Change of Guard

Every day, dramatic events happen in the natural world all around us, unnoticed by us for the most part. There's magic everywhere. You just have to stand in its path.

Every evening, at dusk, there is a silent yet beautiful change of guard that happens between the kites and the bats at Cubbon park entrance. After knowing about the bats for nearly 25 years, today I stood and waited at the signal and watched it actually happen. The first bat coming out. And the second. And then hundreds and thousands, in waves and waves!

Before that, I watched the kites for an hour, while having coffee on MG road. Drawing majestic concentric circles in the blue, the setting sun lighting up their undersides in gold. Each of their marks standing out so clearly as they flew closer to the metro rails once in a while. Kite meditation, that's what it is. Accessible to us all day. As I lose myself in their gliding, I realize that this is the slow, effortless, fluid, unthinking way of moving my Tai Chi teacher keeps trying to teach me. And this endless repetition, the only way to mastery.

And then I walked towards the Victoria statue entrance of Cubbon park, and stood at the St.Marks Cathedral signal, and waited for an hour. The kites continued to glide even after 6, when the light had dimmed, but they were flying lower and lower, you can actually see them in the photos. Around 6.15 I see them settling on trees one by one. The Central Business District, and Cubbon park, has enough trees for thousands of kites to live, I realize.

And then I see a couple of tiny baby bats flitting across, but no big ones. Just when I was wondering whether the bats had decided to go to the West instead, the first big bat flies out, at 6.24! And from the Chinnaswamy stadium side, strangely. And as if on cue, one by one, bats start to fly out in waves from Cubbon park, from the left of Victoria statue, in the direction of Sivaji Nagar. Their flapping in stark contrast to the stillness of the kites' wings. Where do they go? To Ulsoor lake?

I know the place they live in the park, beyond the rose garden. What a tumult that grove must be going through, with thousands of upside-down hanging bats waking up and flying!

The time between the kites and the bats is just a few minutes, barely 10. Do the bats watch the kites come down, and then start flying? Is there a cue? "Here, the city is all yours, we are going to sleep. Take over."

I did it! I stood in the path of magic! I am batty, but I have star dust on me. :) :)

Photos: https://goo.gl/photos/t1GCDpqaqSKXPw5v9