Thousands of visitors were looking forward to the attraction of the renovated aquarium, but left disappointed: “Not interesting at all”

The Xiaomeisha Ocean World aquarium in Shenzhen reopened earlier this month after renovation works that took five years to complete. There were high expectations for the renovated aquarium, which covers an area of ​​60,000 square meters. During the first test week, 100,000 visitors visited.

But that trial period did not go completely smoothly. There was a lot of protest from visitors. They felt cheated after seeing the big ‘attraction’ of the aquarium.

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It ended up with a whale shark, an enormous fish that grows to an average of 8 meters in length – but specimens up to 18 meters long have even been spotted – and lives mainly on plankton, krill, small fish and squid. Only: the large whale shark that was in the tank in Shenzhen turned out not to be real. Visitors were shown a robot.

Animal welfare

It soon rained negative reviews. “The most disappointing part was the whale shark. When I heard the name, I had high expectations. But when I arrived I saw a mechanical whale shark,” one person wrote. Visitors who felt cheated would have asked for a refund of their entrance ticket on the spot.

Xiaomeisha Ocean World stated that they chose a robot for animal welfare reasons. It would be prohibited to trade in whale sharks. The shark in question is said to have cost millions of Chinese yuan. “But even if it’s for animal protection, I’d rather they don’t have one at all than show a fake one,” someone wrote. “This isn’t interesting at all.”