Hallo vrienden,

Yesterday’s Dispatch had two songs about ‘pajaros’ (Spanish for birds) described as ‘non sequiturs’.

I was wrong. Almost everything is connected to everything just like the neurons in a brain or the butterfly and the tempest of chaos theory.  Non sequiturs often are not, and only appear to be such.

Jurlpu (Warlpiri for birds) have often featured in the Dispatches, notably in the one labelled ‘Wings’ in which it was pointed out that a Democracy would only be able to take graceful flight if the pragmatic right wing and the idealistic left wing were evenly balanced.

As I hasten to correct myself regarding the non sequiturs that weren’t, outside in the front garden there is a loud bird that I’ve dubbed the ‘peep-peep’ bird. We haven’t been able to get a glimpse of this bird that keeps well hidden in the oleanders and intermittently lets out a loud peep-peep. Way off in the distance another peep-peep bird answers. This has been going on early in the morning for years.

I often listen to the Dutch news on SBS TV.  Lately this is more of a duty towards my mother tongue as a wall to wall coverage of the corona virus as if nothing else is happening in the world is rather boring in any language.  So you can imagine my delight when a news segment was presented by an ornithologist.  She interviewed city dwellers in the Netherlands who because of the lock-down’s sound of silence had for the first time become aware of and able to hear the song of birds. Unlike us in Yuendumu, they had not realised just how many birds there are.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R_xWCJAtz3U
Simon & Garfunkel- The Sound of Silence

The most common bird in the Netherlands is the merel (blackbird)…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=997RTKzc39c

Sarah McLachlan- Blackbird…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P8U7DmaMEZs

Elvis- I wanna be free…(like a bird in a tree)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0wTKo_kPlck

Tot ziends,

Frenk