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Of Birds, Beasts and Relatives

The Infiltrators

The rains have been continuing relentlessly in Mumbai and on days when it just pours and pours you have little to do other than be alive to all the sounds and sights around you. Some of you, who have read my earlier blogs, may be familiar with the little visitors-the pigeons, parrots, crows, ravens and mynahs –to my window garden. Well, they are still around in spite of all the rain. The pigeons can’t be seen so much since they remain huddled together in some nook and corner, feathers all puffed up, looking like round grey balls. However, their destructive habits continue unabated. They still nibble at my plants, tearing away at the tender branches and freshly sprouted leaves, unashamedly.

This morning, however, I saw them a little miffed with something. All sitting quietly looking askance with big, round eyes; their eyes betrayed anger and jealousy. Had some other specie encroached on their territory? Then I heard their screeches and next saw them- the parrots. These days I see quite a lot of them. Whenever the cloud gods hold back the rain for a while, they come out and can be seen on the sunshades, the railings, or the window sills before they take flight in a group. And what a fabulous sight that is! Today, three or four of them were gnawing at the air conditioner cable- wonder what fascinated them! May be, they got the taste of the latest flavour of kurkure. Who knows? Obviously this crossing of the LOC and encroachment into their marked territory was not seen in good light by my pigeon friends. After all, the sun shades, the nooks and crevices, the air conditioners and all the potted plants belonged to them by right.

 My little tailor-bird, Tuntuni, too came for a short while in the morning and mesmerized us with her song but she is too swift and you just cannot capture her in your lens!

The Predator’s Predicament

This was our first evening at Kabini. The forest lodges on the riverside are worth staying in and we fell in love with the place at the very first sight. We were to spend two days and two nights in this forest. After a sumptuous lunch and a brief orientation about the Nagarhole National Park, we went on our first evening safari to the sanctuary. This was to be followed by two more the next day, early morning by boat and again in the evening by jeep.The board near the assembly point showed the sightings in the past one week and what we read was enough to set our adrenaline pumping. Six vehicles set off around the same time but after entering the forest each followed a different track. In our open jeep there was a British family of five along with their Indian friend, the two of us-mother and daughter- along with the guide and the driver. We were fortunate enough to see herds of elephants, chitals, sambars, barking deer, jackal, wild boars, gaurs or the Indian Bisons and several other smaller rare species like the Crested Hawk Eagle, Stripe-necked Mongoose ,the White- bellied Woodpecker and the Malabar Giant Squirrel. We saw a number of pug marks but the tiger eluded us even though the tourists who had gone there the evening before had been lucky enough to see one. The driver took us to all the possible sighting spots following every track in this dense forest of teak, rosewood, sandalwood and silver oaks but it was just not our day.  Our time was running out and we knew that before dusk fell we would have to move out of the forest.

We had left the main forest behind and moved into the periphery. Dusk was falling. We saw a few huts nearby and two tribal women returning home with some pots of water balanced on their heads. We saw a stray village dog and a small boy make their way back towards the huts. Just then we saw a small animal leap from the bushes on the left and cross the path in front of our jeep with lightning speed. Our guide shouted in a muffled voice, ‘Leopard, Leopard’. Yes, all of us had seen him. No one could have missed him. He had leapt and dashed off right in front of our jeep. Was it the boy or the dog that he was after? Next we heard a yelp and a cry and were sure that the village dog we had seen a few minutes back had been attacked. Within seconds, however, the soundtrack changed. We could hear the barking of a dog and soon saw one chasing the leopard. In a flash of a second this barking animal was joined by six or seven of his companions. The guide asked us to be still and under bated told us, they were the dholes or wild dogs, one of the four deadliest predators of this forest. The scene changed before we could even blink once. The hunter became the hunted and there we saw him climbing up a tree. He was no small cat, a full grown leopard. The dholes were howling in unison at the bottom of the tree.

By now the cameras and binoculars in the jeep were all out. Another jeep had now stopped behind us but they had missed the moment. Also,daylight had faded considerably. The sun had set some time back. The driver said we could not wait any more. As the engine roared we took one last look at the predator hanging for his life from the branch of a very tall tree. The dholes kept up their barks and were in no mood to give up on their prey. The little village dog had escaped for the day. He still lived to tell his tale for at least that day. We had to leave the forest at that moment. We shall never know what happened to the leopard as we left him hanging for his life from the topmost branch of a tree. Did he fall to his death? Or did his Maker hear his prayers for life?

