Hello, Sparky here.
Ø We are in the midst of lovely winter weather – days filled with warmth from the sunshine and nights that beckon us to stay within the warmth of our homes. Sometimes we have friends for company, sometimes it’s a book and cup of something hot by the bed side that more than makes up for the lack of any company.
Ø It’s especially in days like these that I fall in love with my house – a place which is all mine, to be as I wish, where I feel safe and happy, and even when there’s nothing much happening still every nook and cranny carries memories of some beautiful day spent with family and friends. A place that I call ‘home’.
Ø Depending on the purpose of the house, there is a wide
variety of houses to be seen.
o
In fact, not everyone builds a house in the
conventional sense, to some, like the macaque monkeys the Banyan tree is home –
it provides shelter from all weather conditions, it provides them with food and
protection from danger.
o
Some prefer to build huge palatial palaces that
houses the entire extended family – no, I don’t mean humans – I mean ants,
termites, bees, mongoose and so on.
o
Some have tiny little houses – like the
hummingbird’s tiny nest cushioned with feathers, fur, moss, lichen and such
held together by bits of spider’s web.
o
Some build huge houses – like the 36-feet
diameter mound of dusky megapod birds or like the ones that the weird looking
hamerkop (means ‘hammer-head’ in Afrikaans) birds build. Nests so strong that
even leopards rest on them.
o
Some build and carry their houses about them
– like snails.
o
To some like the whales, ‘the whole world is
their oyster’.
o
Some like the weaver birds have turned their
nest-building into an art form.
o There are brood-parasites like the cuckoos who rather invest their energy into mastering the art of deception to lay their eggs unnoticed into the nest of another.
Ø The list is endless and is a product of millions of years
of evolution. Now, coming back to Civvy & Kiwi monkeys who inspired by all
the nest-building happening around them set out to build ‘nests’ for themselves
last week. After a week’s studying the books and looking around, Civvy fancied
a beautifully woven nest for himself, a nest hanging from the tree to function
as a hammock as well and to this end, he approached the Baya Weavers. These are
few of the questions that were asked of Civvy by the few weavers who heard his
request for a nest to be woven for him:
o
If you can’t weave then why aspire for a
woven house?
o
How would you repay us for our effort?
Everything we need is already provided by and available in nature so what
compensation can a monkey give us?
o
Are you trying to woo a female monkey?
While Civvy is looking for answers to the
first two questions, he is aghast at the last one and is now going back to the
books and the other nests to see if that is the very purpose of a nest.
Ø Kiwi on the other hand has been taken in by a hamerkop
nest that he’s read about. He has taken Ms. Indlovu elephant of Kruger National
Park, South Africa’s (remember her from the letter she wrote me in https://sparkysworldweekly.blogspot.com/2020/05/7-sparkys-may-time-world.html)
address from me and written to her seeking her help in finding a hamerkop bird that
would lend his/her technical expertise so Kiwi can build a similar nest for himself.
We all await Ms. Indlovu’s reply.
Here are a few activities for this week. Even
if you are in the midst of building something, be it big or small, take a break
and solve a few puzzles, the break might just give you the perspective that has
been eluding you.
·
Look
at this photo and see how many words you can identify which begin with the
letter ‘S’. Don’t limit yourself to just what you see, widen your imagination
and look for intangible things as well.
This is Melpomene, a muse (minor goddess) in
the Greek and Roman mythology. The 9 muses that there are symbolize arts and
sciences and so over the millennia the word ‘muse’ itself has come to mean
someone who’s an inspiration to an artist. This particular statue in the Louvre
Museum in Paris towering a little over 12 feet, made of marble dates back to
around 50 BCE and was a part of the Theatre of Pompei in Rome.
Initially the Goddess of music, song and dance, Melpomene later was named the muse of tragedy. Her name in Greek means ‘to celebrate with song and dance’. As the goddess of tragedy her statues are usually depicted with a tragic mask in one hand and a club or knife in the other. She also dons a crown of ivy and boots called ‘cothurnus’, which was worn by tragic actors.
- Here’s a crossword with the words rhyming with the letters ‘sive’.
- Match these animal homes to the animals. The first table below is animal ‘homes’ and the second table has a list of animals. Where do you think these animals live in?
Little Readers’ Section
- Here are a few ‘homes’. Can you tell who might have built it or who lives in it?
See you all next week with more news,
activities and answers to this week’s puzzles.
In the meanwhile, if you would like to write
to me, email me at Sparkyatbanyan@gmail.com
Answers to last week’s puzzles:
- Look at this photo and see how many words you can identify which begin with the letter ‘B’. Don’t limit yourself to just what you see, widen your imagination and look for intangible things as well.
This
is by no means an exhaustive list of answers. What is exhausted, is my ‘imagination’
and ‘inclination’
o Bonsai
o Banyan
o Bush
o Branches
o Big (the leaves look big compared to size of
the ‘tree’)
o Beautiful
o Bite-sized
o Baby (is it really?)
o Bountiful
o Big (the tree in the background)
- A crossword puzzle where all the words rhyme with the word ‘ore’. Mind you, it rhymes with ‘ore’ but may or may not end with the letters ‘ore’.
- Another pictorial puzzle. Look at the photos below and identify the city in which these photos were clicked.
1. The glass pyramid in the lobby of the Louvre
Museum in Paris.
2. City of Paris with the Eiffel tower in the
background. This photo was clicked from atop the Arc de Triomphe monument.
3. Mona Lisa Painting by Leonardo da Vinci,
Louvre Museum, Paris.
4. Statue of Liberty, Paris. The original statue
of Liberty on the Liberty Island in New York was a gift from the people of
Paris to people of USA commemorating the alliance of France and US during
the American Revolution. The New York statue stands 305 feet tall,
including the base on which it stands. The replica in Paris on a man-made
island on the Seine river was a ‘return gift’ to France given in 1889 by the US
citizens living in Paris. This replica is a little less than 38 feet tall. Both
the statues are made of copper.
5. The Grand Sphinx, Louvre Museum, Paris. Sphinx is a mythological creature with the body of a lion and head of a king. This granite sphinx in the museum is the biggest sphinx outside of Egypt and thought to date back to 2300 BC. It was found in 1825 amongst the ruins of the temple of Amun at Tanis, Egypt.
So, all the photos above were clicked in Paris. I wonder if you were fooled by the Statue of Liberty but had you seen it with a keen eye, you would have spotted the upper portion of the Eiffel tower behind the Statue of Liberty.
