transcript

Speaker 1:
[00:01] Okay. Okay.

Speaker 2:
[00:05] Alright.

Speaker 3:
[00:07] You're listening to Radiolab.

Speaker 4:
[00:09] Look it!

Speaker 3:
[00:11] Radiolab. From WNYC. See?

Speaker 5:
[00:19] Three, two, one.

Speaker 6:
[00:22] Imagine your eyes grow the size of grapefruits.

Speaker 5:
[00:27] And your heart grows to the size of a gorilla. All of a sudden, your legs flatten into fins and form a tail.

Speaker 6:
[00:38] And you can sing haunting melodies that can travel for miles. You have become a humpback whale.

Speaker 5:
[00:52] Now is the part where I make you sing the theme song with me. You got it! Terrestrials is a show where we uncover the strangeness waiting right here on Earth. I am your host, Sulu Miller. Join us, always buy my song, bud.

Speaker 4:
[01:12] Alan, let's dive in!

Speaker 5:
[01:15] And we are overjoyed to be joined today by arguably the most famous cellist in the world, Yo-Yo Ma. Hi, Yo-Yo.

Speaker 6:
[01:24] Hi, Lulu.

Speaker 5:
[01:25] Hi, Yo-Yo.

Speaker 6:
[01:26] Lulu.

Speaker 5:
[01:26] Yo-Yo.

Speaker 3:
[01:27] Lulu.

Speaker 5:
[01:28] Yo-Yo.

Speaker 6:
[01:28] Lulu.

Speaker 5:
[01:29] Yo-Yo.

Speaker 3:
[01:30] Lulu.

Speaker 5:
[01:32] Woo-hoo, that was fun, that was almost like music. So it is such an honor to have you here. Yo-Yo, you have played cello for presidents, for nobility, you have played inside the fanciest concert halls and palaces, and even Notre-Dame, the nearly 900-year-old cathedral in Paris. But at some point, as I understand it, you wanted to liberate, to free the cello from the concert hall, and get it out into the world, out into nature. Yes.

Speaker 6:
[02:00] At some point, I thought, we are a part of nature, and I wanted to spend more time there because it's something in my life that I know has been missing.

Speaker 4:
[02:10] How beautiful.

Speaker 5:
[02:12] You brought along someone with you to record all these adventures, someone near and dear to Terrestrials.

Speaker 6:
[02:18] Yes, Ana Gonzalez.

Speaker 2:
[02:20] Hello.

Speaker 5:
[02:21] Hello, producer bud, Ana. Where did you guys take the cello outside? Where did you actually go?

Speaker 3:
[02:30] Yeah, we went a lot of places. We went to the coast of Maine, a cave in Kentucky.

Speaker 5:
[02:34] Cool.

Speaker 3:
[02:36] The tallest peak of the Smoky Mountains in North Carolina, a glacier in Alaska, the banks of a river in West Virginia, a remote island in Hawaii, and then the deck of a ship. Wow.

Speaker 5:
[02:47] That last one is the adventure that's going to bring us to whales, right?

Speaker 6:
[02:52] Yes, and humpback whales in particular.

Speaker 3:
[02:55] Because see, humpback whales like Yo-Yo are musical. They communicate through song, whale song. There are melodies that they memorize and perform, and some are kind of short clicks and grunts, and whispers between moms and babies. And then there are other booming bellows that can travel up to thousands of miles in the water. Human beings didn't always know this about whales. Many centuries ago, sailors would sometimes hear faint, haunting moans out in the waters, and they thought maybe they could be mermaids.

Speaker 5:
[03:31] Whoa, the myth of mermaids came from whales?

Speaker 3:
[03:35] Well, not exactly, but these songs were just so human sounding. It wasn't until years and years later that scientists figured out they were actually coming from whales. Humpback whales. And the calls were incredible. And complicated. Just as rich and layered as like any piece of music that human beings have ever made. So complicated, in fact, that human beings still don't really know what the whales are saying with their songs. Do they have stories? Messages? Jokes? Memories? Warnings? Or are they simply singing to sing?

