Kutroo-Kutroo

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And Ruskin Bond in his every second chapter spoke about Barbets. Rain in the Mountains.

A Barbet. What was that? Something I had never heard of. I googled and found a bird I had never seen in my life. And as Sir Ruskin spoke about it again and again, I began to look here and there thinking if it can be found in Uttarakhand then Himachal Pradesh can be no less.
One fine day, sitting under the partial shades of Deodars once again in Dalhousie, I was swinging to and fro. Quiet and all by myself, I glanced at a bird flying from the top of a Deodar to the other. It was far enough for my eyes to recognize what flew but I could ensure it was green. And felt overjoyed assuming I spotted a Barbet. I began to look for it daily but to my disappointment I never spotted another.
I shifted to Mandi with my friends for two months due to the purpose of training. A ten minutes walk to the office from home, that is how it went. Once we were walking along the road and just one turn ahead of my home, I shouted in amazement. My friend got scared what happened while I stood in bewilderment. There! From the hole on that tree, a Barbet-like bird peeped. I looked here and there and found another Barbet. Yes! I was sure now. It was a Barbet. A Barbet! Really! It lives near my home.
And every day when I crossed through, I looked up for it, some days I spotted it, some days I didn't. I wished to look at it closely. But I never got to see it. While leaving for college, I understood how it looked and how it sounded..."....kutroo-kutroo-kutroo...."
I portray this bird to be: A small, active, cute and distressed creature. In a short span of time, Barbet became my favourite bird adding to my fondness of parrots. 

18/11/2016 : Hamirpur
Me and my friend were walking down to the bank from our Department as I had to withdraw some cash from the ATM. These days the demonetization makes you stand in queues for long. Change is the rule of life and Acceptance the key.
Just as we got down from the stairs beside the bank, we stopped. There it was. A barbet, right at the centre of the pathway. 
The bird I had been looking for for so many days and months was there so close to me. I saw it closely.
Bright green body. 
Brilliant blue over the throat. 
Catchy Red over the head. Beautiful.
Lying sideways. Its claws immovable. 
Eyes open. Still. Dead.
Maroon blood from one side of its head.
A layer of silence covered.
I was shaken to the deepest core of myself. This creature which I had always wanted to look for spoke of no life. I was turning numb by the minute when my friend suggested we should pick it up and bury it somewhere. 
We fetched big broad leaves from that tree across the road. Leaves bigger than our hands easily let the blue-throated Barbet rest into them. We took it to the nearby nursery and sought help from the incharge. The kutroo-kutroo was buried deep with leaves over and a few petals of marigold. I joined hands. We turned back. 

A simultaneous spell of pain and peace was casted..."kutroo-kutroo...kutroo".



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