Our young sailor has literary ambitions. The Adventures of Niko the Little Penguin and His Friends is her first story, written a year ago in the wake of our voyage to Antarctica, meeting polar researchers and the boys Vitya and Niko from the Russian diaspora at the edge of the world. Our young sailor is waiting to hear what you think, friends!
The Adventures of Niko the Little Penguin and His Friends
By Lada Andreyevna Klochkova, born in 2011
How the Story Came to Be
In February 2019, our whole family sailed to Antarctica aboard our yacht, where we live as we voyage around the world. I really liked Antarctica because it is beautiful there. The mountains (when I saw them, I was surprised, because I had thought there were only plains there) are not always completely covered in snow, and you can see black stripes of rock. The icebergs are blue, like the sea in a hotel advertisement. And the penguins are so funny!
Of course, we could not help calling at the Russian Antarctic station Bellingshausen. There I met Vitaly, a meteorologist, who gave me photographs of penguins and their chicks taken at another Russian station, Mirny. A large colony of emperor penguins lives there. The babies were so adorable that I was inspired and began making up a story about little penguins. The photographs taken by meteorologist Vitaly added so much to this story. My parents and friends like it, and I hope you will find it interesting too.
Yes, I named the little penguins Niko and Vitya after my friends—Russian boys from the city of Ushuaia, in Tierra del Fuego.
Our young sailor at the Bellingshausen Antarctic station.
Chapter 1, in Which We Meet Niko
On the coldest continent, Antarctica, amid the ice, there lived a large colony of emperor penguins. They were the largest penguins in the entire penguin world. Every autumn they left the ocean and travelled 150 kilometres to the place where they themselves had once been born. There they chose mates in a very unusual way. A male would begin to sing, and if a female liked his voice, they became a pair. I had no idea penguins could sing...
Then the female penguins laid their eggs, handed them over to the males and went back to the ocean to catch fish for the chicks. And the fathers stood there incubating their future children all winter! Despite the bitter cold, down to minus 60, and the polar night. For an entire month, the sun did not appear even for a second.
Four months had passed since the beginning of winter. The hungry fathers had endured their cold ordeal. Then one day, the colony leader felt someone nudging him from below, through the shell of the egg he had kept warm for so long and with such care. It was his son. His very own son!
He hatched, tiny, wet and terribly hungry. All winter, each father had kept one portion of food in his stomach. And that was the portion the leader gave his son.
Polar researcher Vitaly Boldin’s photograph captures this very moment
A few days passed, and hope of food and support appeared on the horizon... It was the mothers! They were walking, and some were sliding on their bellies, their stomachs full of food. The mothers arrived, and that was when they saw their tiny, fluffy chicks!
The chicks warm themselves beneath the fathers’ warm fold of skin above their feet. The very same place where they kept warm while they were still inside their eggs
The Little Penguin’s Adventures
Niko, the leader’s son, grew up very curious and brave, and he loved peering into cracks in the ice. He did not learn to swim straight away (of course, because fluffy, down-covered chicks cannot swim), but once he did, he and his friends loved sliding down the hill by the bay on their bellies and bouncing off the ramp. Their parents warned them:
“Don’t slide into the bay. An evil killer whale lives there, and she hunts us.”
The youngsters remembered the warning, but once, carried away with their game, Niko forgot about the killer whale, took a huge run-up and splashed into the water.
“Come on, everyone! Let’s go swimming!” he called.
And one brave girl named Zhuzhu took a run-up and flew into the water after him with a delighted squeal. The chicks shouted:
“Careful! There’s a killer whale in there!”
But it was too late. The girl had already landed with a splash right on the nose of the sleeping killer whale.
The penguins’ mother and her catch
Niko and Zhuzhu’s best friend, a little penguin named Vitya, who was the fastest of them all, raced off to fetch help from the colony. The others began thinking of a way to help Niko and Zhuzhu get out.
The killer whale was asleep near the bottom, dreaming that she had attacked a group of penguins and chicks. The sleeping predator had not expected something to land on her nose. Furious at being woken before she could finish her dream, the killer whale chased after Zhuzhu. The predator pursued the poor girl for so long that Zhuzhu was already exhausted... The killer whale was about to swallow her!
To the Rescue!
Niko could not bear to see his friends in trouble. And what do you think he did? Of course, he hurried to rescue his friend. But how could he do that when the killer whale’s jaws were already reaching for Zhuzhu?
“No time to think—it’s now or never!” the brave little penguin decided. He tried to sit on the enraged predator’s eyes so that Zhuzhu would have time to reach the shore. The little penguin began catching up with the killer whale.
No, don’t think Niko was faster than a killer whale. Just imagine: someone is trying to eat your friend—what would you do? He did not manage to sit on her eyes, but... one stroke, then another... “Come on, Niko!”
The little penguins Niko and Zhuzhu
Hooray! Our little penguin landed on the predator’s back and tugged at her fin. It worked! The killer whale instantly forgot about Zhuzhu, who managed to get ashore.
“What’s that tugging at my fin?” The predator began swimming quickly and thrashing her fin.
Niko clung on even tighter, but because the killer whale was very strong and thrashed her fin so quickly, he soon became exhausted. He held on and held on... Oh no! Niko slid from her back onto her tail. The killer whale had almost got what she wanted. At last she caught sight of the little penguin and began chasing her own tail. Our brave hero was already exhausted, but he still hoped the enemy would swim close to shore so that he could leap off. But the killer whale had no intention of going anywhere near the shore.
“Oh! Niko, poor boy, he’s slipped off her tail!” With his last ounce of strength, he swam towards the shore. The killer whale chased after him. Niko could not quite reach the shore, but then his penguin father appeared on the bank and shouted:
“Hold on, son!”
He stretched out his flipper. At the very last moment, just as the killer whale opened her jaws to eat Niko, the little penguin grabbed his father’s flipper.
.
Everything Will Be All Right
Vitya rushed over from the shore and firmly grasped Dad’s foot so that Niko would not pull him into the water. Some penguins slid down the slope, while others had already grabbed hold of Vitya. One! Two!... They all pulled together, and Niko managed to get out.
Though he did fall on top of Dad. And Dad fell on Vitya. And all the penguins toppled over like dominoes. Then they all began hugging one another. Of course, his parents and Vitya were the happiest of all. Once the first excitement had died down, his parents asked Niko:
“Why did you go swimming? We warned you, didn’t we?”
“I’m sorry. I forgot about the killer whale. I was very frightened, especially for Zhuzhu. Never—I promise you—never again will I swim in the bay!”
And that was how the first adventures of Niko the Little Penguin and his friends came to an end.
The growing chicks are ready to moult 🙂
This story features photographs taken by Vitaly Boldin, a meteorologist with the 63rd Russian Antarctic Expedition at Bellingshausen Station, which he gave to us. Thank you!
Our young sailor is anxious to know whether you enjoyed the little penguin’s adventures, friends. And should we publish the sequel?
Thank you to everyone who is with us. We are grateful for your support and for the tremendous boost of motivation that your warm words and letters give us all.