Thattekad has no (Airtel) network. I found out on the first evening and had made peace with it by the second morning.

The calls were non-stop though. A sharp one from the canopy, a low one behind it, something from across the river that sounded like a machine gun. None of them left a number. You hear it, you place it, you think back to whatever flew past ten minutes ago and whether it fits, and then you go. Mostly on the back of a Yamaha, behind a man who knew how to answer calls. 

Morning session, afternoon session and then the night session for owls and nightjars. The days stopped having edges. My legs and lower back gave up well before the rest of me did.

Between calls there was chaya, parippu vada, pazhampori and people who talk to a stranger as if it’s the most natural thing in the world. Kerala does this so casually you almost miss how rare it is. At one stall I somehow got very involved in a vazha kola trade between a farm owner and the tea-stall owner. 

Bird photography is not like other photography. A portrait photographer can say “swalpa left.” A landscape photographer can wait for the light. A bird gives you a fraction of a second, from the darkest branch, at the worst angle, and then leaves. You control the settings and nothing else. Half my frames are of where the bird used to be.

I don’t edit out the branches or the leaves, and sometimes I keep the blurred ones too (like the majestic Great Hornbill that flew past just after a quick call). They’re the most accurate record of how the moment felt.

I clicked far too many photographs, and I spent more time shortlisting (for this blog) than editing. These are the ones that got through. My favourites being the Owls. In Kannada, an owl is a goobe. In Hindi, an ullu. Both are insults. I’m still trying to work out why, because the bird sat there calm, watchful and entirely in control, and I was the one holding the torch. Whoever came up with it was clearly cuckoo.

Mottled Wood Owl

Oriental Scops Owl

Indian Scops Owl

Flame-throated Bulbul

Indian Pitta

Brown Boobook

Brown Fish Owl

White-bellied Woodpecker

Malabar Flameback (female)

Malabar Flameback (male)

Great Hornbill

Yellow-browed Bulbul

Malabar Starling

Red Spurfowl

Spot-bellied Eagle-owl

Jerdon’s Nightjar

Jerdon’s Nightjar

Srilankan Frogmouth

So, that’s Thattekad for you. A place that was on my bucket list ever since I took up birding.

Somewhere in these three days my head went quiet. I could tell a flight from a shadow, place a sound, and stand still without reaching for anything. Birding does this. You walk further than you planned, wait for things you can’t schedule, and start remembering calls the way you remember voices. You end up sharing a track with strangers who are all waiting for the same thing, and that turns out to be enough to talk about. Three days of paying attention to one thing at a time. Most of us have forgotten that was possible.

At the time of publishing this post, Airtel is back. It rings all day. Most of those calls are nowhere as exciting as the calls in the forest.