What happens when we learn to listen to the sea — and to the lives unfolding beneath its surface?

After nearly sixty years spent sailing the Mediterranean, Thierry Hoolans and Monique have come to know a world that many of us rarely experience: a world of peace and tranquillity, far from the artificial noise of engines and harbours. And once you have experienced that quietness, you begin to understand what is at stake when it disappears.

Thierry Hoolans is president of ADN Passpartou, a Corsican association dedicated to the protection of nature and the well-being and rights of animals. Through the observation of animal behaviour, particularly that of dolphins and other cetaceans, the association seeks to deepen our understanding of how other species experience the world — and to share that knowledge with the public.

In this episode of A Cup of Care, we enter the hidden world of marine life and explore how sound shapes the lives of dolphins and whales. Drawing on Thierry’s decades of experience at sea, his conservation work and his book Dans la tête des dauphins, we are invited to look beyond our own human perspective and consider the lives of other beings on their own terms.

From the beauty of the Mediterranean to the growing pressures of human activity, this is a journey from listening to understanding, and from understanding to responsibility. It asks us to reconsider our place in the natural world — and to reflect on how our everyday choices, from the way we travel to the way we consume, can help make room for other forms of life.

A talk with Thierry, Monique and Rose. More information about the issue here: https://wwfwhales.org/news-stories/safeguarding-mediterranean-giants

Because the sea is not silent. It is full of life, full of voices, and full of worlds we are only beginning to understand.

Perhaps protecting it begins with something very simple: learning to listen.