NOEL ELLIS' GOOGLE BLOG

 Birds can also make your ❤️ 🧡 Khush 💜 💙

  MYNAHS & A BUFFALO   LT COL NOEL ELLIS   27/V/2023   Last couple of days the weather has been cool. Rather, it rained too. Here in the desert, rain is welcome anytime. At least for the next couple of days, temperatures will stay tolerable while the sun is kept veiled by clouds bringing relief from the scorching sun.   This gave me an idea to visit the ‘river front’. Peafowl froze and admired this handsome young man. They know me well by now and even call out sometimes. However, there was one very unusual thing which caught my eye on the green grassy patch of the river bed.   It was a ‘Jhota’, a male buffalo, in Punjabi. This young black buffalo was lame. It had fractured its front leg in a fall I reckon. The animal could not use one front leg, making it difficult for it to walk around without a limp. Luckily, there was enough grass for it to graze on. It seemed that the animal had been left to fend for itself. It now was no use because of a broken leg. How sad

  REMEMBERING GOOD OLD DAYS   LT COL NOEL ELLIS   21/V/2023   It was this day in 1990 when I was going through the Basic Paratroopers Training Course and did my first jump. A fantastic feeling, which ended on a bad and a very bad note.   It took me back to my IMA days in December of 1984, when one had volunteered to go for the paratrooping course but they sent me on a rock climbing (RC) course instead. Wearing the ‘paratroopers wings’ on my sleeve was a dream. Gentlemen Cadets rushed home during term break but I was in a mood for something adventurous.   Gathering courage, I walked up to my Div O, to ask him why send me on a RC course, instead of the para jump course. You piddly idiot, FO before I punish you to keep running around the tea gardens of Dehradun during term break. I saluted the B, did an about turn and trooped out of his office.   Destiny came full circle. Having finished the ‘Guerrilla Warfare’ course, I filled in the volunteer form for the ‘para b

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  BABIES IN OUR GARDEN   LT COL NOEL ELLIS   20/V/2023   Every morning as I water my pots, especially the ones hanging in the garage, a pair of Bulbuls appear out of nowhere. It appears that they talk to me trying to tell me something. I know that they have three eggs in a nest which are hatching. My promise to them not to shower that pot stays. But they don’t forget to remind me if I inadvertently sprinkle some.   This pair of Bulbuls is not afraid at all. They do not attack or raise an alarm in our presence. However, their talk is not the birdy chirp. Their sound is much heavier that too in short bursts. Are those chirps for us or their chicks, I am not sure.   They appear as if they are trying to speak in a muffled human voice. Similar to how we talk to our toddlers who understand and convey messages in gibberish, which we all keep deciphering. Earlier, the birds would make a ruckus, as if a wild cat had discovered their nest. Now, it is a mellowed chatter.  

 RANDOM CLICKS

  VEIL OF DUST   LT COL NOEL ELLIS   16/V/2023   Imagine, if your maid screams from the veranda “Kood Gayo-Kood Gayo” fanatically. Who could it be and why should he/she or it jump? Both my wife and I ran to find out. Wife was a little ahead of me and in a quick scoop she picked up something and threw it into the fish tank.   It was a Grey Molly fish. The tiles were so hot, that instantly she had got stuck to it. It was just in the nick of time the fish was put back to where it belonged. For a moment, it just sank to the bottom of the tank. Then with a sudden jerk she wriggled and was back to normal, swimming gracefully. It must have been a horrifying experience for the fish, as it was for us. Luckily the maid saw it jump or else she would have been roasted alive.   The weather was terrible and the hottest of this season. Our bad luck, the water aeration pump of the fish tank went ‘kaput’. Come hail or a sand storm, I had to visit the aquarium shop to get a new one before more fish woul

  A NEW MOM   LT COL NOEL ELLIS   14/V/2023   Let me begin by wishing all mothers a very happy Mother’s Day. Raising a child, running home and hearth is by no means an easy task. All those mothers who have gone to other realms, I solicit their blessings too. May all you mothers stay blessed always.   Be that as it may. Let me share with you the woes of a ‘male mother’. Surprised? Who, how & when shall be revealed as you read on.   The person writing this became a ‘mother’ to a few Molly fish last September. We had a water tank and there was no better way to utilise it but to add fish in it. Taking care of them became a learning process.   Feeding them, cleaning their tank, recharging its water, aerating it, moving them to shade when it was hot, heating their water when winters set in, keeping an eye on Kingfishers were few of the chores.   Being a ‘first time’ mom, it was exciting, interesting, time consuming, worth researching, experimenting, accepting failures and enjoying their

  SINKING & STINKING PAKISTAN   LT COL NOEL ELLIS   10/V/2023   Imagine something which was created to be pure and paak becomes the most corrupt, adulterated in mind, soul & policy, infected, like a boiling septic tank which contains all germs imaginable. The body which fell into it has now been eaten from the outside besides its internal organs are oozing pus and failing to function.   That is what Pakistan is today. A nation with no ‘locus standi’ anymore but still has the gumption to spew venom not only on its own people but on its neighbouring nations as well. What a sad state of affairs and they deserve it. If you sow seeds of toxicity, you cannot reap fragrant and sweet fruits. That country will not evaporate but rot in its own filth. India might have to bear the stench.   What has the common Pakistani citizen done to deserve it? His vote never had a say. The military had its own agenda and still has. Their politicians were very clear about theirs. Mon

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