#Free Admission Illustration

[freeadmission]

Alex in my designs.

One of the amazing things I get to do is work with people I love working with on a regular basis.

Alex and I connected a few years back and have been making magic together ever since,

For this shoot, I used my up-cycled designs and we shot in the studio.

The editorial was featured in Issue 28, Volume 16 of Selin magazine and it’s called Alex in Design.

If you want your own copy you can find it here.

[hetalianhistorian]

New "Flower Parade" illustrations and merchandise has been released!

Source links: 1 2

The event will be hosted in stores within Tokyo and Osaka, with both places having their own time duration. After the event, online mail orders will be put up!

The Tokyo venue will be held at the Medicos Shop Shinjuku (Shinjuku Marui Annex 6th floor) from November 1st until November 17th. There will be a lottery system held in order to avoid congestion in the venue. The first shuffle lottery will begin on November 1st in front of the store and tickets will be distributed from 11:00 AM JST to 11:10 AM JST. Official store admission will begin on 12:00 PM JST. Each person will receive only one ticket. If you receive a ticket, you are guaranteed entry into the store, not a guarantee for the availability of products you may wish to purchase.

The Osaka venue will be held at the Abeno Rakubus (5th floor of Abeno Hoop) from December 13th until December 22nd. Store hours will run from 11 AM JST to 7:00 PM JST. Information how to attend here has yet to be released.

For both venues, each person will be limited up to 3 purchases of blindbox items, or up to 3 units of each type of a single product.

Goods List

Large Acrylic Stands -  ¥1,925 yen each

Acrylic Diorama -  ¥4,070 yen each

Acrylic Multistand - ¥1,925 yen each

Clear File Set -  ¥990 yen each

Illustration Card Set - ¥1,100 yen each

Tin Badge Collection -  ¥495 yen each individually (blindbag) / ¥4,950 yen for the whole set

Acrylic Keychain Collection -  ¥660 yen each individually (blindbag) / ¥6,600 yen for the whole set

Mini Photo Card Collection -  ¥440 yen each individually (blindbag) / ¥4,400 yen for the whole set

Sticker Collection -  ¥880 yen each (blindbag) / ¥8,800 yen for the whole set

Chibi Acrylic Stands -  ¥990 yen each

Chibi Can Badges -  ¥495 yen each (blindbag) / ¥4,950 yen for the whole set

Chibi Acrylic Keychains -  ¥660 yen each(blindbag) -  ¥6,600 yen for the whole set

Flower Purse -  ¥1,100 yen each

Sacoche Bag -  ¥1,980 yen each

There will also be an event exclusive OSMO stamps featuring the new illustrations! Each stamp will cost ¥1,210 yen each and you can purchase them within the venues! There will also be two exclusive offers during the venue event!

For every ¥1,000 yen spent related to any Hetalia goods, you will receive a random bonus clear card for free! This offer will end as soon stock runs out.

For every ¥3,000 yen spent related to any Hetalia goods, you will receive a bonus illustration card featuring the entire cast! This offer will end as soon stock runs out and this will not be offered for the post-goods sale.

[dongsofsevotion]

mr./matsumoto appreciation post

original post on twt • pixiv: 13014758 • twitter: Mr__Juck

the short comic above is mr's contribution for the 白黒理論RETURNS anthology, a joint project between japanese and korean ginhiji artists, headed up by tonyu. amazingly, it is still available for purchase on melonbooks. some real heavy hitters in there - the obu short might be worth the price of admission alone.

no great agenda behind this post except it's mr's birthday and he's one of my all-time faves. so let's celebrate 🎈

mr has published many books over the years, but a general lack of mail order means they've been pretty hard to come by. nevertheless, here are two i think of often:

啄んで、花 愛、かわるものに嘯く: this one lives in my head absolutely rent-free. hijikata is going to die, mutual pining and serious emotional damage transpires, but it resolves to a happy end.

毒悦: a joint publication with nanaoemu, themed around deviant fetishes. mr writes the DV and codepency part - twisted, juicy.

there are many others, like a W vice-commander series that unfortunately remains unfinished, and a yakuza x teacher (& reverse) joint publication with sawara, but they are again a little hard to find. they are all fantastic, regardless.

these days, mr mostly works in the nijisanji and crazy raccoon fandoms, but he will be returning to ginhiji for december's otokomae uke anthology (please consider supporting it!). he also writes and illustrates original BL which you can find on his other twitter.

happy birthday, mr!