Speaker 5:
[04:11] It was a mystery. A mystery that Yo-Yo wanted to try to understand a bit more. And that brings us to what you two loons did out in Hawaii on a boat.

Speaker 3:
[04:25] Yes. That's right.

Speaker 5:
[04:26] See, Yo-Yo had this wild idea. What if he could communicate with whales using his cello? But to reach the whales, he would need to get the cello out onto the ocean. So he and a bunch of very cool helpers in Hawaii took his cello onto a very special boat and he played, hoping that maybe this foreign species of massive marine mammal would respond?

Speaker 6:
[04:55] Yes, because I heard whale song and I thought, I can make some of those same sounds on the cello. They're absolutely replicable on the cello and I would love to try to communicate with whales using the one tool I have, the cello.

Speaker 5:
[05:15] I love that. So today, we are going to play What Happened because Anna, amazing producer bud that she is, recorded the entire experiment every moment and turned it into an episode of their amazing podcast, Our Common Nature. So today's Terrestrials is gonna sound a little different than usual, but we wanted to share it because not only are you gonna get to learn some cool stuff about humpback whales, you're also gonna get to go out on a ship in Hawaii and maybe see a volcano eruption and a double rainbow. I'm not sure you're gonna have to listen to find out. So we'll be back in two weeks with a classic Terrestrials episode full of goofy interjections from Alan. But for today, sit back and relax as Yo-Yo and Anna take you away on an aquatic adventure.

Speaker 6:
[06:10] I just have a whale of a time.

Speaker 3:
[06:13] Great pun. Why did you want to try to communicate with the whales? Where was the inspiration for that from?

Speaker 6:
[06:20] Well, whales are our mammal relatives. They obviously have a sophisticated language, and they are sentient beings, as are we, and yet we don't know their language.

Speaker 3:
[06:42] Sension, meaning whales can feel things, like us, and like us, they have this complicated language. And human beings have been wondering what exactly they might be saying ever since whale sounds were first recorded. See, for a long time, humpback whales were on the brink of extinction because people used to hunt them for food and sport, but then people started hearing their songs, and a movement began to try to save the whales. And today humpback whales have made a comeback, a humpback comeback. And when Yo-Yo Ma first heard their songs.

Speaker 6:
[07:22] And I, listen, I heard, my goodness, these are sounds that are kind of in the register of the cello. I just thought, from just a musical point of view, I wonder if I were to replicate some of those sounds in the way that, you know, I go to a different country and I'm learning some words and I'm going to try out my vocabulary.

Speaker 3:
[08:01] Our trip to Hawaii offered a real chance to try out these sounds because we would be there right at the start of the Hawaiian humpback mating season. And we'd be joined by Hawaiian musicians who have their own way of communicating directly with all the elements of the natural world.

Speaker 4:
[08:27] I chant a lot.

Speaker 3:
[08:29] This is Snowbird Bento, and she's a teacher of Hawaiian music and culture. She's an expert in chants, or in Hawaiian, mele.

Speaker 4:
[08:37] Everything I chant is my prayer. As we chant, we're actually putting out vibration into that universe and expecting response.

Speaker 3:
[08:58] Snowbird tells me she chants to affect the weather, to carry histories of people, plants and animals, and to protect things.

Speaker 4:
[09:05] And you're asking for your people to come help you, give you what you need.

Speaker 3:
[09:10] And Snowbird was one of the first people that Yo-Yo called when he was organizing a concert in Honolulu, the capital city of Hawaii.

Speaker 4:
[09:16] I won't lie, I about screamed my head off and fangirled, and I was like, ah, ah!

Speaker 3:
[09:23] Turns out Snowbird actually played cello growing up.

Speaker 4:
[09:26] And I had a picture of young Yo-Yo sitting with his cello, and his eyes were closed, and he was like in this position. And I thought, I'm gonna keep practicing, because one day, this is the guy that inspires me, and like I'm gonna... I would just love to meet him. I never thought I was that good of a cello player.

