Weatherman at my Window

While scores of Chennai citizens are glued to TV and Netizens glued to their monitors or mobile phone screens to purportedly follow the Nivar Cyclone, I have a much simpler and more accurate way to forecast the weather for the day. 

On days even when it’s a rain holiday in town and people are advised to stay at home it’s quite normal in my household for people to depend on me for their daily dose of weather bytes. My daughter would call out to me “Appa, can i go out now?’ without hesitation I would tell her  “yes, you can go. There’ll be no rains today”. “Umbrella..?’ ‘Nah..!’ Sometimes, it may be still bright outside with only a faint hint of dark clouds, and my daughter would be ready to dart out, I’ll tell stop her, ‘don’t go out today, it’s going to rain or if you must, at least take an umbrella with you”

And so far, my weather predictions have worked without fail. If you are wondering if I have a supercomputer tucked away under my bed or if I have downloaded a soon- to-be banned Chinese weather app on my mobile? Of course not. All I do is, I just open my bedroom window and look out. My trusted weathermen are in-house or to be precise on the window sill – the humble grey and white pigeons. Several broods of pigeons have made the window their abode for over a year now. The AC compressor unit set on the sun-shade, gives them well sun-shade and the perfect warmth. Tucked away high up on the tenth floor, these pigeons are protected from the vagaries of weather and protection from predators and human interference.  

Much to the chagrin of my not so friendly neighbours and overzealous resident association office bearers – who even passed a resolution banning all pigeons from the apartment complex, I have been providing these pigeons with water and the occasional tidbits from a slice of multi-grain bread. Every day, I will fill a broad steel vessel - surreptitiously carted away from the kitchen- with water. Sometimes during the peak summers even two such big vessels will be emptied by the thirsty birds in no time.  The water has to be clean and filled up to the brim as otherwise, the pigeons will not drink refusing to strain their pretty necks- so in the course of a day, I will be changing water several times over. 

In this daily ritual, I have started observing their behaviour. Having seen successive batches of pigeons that have launched their solo flights right from my window ledge, I could say with some certainty that they know a thing or two about weather. I have learnt to read their signs and patterns of behaviour and saved myself precious productive time rather than reading WhatsApp forwards of some ancient Indian gyan for all modern day maladies. 

I simply observe the pigeons from my window and reel out my predictions.  On some days before the skies could turn dark and before the first drop of rain could fall, the pigeons would have retreated to their safety and I then confidently predict that it’s going to rain – much before the breaking news from the noisy news channels. Similarly, when I see the pigeons back on their perches preening their feathers and making a big fuss of shaking off all the water from their fragile bodies and seeking out the bread crumbs that I had scattered on the AC compressor,  I could safely say that the rain has stopped.  My avian weathermen have so far never failed. 

This morning, when I opened the window to clear the vessel that I had left outside last night and top it up with fresh water, I could see that it is full and not a drop was consumed. The pigeons are not to be seen anywhere. This is indeed an ominous sign that Nivar may turn out to be the severe cyclone like it was predicted. 

I pray that my feathered friends are safe somewhere and emerge soon after the floods just like in Noah’s times carrying with it a fresh leaf and message of hope.