[merakiui]

Stepson! Floyd with accidentaly pregnancy 😭

Like imagine he thinks you can't have children anymore due to the age gap so he would just happily stuff you full every tike he visits. But then in the next weeks, you start to feel sick and all the symptoms start to appear <3

AAAAAA OTL and you don’t say anything to him about it at first because you really don’t want to believe it. Perhaps it’s a testament to Floyd’s determination to tie himself to you forever—that and his virility. ;;; you’re sluggish in the mornings and when Floyd visits you’re still resting in bed, feeling so sick and sleepy. Floyd’s immediately concerned; if he didn’t have a key to the home (which is more like a looming estate to outsiders. But hey. Home, sweet home.), he’d have kicked the door down when you neglected to answer on the first knock. He's all over you, insisting he help you to the doctor. You tell him it's fine; you'll handle it and if not there are servants employed to help out when needed. Floyd, cutest sweetheart that he is at twenty-nine years old, pouts at you. He's just worried about his mama. He hates seeing you like this. It makes him feel so anxious.

Floyd tries to move back in so he'll be here to look after you, but his pops won't have any of it. The two of them are volatile about the entire thing, hackles raising when he says, "I'll look after my wife. You just focus on yourself, Floyd." And Floyd retorts with an icy, snarling, "Yeah? Well, I'm gonna look after my mama."

Even though you're so fatigued, you manage to sit up enough to scold the both of them. And, though they look like they're two seconds apart from tearing into the other, they listen. You tell Floyd to go home and he tries to protest—this is his home, too—but you give him that stern look many mothers are notorious for and he immediately shuts up. He's pissed about the entire thing the following morning, complaining about it to Ace and Jamil when the three of them get together for breakfast. Ace really doesn't understand it; Jamil does, but he's not about to call Floyd a motherfucker (literally) to his face and risk the consequences that will soon follow.

Jade, slippery, all-knowing Jade, suspects it. Floyd and their father are alike in more ways than one, even if Floyd will never admit to being anything like his old man. He's stubborn like that. But the both of them, though sharply intelligent when the situation calls for it, can be incredibly, obnoxiously dense. Jade knows it's not a joke either; they genuinely have no clue and have yet to catch on.

He visits on days when Floyd and his father aren't around so that he can fawn over you in his own ways, making note of the obvious while you're too bedridden to brush his observations away. He helps you to the bathroom when you need to vomit or pee, standing in the doorway so patiently. You try to shut the door, valuing privacy and dignity and everything in between; he stops it from closing with his foot, his head tilted curiously. The unspoken is illustrated clearly in his actions: Don't shut me out, Mother.

He half-expects you to confide in him because he's Jade—responsible, logical, problem-solving Jade. And you do. When he serves you lunch in bed and you try to keep something—anything—down, he rubs your back soothingly and the admission just tumbles free.

"Jade, honey, I think I'm pregnant."

And he smiles, but it doesn't reach his eyes. "I know, Mother."

Floyd always knows how to take the best things from him. Although that's partially Jade's fault. Everyone's always indulged Floyd; even Jade's guilty of it. It was Floyd who'd get the bigger half of something when it was split between the two of them. It was Floyd who was set to inherit the family business from day one. It was Floyd who got to kiss you on the mouth first. It was Floyd who fucked you first when Jade was out of the country on a business trip. And now it's Floyd who's knocked you up.

Jade's not jealous. If he was jealous, he'd feel as if he was losing his place as your stepson. And he's not. You love Jade as much as you love Floyd (granted, not in the way he loves you, but he can settle for familial for now). But he is envious, sickly so.

Because who else? Who else could possibly knock you up even when you're supposedly too old to be able to have kids?

[kuroshitsuji-indonesia]

꧁GFantasy 30th Anniversary Museum꧂

This museum event will be held on October~December 2023 start in Tokyo, Aichi, Osaka, dan Fukuoka.

Visual illustrated by Yana Toboso, Daisuke Hagiwara, AidaIro and NAOE.

The admission is free! (need prior appointment later in website).

For detail information: click here.

