Avifauna

(Or Birds! Sometimes I have to use big words in my blog posts because I spend so much time speaking slow, simple English.)

Last week was a week of adventures. On Monday Dan and I went on a quest to find the Carrefour, a French supermarket chain. Our directions were terrible and it involved a lot of walking, plus back-tracking on the bus. At one point we found ourselves walking past a few old apartment buildings surrounded by the remnants of lots of old apartment buildings and people breaking down the bricks by chopping them with a machete. Shortly afterward, we saw this:



That's when we realized this was not the way to the Carrefour. We eventually found it at the opposite end of the road and bought 6 cans of tomatoes.

On Tuesday, we went to a nearby park to take a long walk somewhere green and maybe see some birds. I was really excited when we first got there because the list of park rules included "Don't threaten the birds" and the map showed an area labeled "Birds' Paradise". But when we hiked up to Birds' Paradise, it was nothing but peacocks tied to a bench. Dan got one good photo of me before a park employee attempted to make me pay a fee for sitting on the bench (you can see it here, try not to be too disappointed if you see the same photos on my blog! I have little to no photography skills.) There was more to the birds' paradise too but you had to pay to get in, and I've heard that Chinese zoos can be really cheesy (at best) or depressing and cramped. Instead we hiked up the mountain and saw beautiful views of the city. We even drank a beer while looking at our apartment building and supermarket!



As we left the park and headed back for the bus stop, we decided to stop in at the park across the street. And finally I got to see some birds:



I also saw a lot of girls in high heels almost fall into the pond while posing for pictures in front of these statues. But even more entertaining was spotting some REAL birds: a common kingfisher

Photo by Dan

We watched this bird for quite some time and even saw it dive in the water to catch a fish!
We also saw one of my favorite Chinese birds, the black-backed wagtail.

Photo copyright Barry Heinrich from www.birdskorea.org

These birds are very cute, swooping up and down in low flights and calling. They also run around on the grass eating insects and, you guessed it, wagging their tails.
We also spotted a new bird I had never seen before, a white-vented bulbul making a lot of noise at the top of a tree.

Photo copyright Nials Moore from www.birdskorea.org

My other favorite common local bird is the magpie robin. I can't get the pictures to load right, and anyway we didn't see it at the park that day, but you can check out some cool shots on
Wikipedia. I often see these birds in the grass or garden area near our apartment building. Since I am a novice birdwatcher I enjoy any bird which forages out in the open and has obvious identification points like white tail bars that you can see while it's flying.