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Marielle Chartier-Henault: Well, for me personally, this is pretty good news because the mermaid ban is only for public swimming pools. Since I run a private academy I'm not too worried about my mermaid school being threatened. If anything, people might need to come to my school to be mermaids now. But as for the ban itself, I think a complete ban might be a bit extreme. I think the best way would be that you can wear the tail if you have your certificate by passing a swim test, like with scuba diving. You don't go scuba diving in a pool. The thing is, without proper training and supervision, there is a little bit of a risk with the tails—just like snowboarding where your feet are tied together—but [that's why] you have an instructor to help.
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I think it's totally off track. Any kind of swimming you need to put your head underwater, and there's nothing forcing you to hold your breath. It's not like free diving, where you hold your breath sometimes as long as you can. We'd never promote that, and I've never heard of a single blackout, so I dunno where they got that from. I've never seen that in my class. I mean, you've tried it, you have your head underwater for a couple seconds, what did you think?
I think it's a good thing because people didn't know about it before, and now they're talking about it on TV. I'm really happy about that and hopefully we can arrive at some kind of a solution! When I'm in the water and I see the people smiling, that's the mermaid. That's the mermaid magic. To make people happy, that's what I enjoy doing and that's what keeps me going in this. You might have an idea that seems crazy, but if you go forward with it, people will want to join you.
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You know, I don't really know exactly what to expect. It's difficult to say at this point because we don't know much influence the mermaid community would have over the potential bans, but I'm not too worried. I will continue to run classes in private swim time. I've heard of a few professional mermaids coming out of the scene who wanted to start their mermaid business like that woman from Edmonton, but she was unable to with the ban and was so angry. For me, whatever happens, I will just go with it. A lot of mermaids are individual performers and they do birthday parties and stuff, which they do during public swim.Do you feel solidarity with the mermaid community?
I feel yes, there is a solidarity and I try to keep in contact with those people because it's a relatively small community in Canada and it's important to help each other. And for me its just about raising awareness, like covering all the safety issues. But at the same time, I don't know [any other instructors'] qualifications and I don't want to back someone who is maybe unsafe. Even with my own school, I set my own standards like with lifeguards and synchronized swimming instructors, but there is no regulation or any kind of standard that can say 'this is safe.' Just like building a bridge, you have to be sure. Like, I can't make sure that this mermaid in Edmonton would be good. I don't know her, that's why maybe I would like to be the reference in training, you know if someone wants to give mermaid lessons in their own province they can do their training with me, and I could give them some kind of certification.
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[Laughs] Oh, yeah. Mermaid-in-chief. That's how I'll get my empire. But I think that's the way I'll go, like to regulate in Canada. I'm going to the go to the Philippines soon and when I do, I'll see how the mermaid system works over there. I also know they're training potential mermaids in Germany and in Singapore. Those places have certification courses because mermaids are everywhere.So, if we are to take something from this it would be to be a mermaid all you want, you encourage it, but please do it under proper supervision.
Yes! Exactly.And you have plans to expand to Toronto and Ottawa, could you tell me about that?
Yeah, everything is organized for Toronto, the school is starting July 5, and Ottawa in September.Awesome. I wish you the very best of luck.
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