[floatsonabigballoon28]

So I finally read Looking Forward by Maya Henry

And... Here are my thoughts

1) Liam's record company/ the people he surrounds himself with are real villians. Not only do they lie a bunch and keep Liam under heavy surveillance (even his therapist gives "assessment reports" to his manager), they also expect Maya to basically be his manager? Assistant? babysitter? mommy? For free. And all f time.

2) She had to get out. And the switch in his behaviour on drugs must've been sofucking hard..i mean The first half of the book had me wishing Liam was my boyfriend and he's always been my least favourite member of the band. The abortion was horrific. Truly horrific. And the axe night was the stuff of nightmares. I'm glad she got out. And she has the right to talk about it. Period

3) Liam needs help. Serious Help. He needs to get out of whatever bullshit music contract he is tied up in (if any) and focus on sobriety and therapy? Which includes having *sober* people he can rely and trust around him. Probably not the boys tho maybe someone like Chappel Roan? Or Beiber? Lol idk.

4) It's not hard or a stretch to believe his behaviour in the book - the narcissism, anger and almost split personality - based on his own admissions in public appearances. (Diary of aCeo podcast, Logan Paul Podcast, Random other viewings)

5) This book could've been heavily edited. Although the illustrations are working!

6) The sexts with fans are disgusting

[call-me-liquid]

Hi my real legal full government name is Liquid Lorch Orcard,

HI MY NEW GENUINE TRUE HONEST NAME GOVERNMENT NAME IS

LIQUID BHALLS TARA CD-ROM HACK ELDRITCH HORROR PEET DOLLAGANGER THE THIRD.

This is """"not"""" a blog for me to dump Lily Orchard shitposts. (Whoever that is never heard of her.)

Do """"not""""" send me asks, especially """"don't"""" ask for drawing requests.

I did """not"""" set up a Ko-fi in case anyone can spare some tuppence for a poor degenerate. Do """"""not"""" give me money """"it violates my boundaries.""""

You """""can't"""" find the pngs of the Lily wojaks free to download there.

(Out of character: I want to make it clear I personally do not encourage anyone to interact with Lily and will block people who I see deadnaming her or throwing genuine transphobia in her direction. There's a line, this is supposed to be just goofs, let's not cross it fam.)

People kept asking, I'll take commissions here.

Enjoy this commissions sheet I just slapped together.

I may need to close commissions pretty suddenly if I get to busy with my day job, but we'll see.

This is for personal requests. Please still send me funny requests for Lily-related shit through asks! I'll do those for free!

Donate to the Ko-fi ($1+), write an ingredient to add, at 100$ we'll make her eat it!

The first name of each contributor plus the ingredient they added will be added to the list on the pinned post.

(Plus help enable an artist's shitposting.)

LORCH SOUP INGRIDIENTS:

1. Gay Rights - Eldrich L.

2. Three beans - Spaghetti T.

3. Cum tissues - Chaos (Sheev P.)

4. Adderall - Sai S.

Want some spook? Check out the horror blog:

Lilian Orchard this is a genuine offer. I'm serious. This isn't a joke, I'm being 100% genuine. I'll be copying this to my pinned post. Listen up:

I will lease you ALL the PNG files and character design sheet for Liquid Orcard to use and edit any way you/Mikaila wish FOR FREE, I will take down the Bhaalspawnfunniez tumblr, and I will convert THIS tumblr to a personal blog IF:

You purge all minors from your Patreon.

You stop issuing copyright takedowns to channels who react to your content.

You make a formal apology, at least vaguely addressing all your victims. *I know you can't properly apologize without incriminating yourself, but SOMETHING.

You agree to stop mentioning OR alluding to your victims or ex-friends who want nothing to do with you. Namely, Josh Scorcher, Britt, KP, Sunny, Lizzy, Courtney, etc.

You agree to stop spreading defamatory/liable claims about your critics. Anthony, Crim, Sai, etc.

You allow me time to get in contact with Courtney to see if there's ANYTHING that can be done to allow her to receive some kind of closure for what you've done to her. *again, I realize you can't make an admission of guilt without incriminating yourself, and it's too much to ask for you to do the right thing. So something. It can be negotiated.

I will need some way to ensure my terms are being upheld. I will make you sign a contract stating these are the terms in which you can use my artwork and will use all resources at my disposal to enforce it. You want to rebrand? Here you go. Fresh new character design for free.

