Little Birdie in the City

I am a little birdie in the city. Not any ordinary city, city of Mumbai. My mother told me that she had to come here when her home was destroyed to make way for some buildings. She had nowhere to go. She was homeless and without the jungle there was no way she could have servived. She did hear someone say that everyone survives in Mumbai. So she came to Mumbai. She found a place to live on the window of an apartment in Mumbai. It was a tin sheet on the window where my mother collected some sticks and made it look like a nest. My mother told me that it was not like our nest back home. It used to be so big and comfortable but this one is just few sticks here and there just enough for us to rest.

I was born on that tin-sheet and that is what I remember as my home. Mother used to bring some food from somewhere. I never wanted to know from where she brings the food. I was too small to move so I stayed there all day. It's summer time and this year it is so much hotter than any other years, my mother told me, when I asked her why I feel so hot. The lady in the apartment used to dry her wet clothes on the window, which used to help us survive the heat.

It was the hottest day of the summer. I was feeling very hungry. Mother saw the hunger in my eyes and she decided to bring something for me to eat. She looked at me. I saw the assurance in her eyes. As if they said, "we will survive." She flew off the window.

It was almost night. The lady was picking up her dry clothes from the window. She saw me. I got scared. Mother was also not back yet. I was not feeling hunger anymore. I decided to wait for mother. Few minutes later the lady came back with a long stick in her hand. She started poking me with that stick. I flew from one place to another in that small area to save myself from the stick, but the stick followed me wherever I went. I could not understand why she is doing that but I realized that she would keep on poking me till I was there at her window.

I remembered the look in mother's eyes before she left that day. I remembered what they said and I decided that I will survive. I somehow managed to climb to the ceiling of the window. I saw the stick coming to me. I knew the stick was to push me off the window but before the stick could reach me, I jumped. I jumped off the window. I was falling. I closed my eyes. I tried to flap my wings. I thought I would hit the ground and die. I tried harder to flap my wings and before I was about to hit the ground, I was flying. I did not know how to feel. I was happy because I survived. I was sad because I lost my nest. I wanted to cry because I did not know what happened to mother.

I am still surviving in this big city. I do not have a nest. I do not know where my original home was. I fly from one place to another and rest whichever cool place I can find, but I come to that window everyday for some time hoping mother would return some day. I feel I am not alone, because I see so many people living the same life in this city.