Stranded alone in Germany
over a sullen white Christmas several years back, a video artist
from Tel Aviv decided to seek distraction at the city zoo.
She wandered into a glass-enclosed
aviary and began watching the zoo’s flock of lesser flamingos with their foamy orange plumage and their thick, bent bills the
color of a bloodstain.
The lady was fascinated,
practically stapled in place. She’d never really watched flamingos before, and
she quickly discovered that whatever vague impression she’d had of them since
childhood hewed about as closely to the truth as a pink plastic lawn ornament.
The real birds are not peaceful,
gentle or dainty. They’re not swan-necked stage props for a palm tree. If you
want a relaxing vacation on the beach, your postcard to the flamingos back home
should say “Glad you’re not here!”
“They’re very communal, and they
deal with each other all the time, fighting, picking on each other,” the video artist said. “They’re much ruder and noisier than you think, the opposite of the
flamingo cliché.” All of which guaranteed, she said “that I loved them even
more.”
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