Sparrows move house in Triplicane

They have shifted to Number 6, South Mada Street from house number 14 with some help from their old host

Here is the submission of a change of address.

Occupants of Number 14, South Mada Street in Triplicane have pulled up stakes, shifting seven blocks away and settling for a less spacious home at Number 6.

Unfortunately, no packers and movers on earth could transport their most prized possessions — a jasminum auriculatum (jasmine) climber and a vitex negundo ( noochi ) tree — to their new stomping ground. These residents had to also turn their brown backs on feeding vessels, succeeding in only having a dining table carted over to the new address. Though poorer by the loss of some possessions, these residents have hardly lost their chirpiness, a fact attested by other residents of South Mada Street.

Credit for the smooth spatial shift goes to MA Narasimhan, who had for years let these residents — who incidentally are house sparrows — lord it over Number 14, leaving the entire home with its expansive rooms to the passerine creatures, and even supplying them with generous sacks of unmilled rice. Never once — not in a fleeting moment — had he made the sparrows feel like freeloaders.

In the whole of Triplicane, number 14 was known as a 24/7 restaurant for house sparrows, as the supply of unmilled rice seemed ceaseless, with Narasimhan making four trips to the house every day, carrying this staple food. The antechamber where feeding took place would be matted with rice husks.

Right under the Jasmine’s entwining and meandering vertical course, the stepping stones to the house would be plastered white with house-sparrow droppings.

Number 14 is now marked by cleanliness, order and silence, as the old, weather-beaten house has been torn down and a new residential structure erected in its place.