My DMs are open.

[door]

MONOKEL

Invitation to the famed Berlin lesbian bar, months before the rise of the Nazi Party. Illustrated handbill, 105x150 mm; 4x5¾ inches, completed in manuscript with date and event; folds, otherwise minimal wear. [Berlin], 3 March 1932.

Monokel was opened in 1931, one of three lesbian clubs run by Lotte Hahm (1890-1967), known for wearing short hair and tuxedos, and her partner Käthe Fleischmann (1899-1967) as part of Berlin's flourishing gay scene. It was named after the monocle, which had become a fashion staple among the international lesbian community. In this invitation, Monokel is described as "Die Bar der Frau" (the bar for women), and offers dancing and a cabaret program with free admission. The illustration shows two elegantly dressed women dancing.

Less than a year after this invitation was issued, the Nazi Party rose to power and began a violent assault on Berlin's gay culture. Fleischmann, who was Jewish, spent two years doing hard labor in a work camp before escaping; she barely survived the war.

Lot 46, Sale 2677: LGBTQ+ Art, Material Culture & History, Swann Auction Galleries

[colleendoran]

At The Pixelated Geek photos of the San Diego Comic Con Museum exhibit featuring Colleen Doran Illustrates Neil Gaiman. Your last chance to see some of this work in person, as a lot of it goes back to private collections and may never be seen again.

[mossiistars]

I JUST SAW YOU GOT INTO RISD how. olease. its like my dream art school i need i need to know please

(also you have improved SO much since i last saw you're art!!!!! it looks great and i can see why you got into such a great art school :D)

live laugh jmart

first of all WAUGH THANK YOU

second of all it was. a mix of things.

I spent a LOT of time working on my portfolio, and really pushing myself to do things I wasn't used to. I used a pretty wide variety of mediums, included both realism and illustration, observational and storytelling. I focused on the creativity of the process just as much as the pieces themselves.

I also had the advantage of getting to go to a precollege program at an art school over the summer, where I learned a lot of really helpful skills and where I got to do live figure drawing. However!!! Another really good way to practice figure is to just go sit down in some public place and do quick sketches of people, and if you search around a bit you might be able to find some local figure drawing classes!

I asked a LOT of people for help with reviewing my portfolio. My art teachers at school, staff at a local art studio, I went to national portfolio day, and my neighbor actually used to work in RISD admissions and had a lot of good advice.

My grades are also pretty good, I've taken several AP classes, and I did well on the SAT. Grades aren't quite as important when applying to art school but with RISD especially they can definitely help. With the commonapp stuff, I talked with my guidance counselor about what to include, and asked for help reviewing my essay. I also applied early decision.

I watched videos about accepted portfolios (tip: if looking at other art, try to look for specific aspects that make it a good portfolio piece, not just "wow that drawing is good"- what technical skills are being displayed, how much variety is there in skills shown, etc. how pleasing the piece itself looks isn't what they're looking for, they wanna see that you can do different things, in your process, etc.). I also went to some of RISD's online webinars!

Sorry for the essay lol, but I hope this has helped :) Basically- don't be afraid to ask for help, use the resources available to you, push yourself to do new things, and be prepared to have basically no free time for the fall of your senior year (this last one isn't entirely true,,,it depends on how you space stuff out but trust me with a portfolio on top of the standard application you will be BUSY.)

If you wanna talk about it more I'm happy to dm!

[freeadmission]

Free Admission Designs published in Malvie Magazine

Models Rebecca and Daniela styled by Heather Jude wearing my upcycled designs.

Shot in the studio at Doris Land.

Published in Malvie Magazine The Artist Edition Vol 608.

Each piece featured my continuous line drawings placed on a thrifted piece of clothing.

Some feature a silkscreened image that I designed by hand.

This collection is hitting the runway on May 21 and I can’t wait to see what the reaction will be.

[hetalianhistorian]

New pop-up Hetalia Carousel illustrations for Animate Cafe!!

Source link: https://twitter.com/animate_cafe/status/1808063429795893507?t=16Zj9PcH5rINaK-fhTB-CA&s=19

The event will take place at the Animate Cafe Stand in Ikebukurom The event will run from August 1st to September 2nd.

