Woodpeckers.

So a couple months ago, there were woodpeckers in Raph's garden (right outside his bathroom). He sent me a picture of them that looked something like this:

 (Yes that might be birdpoo on his window pane but it's not the point)

The next day I went to his house like:

But to my utter dismay the little creatures were gone.

For the next few weeks I kept reminding Raph to update me of any new bird sightings in his garden.

 But there were none.

I know you probably think that they're just birds, but you see, apart from my general love for animals,

1) You almost don't ever see woodpeckers in Singapore, and

2) When I was a kid, I developed a gravitation towards birds because of this 'I Am A Young Scientist' badge thing that most of us probably did in primary school.

The school gives you this hardback sheet of paper with a list of tasks to do and each task has a certain number points. Collect 20 points (the tasks have to be recorded in a journal) over the holidays and when you come back to school, your teacher will check all your tasks and if you complete them properly, you get a badge that proudly proclaims your legitimacy as a young scientist.

The badges look something like this:

There were many different task cards you can do actually, like 'Young Astrologist', 'Young Botanist' etc, but I chose the 'Young Ornithologist' one simply because English was my favourite subject and I always liked big words that were too difficult for the other kids to understand.

 I remember there was a task like this:

"Bring home an injured bird and nurse it back to health. Take pictures of its progress over the days."

That task gave you the most number of points out of them all, and my 10-year-old self who desired to be smarter than everyone else really wanted to do that task.

And for about a whole week, my entire life ambition was to FIND AN INJURED BIRD.

Everyday I would keep my eyes peeled and walk around the void deck of my flat for half an hour wishing sudden pain and infirmity upon every bird in my estate.

But only because I cared about them and wanted to nurse them back to health.

But once again, my efforts were futile. I found no injured bird.
(Thankfully that desire has vanished too so please don't ever present me with an injured bird for my birthday I will not be pleased. Although nonetheless I remained true to my new-found bird explorer instincts till today.)

So back to real time, after 2 whole months of the woodpeckers' disappearance, Raph whatsapped me the following photos saying, "guess who's back"

 But by then I'd already gone to Germany. This time, they stayed for days.

Jealousy struck me.

A few days later, Raph sent me another picture of one of them trying to get into his bathroom window.

(Disclaimer: I am not responsible for bad photography.)

It made me even sadder.

I don't know what is with my lifelong non-affinity with all the birds I wanna meet.

Anyways, Raph eventually bought a mini scarecrow for his garden because he says that the woodpeckers might break his windows if they continue pecking on them, so I don't think they'll ever come back again.

But I'm currently devising a plan to discreetly dispose of that scarecrow soon.

Will inform you if I eventually meet the birds.

I shall now awkwardly end this post with a picture of a very awkward iguana, who also attempted to get into Raph's toilet.

Not as endearing as a woodpecker, but hey, he tried.