Cho The Asian Carp Analysis

Cho the Asian carp lives with her disabled brother Chang Pu who has suffered autism since a very young age due to pollution in the Chao Lake. Cho talks to us about the struggles and downfalls of living in this dying lake.

This is her story.

Every day I get up, I swim to the shops to buy gill filters for Chang and me. (They protect Chang and myself from the toxic water we filter) I then come home to Chang and help him get ready for the grueling day of work, looking after Chang and struggling to survive another day.

I have lived with change for my whole life, our parents and all of our siblings have passed away from cancer causing diseases that our world brings upon us, Chang tries his best to help me out but it never manages to help me out, I am constantly running around trying to make money and get food to provide for him.

Chang has suffered Autism for thirteen years of our lives, he developed symptoms of autism at the age of two and it is believed he developed this disability from the toxic waste the humans constantly dump in our home lake.

I have never had the money to go to doctors or specialists, he is my everything and my one wish would be to get help for him, to make him well.

Every day when I go out, I see men and women both adults and children on the fish-ways and swimmeries struggling to live their life because of poverty, sickness, loss of loved ones and the government never giving us lower fish any financial help.

I’m not saying I want the government’s money but if I was handed 20 extra dollars a day I could put that into a savings account to help put Chang and even help us get out of this God forsaken place, get us to somewhere else cleaner and a place that can treat Chang.

Things seem grim for Chang and me, but I believe that things can get better for us.

(Translated from

mandarin)

Tim and Lucy are recently engaged guppies that have decided to travel the world in hope that they can help out any struggling or in need fish of the world, in reading about Cho and her struggles, they have decided to visit her and help her out in any way possible.

Tim and Lucy talk about before and during their experience with Cho and Chang.

Upon hearing and reading about Cho and Chang’s struggles with life and the human’s pollution, we decided to act quickly before anything more could happen to them, we packed in Indonesia and we flew in the best pelican’s mouth we could find to Chao Lake in search of Cho and her poor brother.

Upon arrival, we could instantly sense and feel the difference between our home town of Perth and this polluted dead lake, our filtering became forced and Lucy fell ill on the third day of searching for Cho.

Out went out to buy filters and what I saw was appalling. Men, women and children were lying on the sea beds of the fish-ways, dying and in need of instant medical treatment, I did what I could, but sadly I could only help out a few of the children and a couple adults. When I got back from the store with gill filters Lucy told me she found Cho outside her house on gogle maps. Upon the news I was so excited at the fact we were finally able to help out the obviously needy girl.

When we found our way to Cho and Chang’s house, we brought medical equipment and food for them, the look on their faces made us so happy to see the looks on both of their faces.
We offered them money to pay for Chang’s research and medical treatment, sadly, Cho denied it.
Although she did accept our offer of allowing us to return annually and bringing help in any way possible.

Lucy told me after meeting both children that she was looking in adoption, but because we did not have the funds right now to ask for a legal adoption, next time we visit them I am sure we will have enough saved up to legally adopt them so they can have a caring loving family.

There is still hope for these two poor children, they just need someone to love them.

Isamu and Bayani are two of the 1.5 million silver carp deployed into the Chao Lake to clean up and cleanse this dead lake, the two male fish are being made to eat the toxic waste dropped by the humans. This does not hurt them as they are specially bred for this mission.

These two fish risk their lives for the safety of many generations to come.

Our parents were both genetically modified to be immune to the type of waste in the Chao Lake. This of course rubbed onto us, and many other fish whose parents were modified also. As children we lived a normal life, but we were different as in we never fell ill or got hurt in any way that other children would.

Our parents were not entirely rich nor were they poor, we lived a healthy sustained life like any other child would and we went to school. We saw heaps of humans through our lifetime but they never tried to hurt many of the fish around us or pollute our waters, they were very kind to us.

When we were 15 years old both myself and Isamu decided we wanted to join the finy, we both wanted to serve our waters and our government. We felt the need to help others to make the world a better place. We joined the finy when we turned eighteen and then trained with them for a year and then served for two more years.

Four months ago we were asked to attend a meeting with our general. We were confused at first, but when we arrived, we were told that we had a choice of joining the special operations unit of our army or stay in our positions we were in already, we jumped at the opportunity of being in the special operations unit. We signed up instantly

Our first mission was actually the one we are going on soon, we are scared, intrigued but most of all, ready.

(Translated from mandarin)

Statement of intent:

This short story I have written is about six fish, and their struggles with the pollution of Chao Lake, it shows two fish and how they live in the Lake, it shows another couple and how they wish to help out residents of Chao and lastly it shows two fish talking about how they were hired to help fix the lake.
I am aiming this story at young teenagers, this is because it is made in a comical way using fish but it also contains subjects too much for younger children to handle.
I have written this story to tell the teenagers about the dangers of pollution in the Chao Lake.