It was midday on Friday last week and while I was having lunch, I was startled by a noise of something that seemed to have banged the glass door of my porch. Curious, I immediately stopped eating, pushed back my chair and stood up, and checked what the noise was about and where it was coming from. Right there, on the porch, I saw a dead bird lying on its side! My first thinking was, “who the heck could have been so angry with me that the only option of letting me know about it was to throw a dead bird on the porch?” I looked around and saw no one in the vicinity. I took a photo of the bird for evidence, in case I needed to confront the perpetrator.

I had my eyes fixed at the dead bird for a few seconds and thought of what I had to do about it. Should I just kicked it out of the porch or should I bury it somewhere?

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I left the bird for the meantime and continued eating. Ten minutes later, alas! the bird came back to life! It was not dead after all. The cute little flying creature had resurrected and it was looking right back at me. Then and there, I named her ‘Tiririt.” It was the same name of the cute, little bird my brother and I restored to its nest many, many years ago.

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Moving my hand in a shooing fashion from a distance, I tried to get Tiririt to fly. It should fly. Shooed. And I shooed more. Minute after minute, shooing after shooing, its head only turned sideways, the body remained still. “It might have been stuck in between those planks,” I thought. I walked towards the bird, extended my arm, and picked it up. There was no resistance. No flapping of wings to try to escape my grip. No squeaking even, if that is how you call the crying of a bird.

Upon quick inspection, all the legs were intact. There was no sign of fracture or broken wings.

I sat and placed Tiririt on top of my knee. Tiririt was a beauty.

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Below, was the last picture I took before Tiririt finally flew away. There was no time for me to touch it and to say farewell, but I am glad Tiririt was fine.

In the end, all the bird needed was a short rest, and Tiririt got it — right on top of my knee!

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