I was sitting in the balcony of my house
trying to feed my one year old the parantha I had made with ‘extra ghee’ for
her. Suddenly, a sparrow came and pecked on the plate. Before I could make out
what had happened, it flew away. I once again pegged away at feeding my
daughter but the bird’s aerial attack was a reason enough to distract her. I
tried to trick her into eating her food by applying her granny’s formula and
putting the morsel in her mouth saying ‘Ek
nivala haathi ka, ek nivala ghode ka’ but
all in vain. Giving myself completely to her whims, I started beholding the
Bottlebrush tree right in front of my house on which the sparrow had perched
after stealing the parantha and my little daughter was gazing at.
The tree had a nest made of straw, hay,
plastic pieces, paper clippings and what not! Three baby sparrows were peeping
out of it. Their white-grizzly stomachs were glowing in the pleasant winter
sun. Mother sparrow was putting small bites of parantha in their little mouths one by one
while the babies, with their glossy bills, were vying with each other as if
each of them pleading to the mother, ‘let me be the first’, ‘let me be the
first’.
People living in apartments, especially in
metro cities, can only tell how rare this sight is for them. Seeing something
as refreshing as this brought smile to my lips. My heart filled with fragrance
of old memories when I was a student of class XII and after completion of half-yearly
exams I had decided to prepare for annual exams staying at home only. I would
love to study sitting in the big veranda and the lush green lawn of my house. I
had kept a table and a chair there permanently and would sojourn there till the
breeze turned chilly in the evening.
While studying I also kept myself fueling
with til laddus, rewaris and groundnuts. One day when I was
engrossed in my book, sound of “tut tut” attracted my attention. What I saw was
quite amusing. A squirrel was sitting in the plate lying under my table with a
groundnut in her hand. It was intriguing enough, so without making any sound, I
started watching her. What I saw was totally unanticipated and electrifying.
The squirrel first ripped the brown rind of the groundnut, and after removing
its pink peel meticulously started to nibble the groundnut. I am sure, she was
not enjoying the groundnut any lesser than humans. I was astonished to see the
extent to which activities of a squirrel match the humans while snacking on the
groundnuts!!! And then it became order of the day. I would deliberately put
groundnuts or laddus under my study table and enjoy the
spectacle. It seemed as if the squirrel had invited her friends from bird
sphere and now the birds relishing this sumptuous feast also included a mynah,
a sparrow and a beautiful bird with a red glossy beak. Each of them had a
different choice regarding the food served and also a specific style of eating
it. I had also put a water bowl in lawn. The birds would not only drink water
from it but would also drench themselves in it. With every passing day, they
looked least concerned about my presence.
Sitting in the lawn daylong would make me
hear many pleasant sounds every now and then. It included twitter of the mynahs
as well as high-pitched squeaks of the parrots. I remember my father would go
right straight to the rooftop as soon as he got up in the morning and feed the
pigeons. If it was delayed for any reason any day, the pigeons would start
pecking on the roof. Their aggression clearly showed their impatience for their
first meal of the day. At the same time, it seemed as if the singing parrots
sitting on the electricity poles and cables outside the house offered morning
prayers to God.
This reminded me of ‘Mataji’. This
is what my family called her on the lines of ‘cow is our mother’. She had a
spotty body and beautiful sooted eyes. She kept coming to our house for years.
We never knew where did she come from but she would come almost on the same
time every day. My mother would cook first chapatti for her in morning.
In utter contradiction to the pigeons coming early morning, she was extremely
patient…may be because she was ‘Mataji’. She would moo at the main gate
around 2o’clock in afternoon and go away after eating her chapatti. It always
remained a surprise for me why she had never consumed the plants in the lawn.
I was so lost in my thoughts that couldn’t
sense when the sparrow had come back and sat on the railing of the balcony. My
little one’s clapping and chuckling brought me back to the present. I, then,
picking nature’s clue left the plate on balcony floor and went inside holding
my daughter in the lap. This made me think how we fail to live the pleasant
moments we stumble on in hustle and bustle of our modern lifestyle. Today, flat
culture of metropolitan cities has made the sight of common creatures like
birds, cows and parrots rare enough while a decade ago even stray dogs and cows
would unknowingly become a part of the family.
I fear that with the mushrooming of concrete
jungles everywhere, these delightful sights will become a part of virtual world
and our progeny would see the parrots, mynah and squirrels on ‘Google Images’
only and have to resort to internet to prepare a small write-up on ‘cow’. I
wish our age old established relationships with the nature like billi masi and chanda
mama don’t become a part of
‘glorious’ past. The onus of connecting our children with nature is on us.
Let’s begin by taking baby steps in this direction. The simplest and doable
idea is to start putting a water-pot for birds in our balconies and asking our
kids to take care of it. Let’s enjoy our weekends with family in open picnic
spots along with malls, giving our children an opportunity to have the
feel-good moments of life that we still cherish.
(Published in Hindustan Times)
(Published in Hindustan Times)