It seems to be that there will be reservation by lottery, running from July 26th to June 7th, 11 AM to 8 PM on those days. Same goes for free admission. (Note: I am unsure what the listed times exactly mean according to translate)

If you won a reservation by lottery, you can check in as login as you arrive before the closing of each showing. There is free admission, but it will be within the last 15 minutes of the show.

In order to sign up for the lottery, you must visit the Animate Cafe website and click login. You must verify your login through Club Animate or LINE. Then select, "Lottery reservation" and it will allow you to choose a date, place, number of people, and which store you would like to reserve.

[faefaye]

Sometimes I get so emotional about the original Klein.

He was just a normal person with simple dreams of having a better life and a bigger house with his siblings. His education was through Sunday school until his father's death provided the money for enrolling somewhere else. The year he entered university, his mother died. Despite or because of all that, he worked hard trying to achieve what he wanted.

While he got average results in university, that's because he got in on a scholarship and was of a lower social and economic class compared to most of his peers, having to study a lot more to catch up. During which he ended up knowing at least half a dozen different languages. After graduating, he immediately started to prepare for his interview and was just two days away from going for it... then came 28th June.

Somewhere out there is a world in which the Antigonus notebook incident didn't happen, where he passed that interview and lived an ordinary and happy life as a university lecturer (although maybe not all that ordinary if he went after Fourth Epoch history following his interest :p).

Don't get me wrong, I adore LOTM Klein, but I can't help but wonder about the person he was and could be without the infusion of Zhou Mingrui.

(hiding canon quotes illustrating this under the read more, do feel free to add other information on og Klein):

Chapter 1: (1) [His father's] bereavement allowance gave Klein the opportunity to study in a private language school and laid the foundation for his admission into university...

(2) [His mother] passed away the year Klein passed the entrance examinations to Khoy University...

Chapter 2: However, back when he burned the midnight oil four years ago to be admitted into Khoy University[...]

Chapter 3: (1) In light of the present situation, Zhou Mingrui believed that if Klein were to return to university, it was unlikely he could graduate. This was despite him having left campus just days ago without relaxing one bit.

(2) It was not that Klein did not think of helping share his elder brother’s burden but being born a commoner and having been admitted into an average language school, he felt a strong sense of inadequacy when he enrolled into university. For example, as the origin of all languages in the Northern Continent, the ancient language of Feysac was something all the children of nobles and of the wealthy class would learn from a young age. In contrast, he only made first contact with it in university.

He faced many similar aspects during his schooling career. Klein nearly gave his all and often stayed up late into the night and woke up early before barely managing to catch up to the others, eventually allowing him to graduate with average results.

Chapter 4: In his memory fragments, he had once fantasized about renting a bungalow in the suburbs. There would be five or six rooms, two bathrooms, a huge balcony upstairs, two rooms, a dining room, a living room, a kitchen, a bathroom, and an underground storage room on the first floor.

Chapter 9: Having set his sights on solving the mystery and restoring history, Klein didn’t have much interest in the first three eras, whose roots were closer to legends. He was more interested in the Fourth Epoch, also known as the Age of the Gods.

Chapter 18: "Of course, when I received primary education during Sunday school[...]"

Chapter 24: With Klein requiring a scholarship to finance his university studies, he, Welch, and the others had joined Khoy University’s rowing club and were pretty good at it.

Chapter 98: As for the original Klein, he had focused on his studies early on and had suffered from malnutrition. That led him to possess a below-average physical condition. 

Chapter 260: The original Klein was a fanatic towards the history of the Fourth Epoch. He often read journal articles and books, so even now, Klein still remembered a lot of content.

Chapter 323: (1) He tried the words in ancient Feysac, Intis, Loen, and other languages again, but the result was the same.

As for Jotun, Elvish, Dragonese, and other languages from the mysticism domain, Klein could only try them out of hope since they was overly restrictive and unlikely to be the language used.

(2) Klein switched to the languages of Loen, Highlander, and Feysac, but still failed to achieve the desired results.

(Klein studied Jotun after transmigrating, but even excluding all the mysticism languages, considering he knew Hermes in Chapter 1, there's five)

(edited 17/05/23 to add the quote from Ch 98)

[mmenvs3000w25]

Prompt 6: Unpack the following quote...