Speaker 3:
[09:51] In this concert, Yo-Yo was set to play all six of the Bach cello suites. And if you don't already know, playing all of the Bach cello suites is a tour de force in cello performance. It's about two hours of solo cello, and it's one of Yo-Yo's specialties. He usually does it straight through, no breaks, but this time, he invited Hawaiian musicians and performers to come out in between the suites. And Snowbird was first.

Speaker 4:
[10:35] I decided to perform Kaulu Wehi Wehi. It speaks to this time in the existence of our land when everything was in balance and healthy. And so what I attempted in my performance was to create this space that even for a minute, we can touch that type of beauty and perfection.

Speaker 3:
[11:10] But in the last verse, the energy changes from a meditation on the beauty to a directive to the audience.

Speaker 4:
[11:18] He ali i ka'aina, he kaua ke ka naka. Land is the chief. Man is its servant. Remember our place. Can you imagine the way that it changes the way you see yourself within this environment? You're actually saying, I'm not above or below. We're all equal.

Speaker 3:
[12:05] Human beings have the tendency to think of ourselves as separate from the world around us, and even better. We think we can control it, that we're on top. But in this melee, this chant, Snowbird is saying, that's not how it works here. So if Yo-Yo is going to communicate with whales, he's gonna have to meet them where they're at. He can't just expect to walk out of a Waikiki hotel room and play for the whales as they swim out on the beach. Yo-Yo is going to have to enter the space where whales live. And for Snowbird, that place exists both in the depths of the ocean and in the deepest parts of our brains. It's a place with a Hawaiian name, Pole.

Speaker 4:
[12:55] For some, Pole means the cosmic night. Pole is a source. Pole is origin. Pole is darkness. Pole is black.

Speaker 3:
[13:09] Its physical manifestation lies in the realm of the ocean. Because the deeper you go in the ocean waters, the sun begins to fade. The darkness gets thicker. This is the pole. Whales dip into this world holding their breath. As they go deeper and deeper, their eyes can't pierce through the darkness. So they begin to sing. Their songs and screeches ripple out through the water and tell them where to find their friends and families. Snowbirds ancestors also use sound to communicate through the ocean.

Speaker 4:
[14:15] In my own family, we have stories of my great-great-grandfather beating sharks by hand, chanting to them, and they swim in.

Speaker 3:
[14:25] Snowbird refers to her family and the sharks and the whales as Kanaloa people, because in the Hawaiian creation story, the ocean is ruled by Kanaloa.

Speaker 4:
[14:35] Yeah, Kanaloa is one of our four major akua.

Speaker 3:
[14:39] A Hawaiian deity or god, Kanaloa lives within the Po and controls the oceans and all of their creatures, which are mostly mysteries to us.

Speaker 4:
[14:51] We don't know half of the creatures that lived in the deep parts of the Kanaloa.

Speaker 3:
[14:58] Because do you know how much of the oceans human beings have actually explored? Five percent, just five, which means that 95 percent of the oceans are unknown to us, which means there could be anything living in there, undiscovered creatures and portals and maybe things beyond the physical.

Speaker 4:
[15:20] The Kanaloa represents a subconscious mind. The Kanaloa realm is open to us when we allow for us to cross over from the conscious to the subconscious.

Speaker 3:
[15:52] I think it's a good time to tell you how I first met Yo-Yo Ma, and I don't think it's what you'd ever expect. I'll tell you about it after this quick break.

Speaker 5:
[16:13] Terrestrials is back with our pod-cast. Pod-cast about whales, cause whales swim in a pod. Anyway, okay, so back to Yo-Yo Ma and Ana Gonzalez. Ana, how was it that you came to meet the world's most renowned cellist?

Speaker 3:
[16:33] Yeah, I don't really hang out with super famous classical musicians all the time, or like on the beaches of Hawaii. It was actually through a memory passed down to me. Hey, Mom, what's up?

Speaker 7:
[16:49] I was just chewing on a hot brownie, and I couldn't.

Speaker 3:
[16:54] Keep chewing. I also had a work question I wanted to ask you about for the Yo-Yo podcast. Okay. Do you think it would be okay if I talked about him playing at Ampeth's funeral and the show?

