Chapter Seven

After snack time, Mr. Delgado comes in to tell us about the importance of recycling. He talks about the problems we might have about global warming if we keep on making the planet dirty.

Mr. Delgado says that if the Earth becomes very hot, the ice in the polar places would melt and the Earth would be flooded. Sara raises her hand and says, “That won’t happen, Mr. Delgado. God promised that He wouldn’t flood the Earth again. God even made a rainbow to remind people of His promise.”

Mr. Delgado goes quiet. I think he’s as confused as I was in the previous class. Last I heard, God was a good person, but then why would he cause a great flood? Mr. Delgado says, “Okay. But we have to help God keep the world safe from pollution, right?”

“But God doesn’t need help, Mr. Delgado,” Sara says, “He’s God. He can do anything.”

“But Sara,” I ask, “If God was good, why would he flood the earth?”

“People were being bad and making God very angry,” Sara says.

“But if God could do anything, why doesn’t he just stop himself from being angry, or stop the people from being bad?” I ask.

“Class, human beings have been behaving badly by polluting the earth. Maybe God has decided to make global warming to warn people that if they continued to neglect the environment, he would flood the earth again,” Mr. Delgado explains.

“But that can’t happen. God promised that He wouldn’t flood the earth again,” says Sara.

“Why did he flood the Earth the first time?” I ask.

“He flooded the earth to punish all the sinners,” she says.

“Did anyone die?” I ask.

“Everyone and everything died,” she says, “except for Noah, his family, and the animals in the ark.”

Now, I’m really confused. I think Sara noticed how confused I was so she explains further. She goes to where Mr. Delgado is and stands in front of the class to tell the story to everyone.

“A long, long, long, long time ago,” she begins, “the people of the Earth were being bad and disobeying God. One day, God was very angry and decided to punish all the sinners. But before he did so, he told Noah to make a big, big, big Ark for his family. God also told him to pick one boy and one girl of each kind of animal in the Earth so that they can all be saved from the great flood.”

“All?” I ask.

Sara says, “Yes, two of each animal of the earth: two geese, two elephants, two tigers, two crocodiles, two kangaroos, two ants…”

I raise my hand. Sara rolls her eyes. “Yes, Loki?”

“If there were only two ants in the boat, what did they feed the anteaters?” I ask her.

“I don’t know, I wasn’t there.” She says.

Everyone laughs.

“And then there were two snails, and two spiders, and two koala bears, and two Philippine eagles, and two tarsiers…”

“Why’d there have to be two?” I ask.

“So they won’t get lonely,” she says.

“What if they don’t like their animal partner?” I ask.

“They have no choice. They must, at least, pretend to like each other because they’re married and God will become angry if they fight and split-up. Anyway, there were two bears, two cheetahs, two mongrels…”

“Were there any dinosaurs?” I ask.

“Of course there were dinosaurs,” she says.

“If they were saved, how come there aren’t any left?” I ask.

“Maybe Noah picked the wrong dinosaurs,” she says.

“What do you mean?” I ask.

“Maybe one of the dinosaurs was gay!” Tomas Labuyo screams from the back row.

“That’s not what I meant!” Sara says, “Sir! Tomas said a bad word!”

“Gay is not a bad word, Sara,” Mr. Delgado says, "But you shouldn't use it in a derogatory manner, Tomas."

I raise my hand again, “Were there two of every fish in the boat too?”

“Of course, Peter! God said to take two of EACH animal in the earth,” Sara says.

“But, fish can’t drown. Why do they need to be on the boat?” I ask.

“Stop asking questions and listen to the story, Loki,” says Sara. “You’re not supposed to question the word of God.”

While Sara tells everyone about the 40 days and 40 nights of rain, I go over to Mr. Delgado and ask him how all the animals could fit in Noah’s ark since he was the one who said that there were over 5,000,000 species. “How big was the boat?” I ask Mr. Delgado. “It had to fit 10,000,000 animals, right? How big could it have been?”

“If there was an ark that was built to fit all the species of animals… it must have been very, very, very big,” Mr. Delgado says.

I try very hard to figure it out. I go back to my seat sit there for a little bit, then I remember the clown car. One Sunday, Mom and Dad took me to the circus and at the very beginning of the show there was a small yellow beetle car with pink and purple flower drawings all over. It came from behind a curtain and settled at the center of the circus ring.

One by one, out came clowns! I forgot to count how many clowns came out of the car because I was laughing so hard, but it must be more than a dozen clowns who managed to fit in the tiny car.

I imagine Noah’s boat painted bright yellow too. I imagine it being like a giant clown car from where bright colored animals emerged like clowns – first came a blue gorilla, then a yellow dinosaur, then a pink bat, then a red panda.