This image has remained etched in my mind for two reasons- one, a very rare sight where destinies changed  in seconds and the hunter became the hunted; two, do we also not turn to our God only when we are in such a predicament, in a life and death situation, when luck fails us or  life hangs by a thread?

The Monster Man

This tale takes me back to my childhood when I was seven or eight years old. Another summer vacation was being spent at my maternal grandmother’s place in a suburb near Kolkata. An independent, brave lady who used to stay alone in a huge house with a compound that had in it gardens, several orchards, ponds, out-houses, cattle shelters. Also there was a strange smaller house, if it could be called a house, between the residence and the main gate.  This was occupied by a gentleman who happened to be my grandmother’s younger brother and we called him Gattu Dadu. Why he lived there I have no clue but he was very much a part of the landscape as well as memory of my grandmother’s home even though he maintained his own independent existence. He had never lived in the main house. He had instead converted what was actually an old and abandoned pillbox, a military construction used during the Second World War as a shelter from air raids. This piece of war remnant was about to be demolished and its existence obliterated from the land, when he took it upon himself to convert it into a house.

From what I gathered from the family elders it was reconstructed single handedly by him. He fitted it with a proper door and some small windows, even made himself a made-to-measure bed and a desk. He constructed a flight of steps from outside that led to the open roof and below the staircase he made himself a mini kitchenette which even had shelves, a stove, a huge drum that had a tap fitted to it (to remind my readers that when he had built this house the concept of overhead tank was not there) for his supply of water. Later, he even got himself an electrical source of light. To us it looked like a miniature house with very small doors and windows, a bed that was just enough for him, a small desk and a tiny stool to sit on. It was like Bilbo Hobbit’s house in the Shire though in those days we had not heard of the hobbit’s tales. Actually, we never dared to go into that house, we just peeped into it through the windows whenever he was away. He once caught us prying near his house and he did everything short of shooting us down. He was a terror and nobody in the neighbourhood ever dreamt of trespassing. Everyone was scared of him though he was scared of only one person- his sister. He even had a licensed gun which he kept hanging from a hook in the wall.

He was like the ‘giant’ from the fairy tale in all ways except for his size. When we saw him he was a shrunken, stooping old man who was in size closer to a dwarf. May be living in the house had shrunk him. He had a good job once, though, when we saw him, he lived off his pension. He had forgotten to speak, he simply growled. Rather barked. As children we were told by our mothers and aunts not to go near his house or disturb him. Strange tales were heard by us about him from the servants and neighbours- how he had performed caesarian section on a goat, how he had helped to deliver puppies and calves and how he had once killed a cobra in his tiny room with his gun. He was an animal lover and we often saw him, accompanied by his dog, wandering about in the orchards with a battery operated transistor in his hand and a gun on his shoulder. He cooked his own meals though we saw that on most days goodies from his sister’s kitchen reached him in tiny bowls. As children we were so terrified of him that walking from the main gate to the main house meant passing his lair and that itself was quite an ordeal for us. His own strange behaviour coupled with even stranger stories about how he hated little children, especially girls, made him nothing short of a monster to our young minds.

That particular day all the families, who had gathered together for the summer vacation in that house, went on a day trip. I was the only child left behind in my grandmother’s care as I was convalescing from some illness of which I have scant memory. I spent the whole morning indoors in the old lady’s company, played all known games but by the time afternoon came, I was quite bored. When my grandma was taking her afternoon nap, I thought of venturing out into the verandah and playing some self- invented game on my own. While I was engrossed in my activity, I saw Gattu Dadu calling me. My heart stopped. I thought my end had come. That morning I had seen him carrying some thick ropes. I was sure he would now hang me from one of the many trees in the garden and nobody would come to know of it. May be, he had come to know that a few days back while he was away I, along with some of my cousins, had gone up the side staircase to the roof of his house to pick some ripe mangoes from the branches that were pressing against the roof . Now I would have to pay with my life. He was beckoning to me. There was no escape. If I did not go, he would come after me with his gun. I slowly walked across the garden towards his house. He took my hand and walked me to the back of his house. There he had put up a tiny one-seater swing from one of the branches of the big tree. With a sack he had even made a little cushion for the wooden plank. He made me sit on it and told me I could swing on it whenever I felt like.

That day I realized that he was no monster who hated little girls but just a lonely, old man.

DS