The Return of the Natives

A fresh breezy morning. Night blooming jasmine clad in bright green new set of leaves after the spell of autumnal detachment when it shed each and every leaf and looked an old man. Now it's young and sways to intoxicated gusts of mansoon wind. The natives return. It's a spotted munia couple. Beautiful rusty brown birds having a chessboard pattern on the breast. They trill even more beautifully. It's the same branch and the same section of twigs where they had set up a nest last year. I am sure it's the same couple. If I am right then birds seem to have more fidelity than humans because meantime millions of men and women must have parted ways on bitter notes over trivials. Well, none of my business to comment on our foolish ways. I enjoy the making of this irregular globular nest. It's a masterwork in deception. To a predator it would appear like a broken, abandoned nest. In reality, the eggs will be safe in an inner chamber. The father ferries big pieces of grass. He has to pay for his lusty overtures...haa haa. The mother is busy in decorating interiors. She has to pay even bigger for her emotional surrender. Last year the hatching wasn't successful. A squirrel comes and visits the tree. She is just a guest. Not a resident of the tree. I enjoyed the sight of her old womaniah tiktikking...little did I know they are egg stealers also. So she must have been the culprit last time. With the addition to my knowledge about the ways of squirrels, I m better prepared this time. Will keep an ear for the agitated notes of the little birds to find out the cause of distress, like I did yesterday around noon. Busy in writing I heard the plightful softest of notes and ran out to find out the squirrel scouting around the new house in making. Had to chase it away. Lost my meditative balance also by the way. What to do? Have to support the underdogs. A birdi life saved is more important than a squirrel missing a meal. It seems so at least till I cross the final hurdles to beat the paradoxical plays of duality to see everything in the same way. Well, till then the squirrel has a tough time I tell you . I am determined onnmy mission born of emotions for the underdogs. And if it results even in a bump on the lined back of the irritating tiktikking nuisance, whom I found cute earlier but now find a villain due to the addition in my knowledge, I hardly care. I have turned mean in following my basic instincts guiding my emotions for the beautiful birds. I know it will play truant many times. I am but ready for the job. I have a weapon also in mind to punish it with. Taken out a flexible single strand of switch from my mother's Bamboo broom. It's waiting for the culprit. Though it won't harm the squirrel critically but I see it can definitely give her a painful back if she messes with my birdie friends. All the best little couple. Let there be a successful episode in your love tale.

Nice Guys can Win!

You need not be a rampaging bull, huffing and puffing with arrogance, to win. Nice guys can also win. They played like gentleman. No hyperboles. It's possible only if you take yourself to be a human first and a sports star later. They won. And went for a peaceful celebration with the people who matter to them. They are a product of a system that does not promote stardom over the basics of being common mortals. I salute their graceful walks and humble gestures as they moved back to the pavilion as the finalists. Kane Williamson looks a saint on hiatus from the hills who has taken to sports for some time for the reasons best known to himbonly. A pleasant diversion possibly. Whatever the reasons, it's but a treat to come across such graceful persona among hordes of mean machines designed to win at all costs. Grace in both winning and losing is what defines the basic framework of being a good sportsman, or being a good human, more importantly.

The Firebrigade squad in a beehive

Thirsty neighbors beg for a sip of water. The surroundings are almost on fire. The temperature in shade
is 46 degree Celsius. Everything is on fire. It's matter of fight or perish for the honeybee hive in the
marua and wild rose thicket around the compound wall.
As it happens everywhere, the bravest take up the challenge and volunteer to keep the chances alive by
collecting water. So the “water collector” bees scout for some water source. In this case it happens to be
some buckets left around our tap and faucet in the yard corner. I started to keep a bucket of water all
day to help them in this struggle for survival but found that quite a lot were drowning in their extra
effort to retrieve water. So I tried my level best to keep the water full to the brim so that they perch on
the edges and take sips. Even this wasn't helping much though, so now I have put a cloth on the bucket.
They sip on the moisture and there is less risk of drowning. So as of now they seem to like the water
source and give a happy, excited buzz to slurp up as much as possible. Just imagine the scale of the fight
to survive. These water couriers fly back to the scorched hive and regurgitate water so that the bees
there suck it up. The latter in turn spit it out over the hive. All this is to cool it down.
As per the intangible laws of the existential forces, the water collector bees come to know and detect
the problem when the colony is under the threat of scorching, killing heat. Water collectors are the
itinerant types. The adventurers. They are extroverts and don't lie lazily when the brood-nest in under
threat of heat. They are just on the look-out for water deficit symptoms and straightaway start
collecting water to maintain the hive's temperature
This seems to be lesser sacrifice as the bees are even known to commit suicide to save the colony from
dangerous mites.
Researchers have found that when it becomes unbearable under extreme heat, the worker bees start
soliciting by “walking up to the face of another bee, contacting the bee's antennae with her own and
then extending her tongue between the mouthparts of the other bee.”
This distressed water seeking puts the water collectors into action. So they scout for a suitable water
source and get busy in water-retrieval efforts to manage the hive’s temperature. All this of course is
done to maintain their survival as honeybees collectively, not as individuals. They lessen the
temperature below the deadly threshold which can dehydrate the bee larvae thus killing them.
Researchers have found that the effort to survive is never enough for them. Apart from the water which
gets spread over the hive, some extra cautious and wise honeybees stockpile additional moisture in the
brood comb. And to take it further on the scale of management, some of them store water in their

