22 March, 2020

A morning sight in our courtyard !





This bird behaviour enthused me. It was in our court yard. Within a few minutes of a male Magpie Robin calling out with its bird call, a female bird appeared on the cable some distance away. The response of the female bird was in its body language particularly in raising its tail. The female birds are not good singers. The flew away one after the other in rtes same direction. Perhaps their Roa,mnce started or is already going on.






What brings to my attention is the behaviour specificities of each species of birds. They are wired or habituated to a particular way of behaviour. 

What an amazing sight is this! Every species of birds has its own patterns of behaviour. It is an amazing story of surprises, contrasts, similarities and uniqueness. 

Let me apply this to human behaviour. We too have our human distinctiveness, one of which is our sense of togetherness in the human family. 

But we behave biased by our nationality, religion, ethnicity, social standing, economic status, etc.  During the floods in 2019 October in the place where Anna and I live, these differences were erased temporarily as people of all walks of life had to live together in temporary shelters during the period of flooding of their streets or houses.

Now the pandemic of Corona virus infection is doing the same thing. We are reminded to view each other as neighbours. 

The revised national citizenship act seemed to refer to religion as the basis for offering new citizenship to people from other countries, because of which we have had street protests to resist it. It ended in loss of human lives in New Delhi. 

The language the prime Minister used in his public address to the nation two days ago, was one of appealing to bring people together to fight the corona pandemic. It was a welcome change!

Human behaviour needs modification and revision. 

The language of acceptance and tolerance is a human specific behaviour. But in a competitive world we disgrace it by compulsions of all sorts. 

The Magpie Robins highlighted the sense that 'we are meant for each other', without which we do not become a society of civilised people!

M.C.Mathew(text and photo)

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