Quirky Christmas

An unusual crib,  put together with a lot of ingenuity. The crib makes the tableau of the birth of Jesus less solemn , more interesting and well ...definitely quite quirky. Merry Christmas! Its great to be home.

All of these images are of one crib, put together by the laundry department of Holy Family Hospital. Walking around the campus at this time of the year is quite exciting as each department puts up its own crib. While some are the standard cardboard - box - hay structures with confetti-tinsel- streamers thrown around , there are others like this one where whatever is available in and around the workplace and homes is put to  use. Thermocol boxes to make chariots , penguins and parrots upon the same branch, a girl at a well created probably just to use up an old chaniya choli!There was no clear reason as to why a crocodile should be a part of this scene , but someone felt its presence would add value and there it was. In fact to accommodate it better a stream was created before the stable - complete with water in it and a bridge over it. The Croc evidently  moved around  quite a bit as we never found it in the same place twice. It also probably got more attention than baby Jesus.

I didn't get around to seeing all the pieces on campus, but this one was worth each minute I spent on it. 

A camel cart with dolls as passengers. The lovely dates'  of the very wise men?

The guest list for this birthday was quite eclectic, it included , a Crocodile , a tortoise,  some fish and a penguin apart from the regulars (cattle, donkeys , camels and sheep)

A frightful stare from the angel seems to have had its effect in freezing the other players , apart from the curious baby Jesus.

A pretty young thing at the village well.

A walk around the campus - III

I was at Delhi yet again and the weather was lovely (many would disagree). It made up for my gloomy feverish self. It had been pouring cats and dogs and  the Yamuna was swirling around and threatening to flow over. Between bouts of fever and the almost incessant rains I managed to do some scouting around the campus to get some images of the avian residents. 

A surprise was in store, for right outside our home in the car parking i saw Lapwings strutting around in the little puddles. I had heard them calling during the day and had just assumed that they were flying over the campus towards the barrage like the egrets (they never stop by). But the Lapwing couple was in the sparsely populated parking each day and they seemed not to mind much my intrusive gawking.         

The Tawny Eagle, or thats what we figured these are, are more numerous than the crows I can safely say. Their eerie calls can be heard through the day and a look skyward (especially close to the laundry would definitely reveal a couple of them. However , this is the only remotely presentable image i have from this visit.

Of all the joys of re-discovering the campus , the one held most precious is the growing familiarity with the whereabouts of some of these birds. The owlets on the laundry clothes lines post 9 at night , the Yellow Footed Green Pigeons in the almost deserted lane beside the herbarium etc. I've learnt that this flameback can usually be spotted between 7-8 in the morning or close to 5 in the evening on this leafless tree each day.

It calls out loud and clear during its perch and just once have I seen it in the company of another of its kind. Frequently  it has been a red vented bulbul or laughing dove or collared dove for company. The sight of this Flameback (though now familiar) thrills me , the colours are rich and bright , just the kind of company a hospital campus needs!    

A walk around the campus - II

Found myself at home once again and enjoyed the brief walks around the campus. 

The Spotted Owlets

Grey Hornbill

Golden Oriole

Am reminded of my last trip where my nieces caught a bit of the birding fever with us. Mansi and Mahi  accompanied us on some walks around the campus. The herbarium of the hospital seemed like a little treasure chest for them with a couple of white mice, white pigeons and parakeets as pets and whole lot of others free. The sight of their jaws dropping on seeing the dance of peacock on the terrace of a water works building was priceless. They squatted pretty on the boundary wall of the herbarium and watched some sparrows play in a puddle. Thats probably the longest happy silence I've seen the two in.

Very soon, we had Mansi shrieking ...."Maasi ....woh dekho Kauwe  jaisa hai"  sending an unsuspecting coucal into a startled flight! The younger of the two had us rolling with laughter while she tried to quieten the elder one's banter with ssh's sharper than our pressure cooker whistle!  For some reason , they felt that the paths we were walking were also frequented by snakes and that pretty much put a temporary halt to our watching for the day. 

The campus where our home is offers such bounty and I say this with a tinge of regret that I never got around to exploring much of it during my college days. Well, better late than never here's starting with a bird list 

In our visits between March 2010 to July 2010 we were able to identify these birds inside the Holy family Hospital Campus in Delhi. There are plenty more that we have not seen yet or identified and hopefully in the time to come we'll get to see more

1. Black Drongo
2. Brown Headed Barbet
3. Common Hoppoe
4. Common Maina
5. Eurasian Golden Oriole
6. Greater Coucal
7. Green Bee eater
8. Grey Hornbill
9. House Crow
10. Indian Cuckoo
11. Indian Koel
12. Laughing Dove
13. Oriental Magpie Robin
14. Peacocks
15. Purple Sunbird
16. Red Vented Bulbul
17. Rock Pigeons
18. Rose ringed Parakeet
19. Spotted Owlet
20. Tawny Eagle
21. White Breasted Kingfisher
22. Yellow Footed Green Pigeon

..... to be continued

A walk around the campus- I

Some images from around the campus

Laughing doves- serene but ironically humourless presence

Parakeets- Raiders of our Guava tree

Peacocks are by far the easiest to spot on the campus , considering everyone knows where to find them and what time of the day. Starting about sunrise they troop into the compound males and females strutting around and giving out their haunting cries.  Our last walk out at daybreak had us staring in surprise to about 7 of them walking past out kitchen door!!  The laundry area is a favourite haunt of theirs and you find them doing a lil dance on the roof when the weather is favorable or just a group of them taking in the morning sights. Very often your walk will be interrupted by the unsightly and strenuous looking flight of one, either to or from the herbarium.