Speaker 7:
[17:10] Absolutely.

Speaker 3:
[17:11] Yeah?

Speaker 7:
[17:12] Yeah. I think it's a treasured memory for everyone. So I think it's a beautiful memory. I don't think there's any way to be an honor.

Speaker 3:
[17:27] The year before I was born, my mom's sister Beth died of breast cancer. It was a shock to everyone who knew her. Yo-Yo was one of those people. Their kids went to school together. And I was always told with this sort of disbelief from family members that Yo-Yo Ma played at my aunt's funeral.

Speaker 7:
[17:50] Well, it was just so extraordinary and unexpected. There had been a big snowstorm, so there was a lot of snow on the ground, a foot or two, a lot of snow. And it was like crystal clear blue sky and sparkling sun on the snow. And it was quite a crowd of people. And then he just stepped out of the crowd. And his wife put this, his stool down, for him to sit on. He didn't even know he was there. And then he sat down on the stool, he started to play. It's him playing that is what I remember about her burial. It's that moment.

Speaker 3:
[18:48] You don't remember anything else?

Speaker 7:
[18:50] No. Like it's one of, you know, those things like it's, I have the exact picture. I know exactly where I was standing. I know the exact setting. I know exactly where he was sitting. I know like the whole scene is just there.

Speaker 3:
[19:04] When you think about it now, does it feel like it's still like present, like still happening almost?

Speaker 7:
[19:10] Absolutely.

Speaker 3:
[19:18] This memory lives in a place I can't see. It's a place my mom can't see either, but she feels it, and so do I. It ripples out forever into our universe, in our subconscious minds, and in the Kanaloa realm. I didn't tell anybody about this connection I had to Yo-Yo. It just never felt right. And when I got the call to maybe join Yo-Yo out on some trips in nature and make a podcast, it felt like this strange boomerang, like a small, unexpected bit of fate coming back to me. But I held on to it. I didn't tell them until you're in Hawaii.

Speaker 6:
[20:04] The most amazing moment. We're sitting on that plane, and you tell me, so, do you remember Beth Pyle?

Speaker 1:
[20:13] Yeah.

Speaker 3:
[20:14] Yeah. Yeah. And then.

Speaker 6:
[20:17] And I've known you already for a while, you know?

Speaker 1:
[20:19] Yeah.

Speaker 6:
[20:20] So it's like, I saw you in West Virginia, we talked at this time, and then boom, you land. And then suddenly, we're connected.

Speaker 3:
[20:28] Yeah. From before I was born.

Speaker 6:
[20:30] I know.

Speaker 3:
[20:31] That was a year before I was born.

Speaker 6:
[20:34] It's hard for me to kind of wrap my mind around, because obviously, I think of you as very separate people. But the fact that your mother was so close to her is really important.

Speaker 3:
[20:57] Remember before the break when Snowbird was telling us about Poe? It's this place where things that you can't quite see but know are real exist. It's where my aunt and her memory remain living. And it's a place where Yo-Yo goes to find the notes when he plays cello. Yo-Yo uses sounds to navigate his universe, just like the whales.

Speaker 6:
[21:23] And if you have access to that, you have access to a vast repertoire of ideas, memories or just trash. You know, but somehow when you're performing, you're aware of that much more.

Speaker 4:
[21:44] I know exactly what that feels like.

Speaker 3:
[21:46] Snowbird again.

Speaker 4:
[21:48] It's like a light switch. You move from one consciousness into the next. And you cannot help that when you flip the switch from the conscious to the subconscious in performance, you're no longer playing the music. It's almost like the opposite, right? The music is playing you.

Speaker 3:
[22:14] And now the time has come for Yo-Yo's grand humpback experiment. So on this very windy December day in Hawaii, we travel down to the water and see a volcano erupting in the distance. I know it's really cool. It's called Mauna Loa and it's making everything look a little red and eerie, but also magical in a way that I've never really seen before. And we get ready to board a famous ship called Hokulea.

Speaker 4:
[22:49] I was about three years old when I was first introduced to Hokulea on the shoulders of my uncle. He walked me down into the water and he said, this is Hokulea, baby. You know, one day this canoe will take you around the world.

