Maya, a sixth grader went to spend her summer vacation at her granny’s town like previous years. She was a diligent student, introvert and an avid television watcher who would keep track of Mahabharata and Ramayana epics every week. Maya had always been fascinated by the characterizations of these religious epics and also about the messenger-service that used to be practiced in that era.
One Sunday afternoon after an early lunch, Maya who was playing outside, suddenly heard birds chirping. The naïve mind of Maya thought of practicing the old-era messenger service, where a bird would deliver messages. Hence, she quickly went into the house to get a pen and a piece of paper where she scribbled down asking her aunt how she was doing. Her mother and her granny who seem to have been working on making bottled-pickles were at a fair distance. Maya looked around to make certain that nobody was scrutinizing her and hence started applying the old era messaging service by gesticulating the black bird that was sitting on a mango tree. She indicated the piece of paper to the bird. The bird chirped back at her and Maya thought her experiment would soon work out. But after several gestures she could only see the bird not moving a bit and hence opted a different strategy – a strategy to initiate a conversation with the bird.
Maya: Hey chara, I want you to take this letter to my aunty, please.
The bird chirped back at her and Maya thought the bird was asking about the address to be delivered.
Maya: She lives in Kalimati, has a big red house with an iron gate and also has a dog-named Tiger. Now, will you please take this letter to her?
The bird chirped back again. Maya seeked for every possible approach to make the bird understand. She sat there gazing at the letter for a while hoping the black bird would deliver the letter to her aunt. She patiently waited for another fifteen minutes only to find the bird fly away and her audacious effort to implement the massaging-service remained a dream – a dream never to be fulfilled.
After the unsuccessful exertion, Maya found a possible reason – Birds that were used to deliver messages were trained and this was not. With a satisfying answer, she then darted toward her mother and granny.
