On holiday in Uruguay, Tom Michell rescues a penguin from an oil slick, only to find that the bird then refuses to leave his side. Tom has little choice but to smuggle his new companion across the border, through customs and into Argentina, where he teaches in a boys’ boarding school.
‘Juan Salvador’, as Tom names the penguin, soon becomes the school rugby team’s mascot, the housekeeper’s confidant, the host at Tom’s parties and the most remarkable swimming coach in history. This plucky penguin transforms the lives of everyone he meets – in particular one young homesick schoolboy. And as for Tom, he discovers a true friend like no other…
The Penguin Lessons is the perfect combination of fairly light reading with a deeper overriding message. On encountering an oil slick in Uruguay, Tom’s anger with those responsible for it motivates him to rescue the only surviving penguin in the mass of blackness on the beach. Notwithstanding a sharp bite from the penguin when he attempts to wash the oil off it in the bath, followed by a nerve-racking journey through Argentinian customs with the penguin in a carrier bag, Tom gains the penguin’s trust and they become firm friends.
Juan Salvador is a supportive and popular presence for staff and students alike at the boarding school where Tom teaches. He has an endless stream of volunteers to feed him, clean his living quarters and venture into the market to purchase his fish. He becomes involved in all aspects of school life.
Rather than setting out to rescue a penguin, Tom had moved to Argentina so that he could travel around South America during the school holidays. Some chapters are dedicated to those wider travels and it sounds as though he was pretty intrepid – he had no hesitation travelling (and often camping) on his own to some very remote parts of Argentina, walking through the Andes on his way back home from Bolivia, and integrating fully with the lifestyles of rural gauchos (cowboys) in Paraguay. I liked these sections as they really conveyed a sense of just how vast South America is.
Finally, the epilogue of The Penguin Lessons describes Tom returning to Argentina many years later and, as part of his trip, visiting a rescue and rehabilitation centre for sea animals affected by oil and pollution in the local waters, including thousands of penguins rescued over the years. Tom is optimistic about the work done at the centre but rightly takes the opportunity to highlight to the reader the serious human impact on the local wildlife.
Although I did feel that Juan Salvador was a little over-humanised in this book, I am familiar with the feeling of having a loyal pet and attributing human thoughts and feelings to it, so it’s not a major gripe. In fact, I can imagine that the additions of the human characteristics to the penguin would make the anecdotes into perfect bedtime stories.