I’ve discussed the neighbourhood I grew up at quite a few times. For example here and here. Today I’ve brought another story from it. In our neighborhood there used to live a crow. Although the neighborhood was filled with thousands of resident crows, this one crow was special. He was special because in an unknown accident it had lost one of his legs.
Seeing this crow flying around with one limping leg had given rise to many legends and myths in the neighborhood. The children who played in the street openly talked about these legends. According to some, the crow lost his leg while rescuing his female from the clutches of a hungry ‘cheel’ (a kind of an eagle which is very common in Karachi), some said he lost his leg after falling from his nest while asleep, some said he lost his leg while trying to walk ‘huNs ki chaal’ (an Urdu idiom- if a crow tries to walk like a crane, he loses his own walk) etc.
I was also part of this legend mongering crowd which believed in so many stories about this crow. Whoever in the street used to spot this crow, they used to shout aloud for the benefit of others:
woh dekho, langRa kawwa !!
(Look, one-legged crow is here)
This made every one in the street stop their work and look for the crow. Drivers used to hang their necks out of car windows to look for it, street cricket batsmen used to tell approaching bowlers:
“ek minute yaar, woh..kawwa..oopar?” (just a minute friend, that crow, look up)
etc. Within days, this crow, backed by all kinds of legends and myths, grew so much in popularity that he became a household name in the locality.
We saw the crow‘s limping flight for few months but the rot had set in. After few months the crow lost his popularity. Thereafter, he just became part of the area landscape and nobody paid much attention to his flight. Apparently, the crow didn’t like this fall from fame hood. So one sunny evening, the crow came down on an un-suspecting passer-by and pecked the passer by’s head with his beak and flew away to the nearby tree. The passer-by started screaming, pointing towards the tree and people started gathering around him in sympathy. Very soon somebody in the infringing crowd said what everybody was thinking. That somebody said:
“langra kawwa pagal ho gaya hai”
(the one-legged crow has become crazy).
From that day onwards the popularity graph of the crow climbed up steeply. Overnight he was declared as ‘one-legged-half-brained’ crow. His status changed from a celebrity hero to that of a devil-may-care villain. The new status also gave rise to new legends and myths about how and why the crow lost his mind. Some said that it is because the crow society made one-legged crow an outcast so he lost his mind, some said it is because humans didn’t look after him and some again said that it is because he fell out of his nest while asleep.
The crow on the other hand was becoming more and more carnivorous by the day. Now he started pecking anyone who passed under the street-tree he used to live on. There were a couple of people who were his famous victim. One was a boy who worked in a neighborhood. The crow had some ‘zaati parkhaash’ (personal animosity) against this boy. As soon as the boy entered the street, the crow would start screaming ‘kaaeN kaaeN’ and followed the boy home while diving and pecking on his head repeatedly like an air-force jet diving to make a kill. In the end this boy had to become bald and wear dark-glasses in order to fool the crow into believing that he was somebody else. This trick worked and the crow stopped harassing this boy.
Another famous victim was an old lady of our neighborhood. She used to come out in the evening for a walk and this crow made the mistake of pecking her head once. To this she became so infuriated that she started scolding aloud in the middle of the road:
kam-bakht, jhaaroo peetay, kal-moonhe, ek dafa haath aa gaya to tera soup pi jaaon gi?
(You unfortunate, broom-hitted, face-looser, if I catch you once, I?ll drink the soup made from you)
Apparently the crow really got scared of such grammatically correct Urdu scolding and I don’t remember if he crossed her path again.
After a while the situation became so worse that the cabinet meeting of street boys was called again. I also had the honors of attending it. In the meeting there were two groups. One was a humane group which asked for mercy for the crow while other insisted on mercy for the people by giving crow a mercy-killing. Luckily the mercy for the crow group was in majority. It was then decided that the crow be caught, taken to some other neighborhood and let free. Some suggested that we should let it free in next neighborhood because their cricket team beat ours all the time but good sense prevailed and we transferred the crow to an unpopulated place. I am not sure how the crow was caught and transferred because I was not part of the ‘action committee’ which was formed to carry out this humane operation. This happened in 1982. Twenty Five years and a lot of water under the bridges have passed since then. I don’t know how long a crow lives. Our readers can enlighten us. Hopefully he is still alive and kickin’.
Photo Credits: Abro, jalalpages and Junaid Rashid
On average, most crows dont live even upto an year. But if everything remains alright then the male crow averages 4.9 years, whereas female averages 3.3 years.
The Pakistani Spectator
http://pakspectator.blogspot.com
Engaging post!
interesting story, we had a one legged stray dog in our neighborhood, he fell down a newly dug tubewell though.
Daastaan-e-Zaagh khoob ast.
You did not mention the morale of the story and wasted a lot of time. Be genuine and more creative. Dont have much time to read the memories of your childhood.
I think, P S, that crows live longer than that. Or maybe it is ravens that can live for decades.
