The Birds

About an hour after I arrived to Kosovo, I was standing in my new boss' office when this noise interrupted us. A screeching - very high pitched - sounded like it was moving closer and closer to our building, and then it was over us - directly above. I looked up over my boss' shoulder, out his office window, and saw this sea of blackness in the sky - shifting and flowing back and forth - changing directions as one. "Oh, those are Pristina's black birds," said my office director, noticing I had stopped speaking and was now staring out the window. Everyday, he explained, they fly together, hundreds and hundreds of them - all over downtown Pristina. "Where do they end up?", I asked. He said he had no idea, and said that he hardly notices them at all anymore. I asked him to repeat himself, since the screeching sounded him out, but I chose to believe that I too would become immune to the cries.

My first few nights in Pristina, I learned that the birds fly around at dusk - so between 5:30 and 7:30 or so in the evening, and then on some days are up and flying around as early as 4:30, but usually at around 6:30 a.m. They would hang out on the eaves and overhangs of buildings surrounding the hotel where I was staying, then after five, ten minutes, move on elsewhere.

Now I know it is the end of my work day when I hear/see them outside my office window. And now I also know where they sleep.

Indeed, I think there are five trees in all of downtown Pristina (okay, maybe a few more are located around) - and they are in the courtyard of my building, three are right outside my windows. And from my first night here, I learned that the birds may hang out on my hotel's street for a while in the evenings, but they call my courtyard home. At around 8 or so in the evening, outside my building it sounds like a crazy chicken farm sounds (or so I imagine it, or as it was in Napoleon Dynamite, which must be real, right?) - if your windows are open, all other noise is drowned out as hundreds of birds descend onto the scraggly branches of the skinny trees outside my window.

I now have this strange compulsion to read Poe every time I look outside at night at the dozens and dozens of birds perched on the branches mostly with their backs to me. The largest birds are on the top branches, then medium sized, then little ones. It's odd but livable. The problem comes when the teenagers, on the middle branches, or so I imagine them being prepubescent upstarts, start chatting/arguing at 4 in the morning. I do not understand how the good residents of my neighborhood do not cut down these trees. Sometimes, I poke my head through the shades to scare the sh**t out of them, and they fly away but then come back with a vengeance so really no good comes of it. However, I am convinced that a human being can learn to sleep through anything, so will persevere because I love my apartment.

I wonder if Daphne du Maurier ever visited Pristina before penning her novel, The Birds, or perhaps Mr. Hitchcock spent some time here for inspiration. Both these individuals are responsible for my real, and I think, legitimate fear of having my eyes gouged out by maniacal attack birds, should I actually try to photograph them while in residence outside my windows.

However, I shall continue to try and think of a clever way to capture their image and not be pecked to death -- suggestions welcomed.

I have posted some pics from my windows - you can see the trees about which I speak as well as the general view - lots of garbage in the city center - tucked into these courtyards. It's sort of sad - the garbage bins are never overflowing so I don't really get it. I think they are in need of a "Make Pristina Beautiful Day."