"What you looking at?"
Photo: Flickr
Growing up in a neighbourhood with a village--or kampung as we Malaysians like to say--close by, I came to learn that animals were not always what they appeared to be. Cats who wag their tails despise you. Barking dogs do bite. Tortoises have a temper and so do rabbits.
Pets however, were far easier to understand than poultry, the often underestimated collective. I've seen chickens who tease cats and dogs by flying close but not close enough to get caught (unfortunately not all of them survived), and wild fowl who've chased neighbourhood brats for taunting them (and no, I wasn't one of those kids).
But these were petty crimes compared to the likes of the kampung geese and turkeys. There is just one family in the kampung who are known for rearing somewhat notorious geese and turkeys. And placid poultry they are not, if the local 'fairy tales' hold any water: the geese have reportedly taken on wannabe burglars and even snakes who wandered into the compound. Some years back, the geese and turkeys got together to chase a kid walking home from school apparently because the kid happened to look at them.
No fear; the story has a happy ending: the geese and turkeys had a good laugh together after that and the child arrived home with all limbs intact. In fact she vowed never to go near a goose or turkey again, much less eat them. The memory of the goose baying in her face gradually faded (except for a brief relapse when "The Nanny" started showing on TV) and she eventually conquered her fear of geese and turkeys and even became a fan of "The Nanny" as a teenager. Later, she went to college, graduated, became a vegetarian, then a pescotarian, and finally a committed vegetarian who started a blog. This blog.
And because she still has a healthy respect for these gutsy birds, she's posting some of her favourite videos of poultry in action. Enjoy!
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