There is no peculiar merit in ancient things, but there is merit in integrity, and integrity entails the keeping together of the parts of any whole, and if these parts are scattered throughout time, then the maintenance of integrity entails a knowledge, a memory, of ancient things. …. To think, feel or act as though the past is done with, is equivalent to believing that a railway station through which our train has just passed, only existed for as long as our train was in it. — Edward Hyams, Chapter 7, The Gifts of Interpretation

The first sentence of this quote suggests that integrity means keeping things whole and that we should preserve the integrity of ancient things. This includes maintaining a connection with our past. One way to achieve this is by utilizing our knowledge of heritage, as it serves as the bridge connecting the past, present, and future (Beck et al., 2018). If we wish to uphold the integrity that Hyams encourages, we must actively engage with history—by discussing it, documenting it, and continuously learning from it. Our past serves as a window into our future (Beck et al., 2018), and in order to shape that future for the better, we must first understand where we have been.

When applying this idea to nature interpretation, one crucial way to connect with the past is by studying how ecosystems evolve over time. Understanding the history of a species, landscape, or ecosystem is key to developing effective conservation efforts. By analyzing past environmental changes, human impacts, and species adaptations, we can make informed decisions to protect biodiversity and ecological integrity.

I’ve emphasized the importance of learning history, but how can we actively do so? One great way is by visiting museums! One of my favourite museums is the Royal Ontario Museum, which features sections on natural history, art, and culture. A bonus for students—on Tuesdays, full-time college and university students receive free admission! Other ways to engage with history include enrolling in history courses, reading historical accounts or books, watching informative programs on TV or YouTube, and exploring history-related blog posts (as long as the sources are reliable!).

Hyams’ quote also highlights the importance of keeping history "whole." This is crucial because, too often, history is presented in a fragmented or biased manner, particularly in formal education systems. There is a tendency to frame historical narratives in ways that favour certain groups while downplaying or erasing the experiences of others. As Winston Churchill famously said, “History is written by the victors.” A clear example of this is how the historical (and ongoing) mistreatment of Indigenous Peoples by the Canadian government is frequently minimized or overlooked. Many people find it uncomfortable to confront these realities, especially when they reveal past atrocities.

This ties into the second part of Hyams’ quote, which uses the metaphor of a train station to illustrate that just because we have moved on, it does not mean the past ceases to exist. Some argue that history is irrelevant—that the past is the past, and learning about it now is unnecessary. To that, I reference another quote by Churchill: “Those who fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it.” Historically marginalized communities are often told to forget their oppression and to “move on.” However, moving on without acknowledgment and accountability only creates an opportunity for these injustices to be repeated. If we truly wish to build a better future, we must first be willing to learn from and reckon with our past.

Beck, L., Cable, T. T., & Knudson, D. M. (2018). Interpreting cultural and natural heritage for a better world. Sagamore Publishing.

[ihazyourkitty]

Why John Hargrove is full of it p.1

Multiple people have expressed interest in the detailed Blackfish rebuttal I am working on. The plan is to put it in video essay format on Youtube. This not only has the potential to reach a larger audience, but it also gives me more creative/expressive flexibility that would otherwise be difficult to get across in just written text.

This project will not be completed for quite some time, as there are a lot of things to cover. However, I did want to provide a short glimpse into some things I've uncovered thus far.

You see, I plan on not only refuting the movie itself, but also covering the consequences of Blackfish, and major figures like Naomi Rose, Ingrid Visser, etc. So as part of this project, I am listening to the eBook version of John Hargrove's Beneath the Surface for the second time. It's..... so.... much..... fun.....

*sigh* Warning, there's a long rant ahead. TL;DR John Hargrove comes off as very full of himself in this book, and it's annoying.

______

Now, on a purely emotional, literary level I guess, the book is certainly very gripping. It's difficult to put down, even when you know that much of what is alleged therein is utter bullcrap. However, I don't think this is just because the whole "little-guy turns against evil corporation" trope makes for good storytelling across the board. I think it's also because, unlike Mark Simmons' Killing Keiko, or Hazel McBride's I Still Believe, John Hargrove's Beneath the Surface has the luxury of both professional editing, and a co-author (Howard Chia-Eoan).

