Birdwatching

I caught up with a couple of friends at the Lembah Kiara park yesterday morning. It was an event organized by the various nature and environmental groups, including MNS. My friend (Dr Amar Singh )had written a beginner's book on birdwatching ("A friendship with birds" - a guide to the identification and appreciation of common birds in the gardens and cities of Peninsular Malaysia) and he and his wife were at one of the MNS stalls to introduce the book. I browsed through the many nature books on sale and realize that the created order has so much to give and teach us - yet we tend to be unobservant and have a consumerist attitude to everything - it has to be of 'use' to capture our attention.

I have tried to be more aware of common garden birds, and there are many around, but attention seems to be too focused on the task of gardening rather than on the sounds around. But, in flipping through a leaflet on "garden birds of Malaysia" I recognized the rather beautiful "white throated kingfisher" that stole a fish from my tank a few months ago. Since then, I guess i have driven him/her away because of the net over the tank.

I suppose it is easy to say "if only....I lived in a most natural place, rather than a built up street,,,,,if only the weather was cooler....." But in actual fact the park is not far away, and I have been walking there from time to time, so nature is present in our midst, whether in greater or smaller measure.

In fact, as we left a nearby shop in Taman Tun where we had lunch my friend pointed out a "Brahminy kite" (a kind of eagle with a white head and neck and chestnut brown wings and body) over the sky, low enough to be visible. This bird is much more common near the coast....but imagine we saw one flying over Taman Tun - which is quite a distance from the nearest coastal town!