Speaker 3:
[23:03] Hokulea is like two canoes connected by a deck with these two massive sails. It was built in the 1970s as a replica of the original ships that brought the first Polynesians to the Archipelago of Hawaii thousands of years ago, which by the way, are what the ships in Moana are based on too. And just like Moana, the captains of Hokulea navigate the way their ancestors did, through mapping the skies, the stars, the wind, and the water. And today, Hokulea is going to serve as a vessel for us to navigate the realm of Po and the Kanaloa with music, and maybe connect with some whales. Although I'm Anna by the way.

Speaker 8:
[23:47] Lehua, nice to meet you.

Speaker 3:
[23:49] I met with Lehua Kamalu, one of the captains and primary navigators of Hokulea.

Speaker 8:
[23:54] We are about to take Hokulea out of Waihai Harbor on a short sunset sail. It's a beautiful afternoon, and I think, you know, invite the whales and the ocean to listen to something. Maybe they haven't quite heard before from the deck of a canoe. It's going to be super amazing with Yo-Yo on board, a number of our elders and kupuna and practitioners.

Speaker 3:
[24:18] There are about 40 or 50 people on this working port. It's a real mix, like Lehua said, older Hawaiian people who know Hokulea well, Yo-Yo's team, and a man who calls the group together. His name is Nainoa Thompson. He's the CEO of the Polynesian Voyaging Society that runs Hokulea, and he's a legendary navigator in Hawaii.

Speaker 9:
[24:39] Just quickly, there's a lot of people that want to come on this trip. We only got so much room for everybody. We're only taking people who protect something, whether it's this land, whether it's this ocean, whether it's our ancestors, whether it's our culture. So that's when everybody was calling us saying, we want to come, we were asking them, what are you willing to protect? Roll up. There's a thousand thank yous. We don't have time.

Speaker 3:
[25:04] The sun is beginning to set and the winds are rolling in. There's like 20 of us who go over the short plank and we're on Hokulea. All these clouds are moving in and drizzling rain on us. And suddenly a double rainbow appears over Mauna Loa, which is spitting lava into the clouds. And I find Yo-Yo. How are you feeling?

Speaker 6:
[25:25] Well, first of all, there's a double rainbow here, which is unbelievable. It's just like we have the volcano, we have the rainbow, and we're going out to see whether we can maybe spot a whale or two. We'll then see whether it's possible to make some form of contact through their songs.

Speaker 3:
[25:50] Do you think, yeah, how do you think it's going to be producing them?

Speaker 6:
[25:55] Well, I think possibly as with any two living beings, if you spot one another, there's a greeting, you know, there's some form of recognition. And if we could try and get to that, that would be an amazing thing, because then what happens after that is a relationship, you know?

Speaker 2:
[26:23] Yo-Yo? Can I put this on you?

Speaker 6:
[26:25] Why?

Speaker 3:
[26:25] Someone comes over and puts a life vest on Yo-Yo. We're all kind of like stumbling around this ship as it undulates on the calm, glossy waters.

Speaker 8:
[26:35] I think we can catch you.

Speaker 3:
[26:36] People are throwing rope and going under deck to grab supplies. There's a group working together to row this long oar at the back of the canoe, which helps the ship move without wind. A little ways down the canoe, there are marine biologists with audio equipment.

Speaker 8:
[26:51] Hey Lars.

Speaker 2:
[26:52] Hi guys, how are you doing?

Speaker 3:
[26:55] Lars Bedger is the Director of the Marine Mammal Research Program in the Hawaii Institute of Marine Biology. How are you feeling before we set the floor?

Speaker 2:
[27:03] I'm so excited. Look at this background. Look at that rainbow right there. Two of them. Yeah, it's going to be awesome.

Speaker 3:
[27:10] Lars specializes in marine megafauna, aka big old ocean animals like whales. Take me through the sciency side of what's going to happen right now. What are you planning on doing?