To be clear, I'm not saying this as dig against Hazel McBride or Mark Simmons. I bring this up merely to illustrate the stark contrast here. As far as I know, their works were self published, or at least lacking the same polish and publicity from big name publishers, or sensationalist documentaries.

However, this contrast wouldn't be so noteworthy to me were it not for these two things I'm increasingly noticing in this reread of Beneath the Surface:

It is never clearly stated which parts were written by Hargrove, and which were ghost written by Chia-Eoan... but the amount of contradictions and shoehorned information in here gives me some serious suspicions.

John Hargrove... seems incredibly full of himself!

I don't have the time to elaborate on #1 right now, so we'll just talk about #2 today. John Hargrove is almost never in the wrong. He is always painted as the hero, the true advocate for these animals. You don't hear much about the other trainers he worked with or learned from. Mostly, it's just about him. He bemoans the allegedly poor conditions SeaWorld's animals are kept in, while simultaneously boasting about all his accomplishments with them. He speaks of differing perspectives between him and some of the other trainers, but seldom elaborates on what exactly those differences were. Instead, he usually just frames it in a sanctimonious "me vs. them" way.

The closest he gets to admitting any mistakes he had to learn from is when he recounted an aggressive incident with Freya at Marineland Antibes, and even then.... the whole reason why that incident (allegedly) happened was because Hargrove overestimated his training/waterworks abilities with a whale he didn't have a relationship with. His admission of that mistake is then overshadowed by the rather self-righteous tone he frames the resolution with. All the success was about him. You don't hear anything about how he worked with the other trainers there, what they brought to the table, and certainly not the stronger, lasting relationships they had with Freya. It's not that he had to mention them by name, but he didn't even mention them at all!

To be fair, this interpretation is partly subjective on my part. Still, as someone who is personally working in animal husbandry right now (albeit not with marine mammals), the gaping holes in this narrative raises some red flags.

Here's some free advice to anyone interested in working in the zoo/aquarium industry: I have been told by multiple hiring managers that they don't want someone who "just wants to work with the animals, and not deal with people." That's not how this works. You still have to work with people in some form or another.

It doesn't matter which animals you are working with. When you're on an animal husbandry/training team, you gotta ask for/provide help, seek/give feedback, communicate with other departments, etc. Complaints, conflict and disagreements will inevitably happen, but you gotta be mature about it.

And yes, in that process... you are going to make mistakes, and you're going to have to own up to them! It's part of how you learn. You're also going to inevitably work with people who don't see things the same way.

The people who can't do this tend to not only get stuck in their own way, but are more likely to start resenting coworkers and/or management whenever disagreements happen. They'll constantly complain about how other people do things, but then can't/won't take constructive feedback themselves. It's worse when it's someone with more experience under their belt because of the massive ego. Let me be clear: this kind of mindset does not help your animals! It only creates a toxic work environment that's resistant to change!

DO. NOT. BE. THIS. PERSON!!!!

No, this does not mean you can't vent frustrations. No this does not mean that you can't take pride in your work. It means that you gotta be able to swallow your pride, and not alienate other people.

So, what does all that have to do with the contrast mentioned earlier?

Like Hargrove, McBride details her career journey, but doesn't just paint it all in glamour. She talks about her setbacks, how she grew, things she learned from other people, the internships she did, the grunt work she was willing to do, etc.

Killing Keiko has less to do with the details of Mark Simmons' career path, but he does give credit to other people where it is due, even at times towards those he fundamentally disagreed with. I can remember one part where he explicitly admitted that he made a mistake too, and tellingly, it was in an instance where he played the "I've been doing this for years" card. In the very next sentence he admitted it was the wrong thing to say in that situation, and highlighted the perspective he was missing in that moment.

These things are conspicuously absent in Beneath the Surface. I don't remember anything of the sort that stood out when I first read the book, and thus far it's certainly not there in my second time around. The first third of the book is dedicated to how he dreamed of becoming a trainer as a kid, and the path he took to get there. Most of this path, though, is painted in glamor, when the reality is.... the path to getting into animal husbandry isn't particularly glamorous. Not only do you have go to college, but you also have to settle for various unpaid internships or volunteer gigs, and then apply for multiple jobs only to get several no's before it works out (to say nothing of how underpaid zookeepers/aquarists/trainers are).