bellies. Their life and living is at the collective level unlike us.

Little winged tools of cosmic love-making

Let them live! They are Nature's love-making means to self-sustaining procreation through pollination. They share the bond between two flowers eager to meet, love, create flower and fruits. These little winged Adam and eves are the Angels of creation. Their buzzing sings the song of love and procreation. Their flights symbolize the dancing of two flowers eager to brush against each other, pining to pollinate and procreate. Look deeply into nature. This is the same energy following countless pathways. And love and procreation hums deeply at the cosmic frequency.
PS: These are honeybees and yellow wasps, unnecessarily ill-famed for giving bulbous swollen noses and lips to humans. If you don't mean to be an intruder they are unmindful of your presence, like mine just a couple of feet away. Even the angriest of them always follows the rules of the game, never attack till attacked. So even if an angry one happens to perch on your nose, it won't bite unless you get panicked, and transfer your fear to the tiny helicopter on your nose by taking a swipe at it. Then it becomes a question of flight versus fight scenario. Even in forests animals basically attack only after our panic gets hurled at them through our scared eyes. It lets loose a tiny chaotic storm in the tea cup which may result in swollen lips, bloody screeches on skin or even the end to dear life.

The sad love story of a lonely hoopoe

Insistent, persistent, adamant and brave. The lonely Romeo. Apart from my mind's own inconsequential blabbering with its own self, I hear this hoopoe's mate song almost with the frequency of thoughts in mind. He is relentless. Going on and on for the last two weeks. Hope he hasn't forgotten to eat in his mad song of love to attarct some female of the species. Hoopoes are almost gone from the area. Where is wood, so where will they do their master carpentry in tree trunks. There are hardly any flocks left. It's a lonely bird who wants to keep his species alive at any cost. Hidden in the foliage of this acacia he is busy with love song in this heat. The song of love which may reach some stray female  to allow the natural chemistry to take place and delay their tragic story of extinction from the area for some more time. It's lyrical, pining uuup, uuup, uuup is riding the dusty air of wheat harvesting season. They are hardly seen in this part. In fact I had forgotten its sound. Then its lovely sad notes reached me in meditation and some long asleep memory drew a picture of hoopoe in the blank vastness reminding me of those childhood days when we were lucky to see them going tonk tonk on big tree trunks. So that's how the tragic stories of bird extinction unfolding. But these are not just the desperate love notes of a lonely bird. These are the sad stories told by the last of their generation here in this part. Let's hope some lonely lady hoopoe comes to hear these mate-finding notes.
Contrary to weeks long day in and day out songs of love by this lonely bird, humans are having gala time. Bred as we have with the tenacity of antswarms. So there is hardly any fight. Mates available. People pick up mates with the drop of a hat. Relationships last in weeks because there are humans and humans around. Spoilt for choice are we humans. Instragram, dating sites, Facebook, twitter everything is saturated with choice for a mate fling. People hardly come to feel the depth of love. It's short version twenty twenty of love. Hit sixes and fours, grab your trophy and start new innings.
Isn't it ironical that only animals and birds appear to carry the message of love these days. This hoopoe for example. Can somebody show this type of lyrical dedication for weeks in all this heat. Well, it makes me sad and happy at the same time. Sad because love seems to have vanished from the world of humans. Happy that I am at least lucky to see and hear these love tales in nature.