Absolute punctuality

I visited a small village called Khichan, in the Thar Desert, to meet his interesting inhabitants and his thousands of guests. The villages of this region follow the Jainism that is a religion founded in India in the 5th C. but nowadays has not many believers. This belief has as main precept the respect for any kind of life. Even his most radical believers sweep the soil before walking on just to not crush any kind of bugs or they do not travel by plane to not hurt the air. Obviously they are strictly vegetarian and they try to help all the animals, specially the weakest ones. In Khichan, from October to March, they host thousands of nice and noisy guests: between ten and twelve thousands of cranes migrate every year from the North of Asia to stay in this town during the coldest months. People feed them with 800 kg of grain every day in the “Birds feeding centre”.

At 7 am I was in front of that place ready to see the spectacle. They told me that at that time the birds began to come there. Really, in short, big flocks of birds were flying over the place but landing far away from the feeding place. They seemed to be afraid of approaching to the food. “Why they don’t eat?” I asked. They answered me: “It isn’t the time yet. At half past seven they eat”. At exactly half past seven one of the cranes land on the grain and started to eat. Immediately hundreds of birds did the same making an incredible row.

Watching ten thousand of big birds flying and eating is an awesome spectacle. Their row is like a stadium crowded of fans. But for me the most incredible thing was the absolutely punctuality of the animals. I’m still impressed!