Our school was located bang on the beach. Which was wonderful. To balance that, we had scores of casuarina trees in our compound. And on those trees lived hundreds of crows. Greedy, malicious crows. Crows that would swoop down on you and pick your sandwich right from your fingers. More crows that would hop around you waiting for a scrap to eat. Even more crows eyeing you everywhere you looked.
Then there was this street which was white. We called it crow-s*** street. I don't think anybody walked down it without being favored with crow droppings. Especially when wearing white.
And these days, the railway station has become their new favorite haunt. During the morning rush, there are these fisherfolk walking out the station with baskets of fish on their heads. Bad enough we have to keep an eye out for people spitting on you, and also look ahead for wretches who walk on the right instead of the left, you've also got to avoid the fisherfolk for fear of fish water dripping onto your freshly laundered clothes and having your colleagues wrinkle their noses in disgust. Especially the vegetarian ones.
To top it all are those blasted crows. They pick fish from the baskets and then perch on the beams above to feast. If you don't look up ahead and mark those creatures, and hence make every effort to avoid them, chances are you'll have fishy body parts dropped on you.
As if we didn't have enough to worry about!
Finally, there's this crow which, quite literally, does not know when to keep it's mouth shut. It insists on waking me up rudely at some odd hour in the morning, or cawing desperately all afternoon on the weekends. I'd like to get hold of an air gun and shoot it, but PETA might chase me. I took a picture of it though:
Wretched creature!!!