Speaker 2:
[27:20] Yeah. It's a little bit early, but the whales have started showing up. If we're lucky, we're going to put a hydrophone, so an underwater microphone in the water. That's going to be listening for whales and snapping shrimp and all kinds of other things that are in the ocean. Then at the same time, Yo-Yo's Jello is going to be connected to a speaker that we're going to put in the hull, that hopefully will project the sounds into the ocean. Those sounds we will be recording together with anything else that we're hearing in the ocean. And if we're lucky, we'll pick up some Humpback Whale songs.

Speaker 3:
[27:52] Let me break this plan down a little bit. So these waters and all the living beings in it are very protected by law from all human disturbance. So we actually could not get permission to use speakers to project Yo-Yo's cello directly in the water. So Lars and his colleagues have rigged up the wooden hulls of the Hokulea to be natural amplifiers. Yo-Yo will play and his cello will shoot out through the ocean, through the canoe. And the Marine Biology team set up a hydrophone, that's an underwater microphone, to drop off the side of the canoe.

Speaker 1:
[28:29] When Yo-Yo's performance starts, we'll have the hydrophone recording and hopefully we can record what's happening underwater.

Speaker 3:
[28:35] This is Ode, one of Lars' colleagues, and she's crouched on the side of the canoe with a little audio setup and headphones pressed to her ears.

Speaker 1:
[28:43] Yes.

Speaker 3:
[28:43] Have you ever done anything like this?

Speaker 1:
[28:46] No, this is the first time. It goes back to what sound is and it's a wave and wave travels and transmit and what is sound, what is a wave and waves are everywhere. Yeah.

Speaker 3:
[28:57] And how long do they last?

Speaker 8:
[28:59] Yeah.

Speaker 3:
[29:03] There's no guarantee that Yo-Yo's sound waves will reach any whales or that the whales will respond if they do hear them.

Speaker 4:
[29:11] All right, I'm excited.

Speaker 3:
[29:15] Moments later, Hokule'a set sail and we're off. Yo-Yo is busy setting up his cello with the marine biologists, but out of the corner of my eye, I see Snowbird.

Speaker 4:
[29:29] Because I think my job was whale chantress, that I would be chanting for the whales. Well, let's see who decides to come out then to play. As we sailed out and we started to move away from the pier, I kept my eyes scanning the horizon in front of me, and I started to chant. I called out to my ancestors, the ones I descend from, and then I said, if it is possible for us to connect with you folks, then please show us whatever those signs are. Let's see if we can connect with the rest of the Kanaloa people, like the whales, and see if the Kanaloa people want to make their presence known. The last portion of the chant says, E ho mai ka ike, grant unto me wisdom. E ho mai ka ikaika, grant unto me strength. E ho mai ka akamai, grant unto me knowledge. E ho mai ka ike papālua, grant unto me the ability to see the things that others may not see. And then the last line is, E ho mai ka mana, grant unto me the spiritual power. And when I clapped twice, right off my left side, 45 degrees, I saw the tail flap.

Speaker 3:
[31:23] It was a humpback whale.

Speaker 5:
[31:24] What? Yep, she summoned it.

Speaker 3:
[31:27] We don't quite know, but it showed itself, made itself known with its big Y-shaped tail.

Speaker 4:
[31:36] And that was it. Nothing else. I didn't see it breach, I didn't see it blow air out, just the tail flap, boom, and it was gone. And I was like, you saw that right?

Speaker 3:
[31:53] The mood was different after that. And the focus turned to Yo-Yo, who sat in the glow of Mauna Loa's lava and the double rainbow crown and dropped the end pin of his cello. He played a medley of all the pieces he's been playing throughout this series. Somewhere over the rainbow, Amazing Grace, a Catalan folk tune called Song of the Birds, the prelude to Bach Cello Suite No. 1 in G Major. And we waited by headphones, listening underwater for a response. But Yo-Yo had another idea. Maybe if he played the sounds of whales that he learned to replicate, maybe some whales would call back.

Speaker 6:
[33:29] I think the only thing that I can count on is purity of intention. You know, we mean no harm going there. The intentions are benign.

