journalist]: And we will be thinking of you. We join from here in this warm farewell to Keiko after 11 years of being in our country. We wish you a happy trip to the United States…

[Daniel]: There were journalists reporting on the trip. The route of the convoy was supposed to be a secret, but Keiko encountered thousands of people along the way—kids in pajamas, girls with Mexican flags. Cars and motorcycles approached, drivers waved, horns sounded.

[José Luis]:  I have to give this comparison—I once went to welcome the Pope, and I had never seen a demonstration as large as the Pope’s and as large as Keiko’s…

[Renata]: Chock-full. All the pedestrian crossings we passed were full of people with banners, shouting, clapping… I mean, very emotional.

[José Luis]:  On the streets yelling. Holding signs and sheets painted with shoe polish: “Goodbye, Keiko.”

And then, at some point along the slow, heavy road, a mariachi band started playing an old song, Las Golondrinas. 

[Archive soundbite]

[Mariachi]: Whither will the departing barn swallow arrive in haste and exhaustion?

[Daniel]: It’s honestly crazy to see the emotion on people’s faces, the palpable sense of loss. Dave told me that some people tried to climb up onto the container. So the convoy moved forward as best it could, starting and stopping and starting again down the crowded streets. A city and an entire country were staying up late to see their beloved whale for the last time. 

[Archival]: We can hear the enthusiasm of the people saying goodbye to Keiko. Here they are crowding near the container that carries Keiko. Let’s listen: “Que se quede, que se quede.”

[Daniel]: “Let him stay. Let him stay.” Maybe Keiko heard them…

[Renata]: As for me, I didn’t stop crying from the moment he got on until we got to the plane. I mean, it was really a kind of a spiritual moment for a lot of people. 90%—no, no, not 90! —98% of all Mexicans will never be able to get close, or even from a distance see either a free or a captive orca again in their life. 

[Daniel]: But Keiko no longer belonged to Reino Aventura. And much less to Mexico. Now he belonged to the story that was being told about him, the sequel to the movie that had made him a star. A sequel in real life, much more ambitious and with no guaranteed happy ending. 

Around 5 in the morning, more than three hours late, the plane that would take Keiko to his new home took off. It was a beautiful sunrise in Mexico City.

Only the vets went with Keiko. Dave and Renata were on another plane, flying alongside him. 

[Renata]:,We could see Keiko’s plane out the small window. So we looked at the gigantic plane, and we also prayed. Just there, like you’re saying, “Please, let everything go well, let him arrive well, let it all be fine.” A lot of things can go wrong. A lot.

It was a feeling of, “Well, it’s what is best for him. So we have to let him go.” But also… also of… of absolute love. And admiration too, for what he was, for what he had been, for everything that Keiko represented for Mexico.

[Daniel]: As if those years swimming in circles in Reino Aventura had actually been a public service for Mexico. For his child fans, who shared secrets with their orca friend, for making so many laugh, and others cry with emotion.

And now, with that mission accomplished, it was his turn to leave.

[Archive soundbite: Las Golondrinas song Ana Tuirán’s version]

[Daniel]: This episode is a co-production with Serial Productions and The New York Times. The rest of Keiko’s story will be told in five episodes over the following weeks in English. You can find a link to that series on our website.

This story was reported and written by me and produced by Pablo Argüelles, with editing by Camila Segura, Luis Fernando Vargas and Natalia Sánchez Loayza. Bruno Scelza did the fact checking. Sound design and music are by Andrés Azpiri.

Thanks to Jen Guerra, Katie Mingle, Alissa Shipp, Julie Snyder and Ira Glass.

The rest of the Radio Ambulante team includes Paola Alean, Lisette Arévalo, Adriana Bernal, Aneris Casassus, Diego Corzo, Emilia Erbetta, Rémy Lozano, Selene Mazón, Juan David Naranjo, Ana Pais, Melisa Rabanales, Natalia Ramírez, Barbara Sawhill, David Trujillo, Elsa Liliana Ulloa and Desirée Yépez.

Carolina Guerrero is the CEO. 

Radio Ambulante is a podcast by Radio Ambulante Estudios, produced and mixed on the Hindenburg PRO program.

If you enjoyed this episode and want us to continue doing independent journalism about Latin America, support us through Deambulantes, our membership program. Visit radioambulante.org/donar and help us continue narrating the region.

Radio Ambulante tells the stories of Latin America. I’m Daniel Alarcón. Thanks for listening.