A few days ago, I happened to visit Sentosa, and stopped by at Palawan Amphitheatre. I bumped in at the right time when they were having an animal show and I realized my last one was probably back in primary school during one of those school trips to the zoo or bird park..
As your usual animal shows go, we get to see a variety of animals. Birds of prey, parrots, monitor lizard, snake, monkeys, running peacocks and the Siberian husky were some of the few present on stage that day. But what really touched me that day weren’t the beautiful performances they put up. It was the story the parrot, Nana. (if I didn’t get her name wrong…)
Some years ago, a delighted visitor at Sentosa was amazed by the birds he saw, especially parrots. He wanted to keep one of them as a pet. Hence, he spent thousands of dollars to get little Nana. You might think that with such a rich owner, Nana must live a luxurious life. However, things often seem to go the other way.
In order to ‘keep his investment’, the owner kept Nana in a cage and locked her shut inside. Each day, she can only look through the bars, longing to be one with the birds outside. Flying is part and parcel of a bird’s life, and is crucial to the development of its wing muscles. But with restricted space and movement, Nana cannot spread her wings and fly. Slowly, her wing muscles start to waste away…
Besides being locked, Nana is also deprived of nature’s food. Birds need something more besides nuts – they need tree barks to chew on or sharpen their beaks. Without anything similar to a tree bark, Nana’s beak started to waste away as well…
A bird less like a bird…
It was after quite sometime that the owner realized that his parrot is not doing well, and made the only wise choice by bringing the parrot back to Palawan, where they have certified trainers to nurse the bird back to health.
Today, Nana can fly but is still very unstable. She looks different from the healthy parrot we see, she is quiet and trusts only one trainer. Looking at the 10 or more parrots in a big cage just outside the amphitheater, I felt a sense of irony. Why do they still keep bird in a cage, though it is a huge one? Just because it’s larger and does not restrict the bird’s movement, it doesn’t mean that they are not trapped. Occasionally, the parrots climb up fences, trying to break free.
It’s best when we don’t try to force animals or people into doing things they don’t want to. Not just that, we ought to respect them as well.
And this reminds me of the Pandas…have they become an exhibition already? When animals are near extinction, they have greater value in exhibitions. What if man comes near to extinction one day? Will we then try to exhibit the different types of human beings, or will we even have time to do that…?
i love dogs! must love dogs!!