Speaker 4:
[33:45] I watched how he played, how he closed his eyes, how he moved, and I thought, they're hearing you, and they'll respond to you in the way that they will respond.

Speaker 3:
[34:01] But the water remained quiet.

Speaker 4:
[34:04] Sometimes you don't get it recorded. Sometimes it's not seen by everyone because it's not meant for that. It's meant for that audience, even if it's an audience of one.

Speaker 3:
[34:25] We don't know if Yo-Yo's music or whale sounds reached any whales. After the tail flap, we didn't get any response. But through our attempts to communicate with the whales, we thought like them. We entered the realm of Kanaloa. We accessed the pole with help from Snowbird and Yo-Yo. And I think the whales felt our presence.

Speaker 6:
[34:50] That whole trip was magical. I remember those double rainbows. You know, and are they signs? Are they just natural occurrences and all coincidences? And we don't know, right? We probably will never know. And whatever we know, we're trying to bring as a peaceful offering. And if they choose to engage, which in our case, they didn't really, that doesn't mean that we can't try again and see what happens, because that's what people do.

Speaker 3:
[35:25] Because it all comes back to knowing our place in this world. If we're truly connected to the world around us, we're listening, we're observing and striving to understand something we can't yet see or touch, but know exists.

Speaker 5:
[35:45] Wow. Anna Gonzalez and Yo-Yo Ma, thank you so much for bringing us this story. Reminder that they went on a ton more adventures, and you can listen to all of those on their podcast, Our Common Nature. But just to entice people, did you meet any other animals along the way?

Speaker 6:
[36:09] We saw fireflies, birds, black bears.

Speaker 3:
[36:13] Bees and bats, alive and mummified.

Speaker 6:
[36:16] And many, many incredible people.

Speaker 3:
[36:19] And those people taught us so many incredible ideas, like this one thing I learned from Snowbird that I want to share with you about that famous Hawaiian word, aloha.

Speaker 4:
[36:31] Aloha is having a deep love and respect and understanding for all the good stuff and all the bad. All the obstacles and all the successes. Aloha is when you look at someone with empathy and compassion. If I say to you, aloha kāua, love and respect, understanding dwells between you and I. The world needs that. Aloha.

Speaker 5:
[37:20] Thank you, Snowbird. Thank you, Yo-Yo. Thank you, Ana. Thank you, Wales. Thank you, you, for listening. One more time, if you want to go on more wild adventures with Ana and Yo-Yo, check out their podcast, Our Common Nature. It is such a beautiful and tender thing that, like the word aloha, I think the world needs more of right now. Bonus fact, songbud Alan also helped make it and sound design it too. So one more time, that's Our Common Nature. We'll be back next time with a brand new Terrestrials episode. Ana, want to take us away on the credits?

Speaker 3:
[37:57] Our Common Nature is a production of WNYC and Sound Postings. Hosted by me, Ana Gonzalez, produced by Alan Goffinski with editing from Pearl Marvel, and original music by Alan Goffinski. Mixed by Joe Plord, fact checking by Ana Alvarado, additional fact checking by Sophie Semmy. Our executive producers are Emily Boteen, Ben Mandelkern, Sophie Shackleton, and Jonathan Baez. Our advisors are Mira, Burtwin Tonic, Kamaka Diaz, Kelly Libby, and Chris Newell. Special thanks to my mom, Maura, for picking up the phone, and the Hawaii Institute of Marine Biology and the Polynesian Voyaging Society for making our whale dreams possible. This podcast was inspired by a project of the same name, conceived by Yo-Yo Ma and Sound Postings with creative direction by Sophie Shackleton in collaboration with partners all over the world. And if you want to listen to more music from this series, you can check out the Our Common Nature EP, featuring Yo-Yo playing with Eric Mingus, Jen Kreisberg, and an Icelandic choir, now available on all streaming platforms. Our Common Nature is made possible with support from Emerson Collective and Tambourine Philanthropies. Special thanks to the one and only Yo-Yo Ma. And I want to dedicate this episode to the memories of Eleanor Sterling, who used to run the Hawaii Institute of Marine Biology, and to my aunt, Beth Pyle, until we meet again.