Hargrove, on the other hand, kept pestering lead marine mammal trainers at SeaWorld since he was a kid, practiced his swimming/diving abilities, and started his degree in psychology. Then, as luck would have it, an apprentice trainer position opened up at SW San Antonio, and when he got the job, he jubilantly quit college. Not much is said about what kind of volunteer work he did before that. I think he did some stuff with marine mammal rescue in Texas, but I'll have to go back and reread to be sure... in any event, I wish I'd heard more about the experience he got besides swimming and pestering the SW animal training department.

And like.... great, he got the job, but it seemed more by luck than by the sweat of his brow. Then he balked that he was put in the SeaLion Stadium, and/or that he had to spend a lot of time washing dishes and spotting before even being allowed to work directly with a whale, which like..... yeah? I don't know what you were expecting dude.

(Btw, this part isn't just me being nit-picky, Duncan Versteegh from ML Antibes corroborates Hargrove's resistance to doing grunt work like cleaning)

Whenever mentioning people at SW who didn't want to work at Shamu Stadium, Hargrove couldn't understand how anyone wouldn't want that.... because heaven forbid other people have different preferences? To be fair, from what I've heard of SW work culture in general, Shamu Stadium is kind of painted as the glamorous A-team, but DANG does Hargrove really lean into that attitude!

Later on, he detailed some of the conflicts he had with SW's entertainment department. At one point his manager explicitly told him he needed learn to get along better with other departments. And like... yeah... yeah you do!

Look, I'm not interested in doing blanket apologia for SeaWorld. I'm sure Hargrove was in the right more than once when he'd argue with people, but I'm also not convinced that the whole of the entertainment department, management, et al., were just a bunch of unfeeling jerks who didn't care about the animals.

This part actually ground my gears quite a bit. Before I became an aquarist, I was an educator, and sometimes I would overhear certain husbandry staff gossip about us in a really patronizing way whenever there were miscommunications. Not that they never had valid reasons to complain, they did, but to be treated like you're just a dumb educator/guest services person is not pleasant, and certainly not professional. I don't know how common this is at other places, but I bring this up to illustrate the importance of being able to work with other departments, especially in the face of disagreements or miscommunication.

That Beneath the Surface paints Hargrove's inability to do this as a virtue rather than as the character flaw that it is... well.... it's um... it's a choice. And it's telling.

Again, some of this interpretation is subjective on my part. Ultimately, none of us can know for sure what is in someone else's heart. Hargrove does seem to sincerely care about the animals, despite the narcissism. However, the vast majority of people who are going to be reading his book are not people who have spent much if any time working in the zoo industry, and thus may not pick up on some of these things. I'm not the only one to point these things out either.

So even if one is against keeping orcas in captivity, I think being aware of the egos behind figures like Hargrove is important. When you get to the end of his book, you would think that all his former colleagues are, at best, just timid little clogs in a corporate machine, brainwashed to do as SW says. This is just not true. These people are dedicated to their animals, and have worked very hard to get where they are at. Some have gone on to get their masters, or PhD's, provide expertise to other facilities, or take part in rescues, etc., and they did it without chasing clout.

SW Corporate should absolutely treat their employees better, but their treatment of them pales in comparison to how people like Hargrove basically erase their accomplishments altogether. In this way, he tries to have it both ways... his time at SW proves how much of an expert he is, you know, because he was a senior trainer with two decades of experience after all! Oh, but when someone else from the field speaks up to refute what he says, nope.... their accomplishments don't matter, they're just brainwashed. If that doesn't scream "massive ego", then I don't know what does.

I'm only halfway through the book on this second round, so there is a chance I'll come back to correct some things here. I do encourage people to try to read this book themselves and come to their own conclusions. You don't have to buy it either, check your local library (it's how I got a hold of this eBook).

[mewmewchann]

My Confession

Katsumi hones in on a suspect, but a surprise admission changes everything...

trial 4 part 2 baybeyyyyyyyyy anyway I hope you enjoy me saying "I've been waiting for people to see this for 4 years" because I'm gonna be saying that about this trial a lot skdhgkjsdhgkj And this chapter has a few fun illustrations too!

I hope you guys enjoy! If you wanna scream in my inbox after this please feel free to do so (and you're gonna need to. :3)