Crow's Eye View

It was gone. All of it, morphed into a long line of logs, dried twigs and dead leaves in just two days and two nights on both sides of the streets. And the humans call us 'bad omens'. HAH!

I didn't know what this place was called. I've heard the humans mutter 'Uttara'. It didn't matter anyways. It wasn't our home anymore. It was now a place for those tall metal posts that gave light to the pitch-black roads when we can't see the sun anymore.

True, food is aplenty here. The humans do generously throw out food (like chicken bones or small packets of plastic full of food I can't name, but are delicious to eat) out on the streets for us to peck at. And who can forget the piles of garbage at some areas of this concrete wasteland, ready to offer us a feast. Yet, home isn't home without a place to live. The high-rise concrete trees are just not right for us. I never understood how the humans get to live there so cosily, with all the concrete trees crammed uncomfortably close to each other, all cold and damp. Besides, it's weird that the humans lived INSIDE them and not on them. Shouldn't that be more uncomfortable?

Anyways, I wish I knew what my name is. I reckon it's Kawwa. I took it to be my name when I heard a handful of souls that would notice me call me that. Not that it's of any significance, but hey, at least I have a name.

Nevertheless, I had realised that I had to travel to somewhere else, somewhere nice and quiet. Somewhere the humans wouldn't be able to reach with their hollow and tamed metal creatures that zoom past the streets, leaving a trail of black smoke in their paths. Somewhere I'd find a missus and settle down in a tall banyan tree.

And so I did leave. I flew north in search of hope. But alas! The further I went, the worse everything looked. I stopped at a place that was extremely busy. And the streets led to three different directions. The bands of metal creatures seemed to rise in number here, moving occasionally at a slow steady pace. And they were awfully noisy. It looks like the humans inside must agitate them a lot if they were slow or standing still. It was tough to ignore their incessant honks of agony.

The humans here were extremely impatient. However, they were no less generous. They would throw away half-eaten food, plastic packets still full of food. Some would regurgitate on the streets while sitting in one of those larger metal creatures. The humans seem to yell their names out a lot. They would call them 'Bus'. They were among the noisiest and the dirtiest of the metal creatures. They were always beaten down, would cough out black smoke from their rears, and the people must not enjoy being in them, seeing how many times they would puke.

The creatures' feeding grounds were a perfect place to sit down and have a snack because that's where you could find snack shops for the humans. And it was behind those shops where all the leftovers were chucked out, all putridly stinking and ready to be eaten by the dogs and our kind.

After the pit stop, I continued to fly north again. At one point I reached a river. Or at least it was one, once. The stench from the pitch-black waters was unbearable. It felt like the stench was burning up my insides. I quickly flew away from that place. The garbage strewn around the bridge over it was tempting, but luckily I already had a pit stop. There were several very tall and lean cylinders that constantly smoked out dark, ominous smoke from them near the river bank too. Wonder what they were for.

Next I went to this place where the concrete trees were not as tall as the ones in Uttara, but they were very broad and wide in size. I could see humans constantly go in and out of that tree. A particular human in one of the buses yelled 'Tongi' and many of the humans in the bus disembarked after that call. Maybe that's how they tell each other to leave.

I flew miles upon miles, but all I could see was dust, garbage, filthy drain water and huge potholes full of clogged water (it was full of mosquito larvae, but at least it helped me quench my thirst. Bless the potholes). This place was unsightly.

However, as I flew further, I realised that there were trees. I had finally reached the outskirts of the concrete wastelands. I could see more and more trees in the horizon. The streets were getting cleaner and the columns of metal creatures were getting smaller. The air here is much cleaner. And there was just enough filth in the small human settlements to satiate my hunger.

Maybe I've finally found a place I could call 'home'. There's food, there's places to live. What more could I ask for? I don't care what this place is called. None of that matters to me. All I know is that I found a new home.

But wait... why does that small patch of land not have any trees on it? And why do those humans look like they're holding the same large sticks with those heavy, sharp-edged metal heads I've seen in Uttara?

Aka is a tiny little bleep on the world's radar, and he finds peace in knowing it. Ruin his peace by poking him on akaaraf@hotmail.com