(Shinrin yoku is a japanese term meaning bathing in the forest or absorbing the nature or just spending time in the forest . )
I have a home surrounded by tall trees .
We live in a jungle , practically . Far from malls , highways and food deliveries at your doorstep . However , Amazon delivers to this place . Amazon to here . One jungle to another .
It is a pain most of the time . But there are upsides . Lot of them . You open your windows and doors to a thick wall of greenery . The kitchen door opens to a vista of gnarled trunks , topped with a vast canopy of green . It shields you from the harsh sun , and receives most of the lashings of a wrathful tropical rain on its face . The green canopy also blots useful sun . So your lawn grass wont grow , neither will vegetables in your kitchen garden .
The best part are the birds . Rose finches determined to build a nest in your window . The sharp guttural call of the treepie , awakens you each morning . Rest of the day , they are mostly silent , but fly from one tree to another , dazzling you with their plumage of white, black ,brown and gold . Then woodpeckers , with their red mohican plume , beating a tattoo on the tree trunks , finding insect filled hollows . They fly out suddenly and swiftly , like a startled solitary roman legionnaire ., lost in the forests of Gaul .
Yellow and black golden oriole sings at roughly ten . A beautiful melody . Arrogantly short . If you are lucky you get to see it , when it darts out . Mostly , it stays hidden inside the foliage. Mocking you , testing your patience , sitting still , magically invisible to hopelessly inadequate human eyes . Just like cuckoos . If you spot one , you are lucky .
Then come mynahs , who , one imaginative author , had compared to marching gendarmes . With their yellow eye masks , and yellow booted feet , their sharp hoots and authoritarian marches .
Then I hear sharp whistles , hoots and trills throughout the day , which I am a total loss to identify . You just cant see the birds .
In short , you can look at birds and trees , and you could be lost in them . Yeah , it is working . At least for me .
I would love to die surrounded by tall trees . In the company of giants .