Seems like “Pakistan Zindabad” doesn’t have time but still ended up reading the whole story hoping the writer will provide a “tashreeh” at the end so he won’t have to think.
Any ways, I thought it was a good effort and reminded me of some thing similar written in Urdu by Patras Bokhari by the title “Kootay”. I am not saying this memoir comes close to it, but it was still a good read and a nice distraction from depressing political history of Pakistan.
Owais: A very nice post :)… I enjoyed reading it. Good piece of writing. Reminded me of VS Naipaul’s memoirs of his childhood in the Carribean in “Migeal Street”.
For those who were hoping to find a moral of the story, here is one: “The moral of the story is that not every story necessarily has a moral”
Nice narration and ending. I was hoping people will talk about the lesson-learned and not the average life of crow.
What I got is crow needed an attention of others, went too far for this wish and ended up being deported like NAWAZ SHARIF.
I think the crow pecks when they have baby crows in their nests. So its more a protective measure!
@ Mera Pakistan
its really funny that the crow “..ended up being deported like NAWAZ SHARIF”
Beautiful post. Brought back my own memories. Made me realize just how many crows we have in Pakistan. They were everywhere. Later when I lived in the Middle East, then Europe and USA one really did not see that many crows. Now I am back in Pakistan and crows are everywhere again. I actually think they are quite an elegant looking animal.
As for so-called ‘Pakistan Zindabad’, if you dont have time please dont read…. certainly dont waste our time with your sarcastic comments…
Nice post Owais. I always thought of Pakistani crows being ‘white collared’ crows and different from local crows here who dont seem as smart and professional as our Pakistani and especially Karachi crows. Karachi crows like all Karachiites are zinda-dil, survivors & street smart, therefore the 1-legged crow fits in perfectly.
Owais Sahib;
Reading your piece reminded me of my simple but
joyous childhood in Karachi.
Nice post,,, reminds you of your childhood . it reminds you of Karachi especially if one has spend his childhood there.
Brings back my own memories of Karachi. I used to have an ‘air gun’ which was nothing very powerful but I managed to shoot down a crow one day. It was very mean and, okay, here is my excuse, I was barely 10 years old. But, boy, it seemed like for generations the crows in the neighborhood targeted me whether I was on my rooftop or out on the roads. I remember thinking that: ‘May be I should not have shot down that crow’. But it was not because of some ethical reasons, I must confess.
Now, I feel very guilty and sad to have shot down that crow. I really do. I also shot down one of my pet pigeons who refused to fly on my command–he was VERY old. Shame on me, in the end.
But thanks for sharing.
Owais…nice post and very good translation..”You unfortunate, broom-hitted, face-looser, ….” :-D :-D
Roshan is right; the crows start attacking the passerbys when they have hatchlings in the nest. The humane group probably ended up killing them or at least the spouse of the crow must have had a lot of work feeding them singlehandedly.
And zeb, I fail to visualize a one legged dog. Did he hop??? It must have been a three legged dog.
Would be nice to also see a post about the thousands of eagles living in and around Karachi. Don’t think they are found in other cities, but thrive in Karachi.
Interesting comments all especially people being reminded of their childhood and “kawaz” being integral part of Karachi and growing up in this once magical city so thanks Owais..It is interesting that some one has actually referred to it as white collared and i too think it is a beautiful bird, a harbinger of good news in classical literature
* a’la Nasir Kazmi – phir kaga bola ghaas kay haray samandar main, rut ayee peelay pholon kee, tum yaad ayay
the crow, again, singing in an of ocean of green grass, a season of yellow flowers beckons the unleashing of Love’s remembrance), * symbol of the downtrodden an icon of the human condition in sufi poetry, *or a companion to those denied their freedom
interesting themes all should one wish to ponder
Pakistani Kuuway (crows) are the world’s most handsome, wellnourished, dieting, smart & clever, very “political carnivorous.”
Its solidarity among them is examplery, but when :
Kuuwa chala hunse ki chaal, apni chaal bhi bhool gaya
actualit? non ???
THERE IS A PROVERB IN GUJRATI:CHATOOR KAGRO GOO NA DHAGLA PAR BESHE,means that clever crow sits on dirt.ALTHOUGH THE BIRD IS CLEVER BUT IT LIKES TO SIT ON DIRT.PROVERB IS USED TO CONDEMN THE PERSON WHO THINKS HE IS CLEVER AND MAKES A BLUNDER.
i personally hate this evil bird coz its ugly voice and nature of stealing anything and eating even shit but im impressed that this bird is very clever i remember that once a man kill of this crow on his roof but after an hour full army of crow gathered there shouting and didn’t leave his roof and keep attacking a man who killed crow. a funny thing happened a man didnt leave to work or even go outside for few days lolz! coz of the crow keep attacking him. i know he was afraid as hell hahhah .. im local of quetta.. i remember my first day in karachi i was wonder what the hell is this ugly bird