Life ….to learn from….

Life ….to learn from….

Just yesterday my bro shared with me BBC documentaries of Life. I watched three of them ( Birds, Plants, and Fish)of all the ten in their series. And I will watch them again. Would you like to know why? If yes…..

I welcome you to the land of magic, charms, magnificence, beauty at its best and with all of that some beautiful lessons to learn….from LIFE!!

It’s amazing when you watch these High definition videos on a flat screen at the amount of effort these cameramen have put in to make these spectacular documentaries of an hour. The best bit gets unravelled at the end of the documentaries when they share with you in ‘On Location’ how they shot some of the most difficult moments in the documentary, some of the clips which we see in minutes take around some three or more years to get shot.

What made me write this post is the number of similarities we humans share with the splendid creatures out there, in the sky, on the land or under deep blue waters of the sea.

Take for instance, the aspect of wooing the female and nurturing the off spring together - this is one feature which is seen in different kind of species. Like the Bower bird builds a beautiful nest to woo the female bird (rather beautiful might just be too ordinary a word).

It spends many a days together to reach the art of perfection. At the entrance of its nest it even creates a bouquet of flowers to impress the female. The male then, waits inside the nest for the female to come over. The female bird then inspects the entire nest, and only when she thinks it’s worth it, she enters the nest, only to open its wings together and mate with the male bird.

The male humming bird too has a tiring job to do. For a humming bird to stay in the air for long, without any pause is indeed a Herculean task, and that is exactly what the male bird does, flapping its gorgeous wings in all its glory to impress the female perched on a nearby branch.

A Male Humming Bird

                                         

Now, let’s take some more instances, that in the ocean world, the clown fish,
of what you recognise as the protagonist in the movie ‘Finding Nemo’ indeed has a very unique way of staying together. They stay in an anemone, and as they female and male together create grooves in a rock to hold their eggs, this is how it starts: the female sticks her eggs onto the grooves, only to give the transfer the responsibility onto the male clown fish for further care of the eggs. ‘If only’ she feels that the male has done his task well, she stays, else she leaves.

                                  

 Co-incidentally at that very time other amateur male fish start hovering around in case they find an opportunity.

When I watched the movie ‘Penguin- A love Story’ few years back narrated in the voice of Amitabh Bachan, in English I was impressed, and amazed at the amount of hard work these birds did not only to survive themselves but also in bringing up their off springs. One thing I profoundly recall is that when the female lays her egg, she gives her egg to the male, before she leaves for the seas far away to gather food for the baby. The transfer of egg itself is a very significant process, for if the egg cracks, then the life within it dies. And as she leaves, along with a thousand other female penguins, the males huddle together in the stormy winds trying their best to keep the egg warm and protected. Even in such turbulent conditions, there are some penguins who try to pester around, who may have lost their babies, and thus try to attack the other eggs. (Who say 

life is hard only for us humans??)

                                  

 Coming close to penguins are the sea dragons, gorgeous, sparkling, fragile looking creatures that look magnificent with their bright colours. As the male and female sea dragon walk together, they mirror each other’s walk, so much so that even when the two are moving, it feels as if it’s the reflection you are seeing of one I the mirror. It just made me feel how much in love they are…

                                           

Here too, the responsibility of bringing the off spring is shared by the two, as the female lays her eggs, she transfers them to the male, which stick around his body, until the eggs hatch.

The life series just made me realise that there is so much out there for us to learn, to imbibe, and to be greatful for all that exists around us.

It makes me feel glad and thankful to the cameramen who for their love of photography and shooting gift us with such marvellous documentaries which are not only a treat for eyes, but for our mind and soul as well.

PS: These documentaries are something which one should never miss. The beauty of these one hour documentaries lie in the fact that they make the world out there ‘alive’, they bring ‘LIFE’ into everything making us learn and educate in ways I just did…;) A bliss for all age groupsJ

Credits for the above pictures:
http://www.wunderground.com/wximage/viewsingleimage.html?mode=singleimage&handle=drash&number=461
http://withfriendship.com/user/neeha/penguins.php
http://www.cblohm.com/index.html
http://true-wildlife.blogspot.com/2011/02/clown-fish.html