By the time the hospital kicks into action they just about disappear from vision but their call can still reach you. .

Yellow Footed Green Pigeons- I saw them for the first time in this trip

Purple Sunbird

I have no idea who this is...but i like this image

A peacock playground at dawn and clothesline by day

Green Bee Eater

Red vented bulbul

hmmm...which ones mine?

??

Brown headed Barbert

These are my personal favourites- they're all around the place and very relaxing to watch

On my last trip , I thought I saw a bird that resembled a hornbill, but was quick to chide myself into disbelieving my eyes. A hornbill in middle of Delhi? But this time round I had many second the sighting and finally managed a picture ( a rather poor one) of it. I understand that apart from the twosome that I saw, there are two young ones too!

The Indian Grey Hornbill

 Indian Koel

Tree Spotting

To start at the very beginning there was a book – Trees of Delhi and a romantic me thinking of walks in on the various tree lined avenues of central Delhi trying to understand how one goes about identifying trees.  Then there was a more enlightened me and I decided to start right outside the house and though I haven’t written much on my attempts these are the only two I could find. Initial journal on tree spotting!!

Day 1

It was 8 at night and I was feeling extremely guilty of having put down Trees of Delhi after a certain point i.e. post the introductions and description of Delhi , the process of writing the book , how to use the book etc,.

Right when it was time for me to now start identifying trees I got caught up in work that I was more familiar with. Right when the book reading called for my participation I slipped back into familiar territory.

Let me at least spot one tree I said to myself. Rather let me decide which tree I will find in the book. It was dark and I wasn’t dressed to venture out , so I decided to just id the one right outside my door. Looked at it up and down and realized that there were a line of these in front of my home. I’d kind of known that before- like the color of my house on the outside, but if were asked I’d answer less than correct.

Its true- knowledge or education has a lot to do with acute consciousness, being aware. I’d known that these trees were around..but the fact that they were all the same…and that they had x kind leaves and y kind of trunk..had not registered as information….while there were people studying it like a science.  

My lesson for the day was done. As you can see I'm easily pleased.

Day 3

Post a splitting headache yesterday and unbelievably fresh morning I was ready to give myself another chance with tree spotting. I was left staring foolishly at a one not too far from home. There were so many of them around but I couldn't find it in my book. Impatience. Despair.  

The next one I chose looked familiar but I still couldn't match it with any leaf in the book. And when the leaf matched the rest of the tree and description didn't. Quite exasperated at my own shortcomings I decided to check with the security guard close at hand.

Yeh?...yeh tho Jamun hai……

Zyaada time nahin falta ..thoday din meing khatam ho jaatey hain….iske beej diabetes par asar karti hai..log kehtein hai phal hi khalo!! ..par phal kab tak milte hain ? beej sukha ke rakh lo., phir powder bana ke roz ek chamach subah khaa jao.

I smiled, packed up and walked homeward.  This deserves solitude to savour!

P.S- Thanks for the book Nimesh

Looking closer home

I write about Saiha on the blog a place i've come to feel at home in. Our travel here, encounters with people and experiencing the forests and the lives that are sustained by it. 

Back at my home in Delhi too, there is a whole lot to see especially where Amma and pappa are , thought I must put some of it up too. 

We’ve been living in the Holy Family Hospital Campus for over 10 years now. Fortunately or otherwise the largest stretch of time I spent here has been my troublesome teens. It didn’t leave me with much desire to look beyond myself and my immediate concerns into the what this campus had to offer. 

However there were stories (there always are) that found their way into my almost indifferent ears, hostel girls and parakeets raiding the orchards for guava(I’d put my money on the parakeets) The theft of mangoes by little boys, the hovering eagles known for plucking out the eyeballs of children who dare to stare (i think this is an earlier horror tale that stuck to my amused mind all these years)  and many of the like. However apart from the attention seekers like the crows and parakeets the other birds just wandered in and out of my line of vision without really holding my attention to any consequence.

2002 onwards I’ve lived here in patches owing to my declining fondness for Delhi in general but drawn to home nonetheless.  The last year has been different , for one I’ve started living in Saiha and am in a better place both geographically and in my head and as a consequence I’ve learnt to appreciate better the seemingly smaller  pleasures of life (they only seem small). And my visits home have added dimensions. Sharing some of the experiences of the past year in the posts that follow.