Talking back

Talking is a foundation of relationships. Yet words can betray us, too, especially if we don't completely understand the meanings and how they're received.

Besides parrots, a few songbirds can mimic human speech - including the Hill mynas, common mynas, some crows, European starlings, the Northern mockingbird. Among the top 10 talking birds, the Hill Myna is the only non-parrot.

The birds that speak are typically young, and the words are limited. Researchers may debate over just how much the birds understand, but the mynas seem to have minds of their own. They can pick up the odd phrase and surprise and reject phrases despite repeat recitations and pleas. Kaleo is a talking myna who goes through a repertoire of insisting he is a "turkey talker," a duck and a chicken - and it's hard to believe the bird does not understand some of what is saying.

The Hill myna, Gracula religiosa, is a native of south Asia - including Afghanistan and India, reports Encyclopedia.com. "Hill Mynahs are sought, in the west, as pets, because of their endearing mimicking of the human voice. Ironically they are rarely encountered in pet shops as demand hugely outstrips supply," notes GarrettPhelan.com.

Common mynas are less prone to taking and have been introduced to other countries, including Australia and South Africa, to eat insects, but now are regarded as pests themselves when they attack fruit crops. But the bird is adaptable. "The common mynah is one of the very few species that have greatly benefited from the sorts of ecological changes that humans are causing on Earth," Encyclopedia.com.

Mynas are believed to mate for life. The average lifespan is 12 to 25 years.

Animals can serve as  mirrors for their human caretakers, reflecting nature, moods and basic needs all very much in the present rather than past or future.

Talking about the future too much can disappoint or mislead. So-called goal-setting exercises may not be a good idea and dreamers should be especially wary when talking about big goals "Repeated psychology tests have proven that telling someone your goal makes it less likely to happen," said  Derek Sivers in a TED Talk. He explains how talking about a goal can trick the brain into a feeling of accomplishment - long before the work is completed - and that diminishes motivation. "Ideally, you would not be satisfied until you had actually done the work. But when you tell someone your goal and they acknowledge it, psychologists have found that it's called a 'social reality.'"

Conversation should serve both parties - and the talking mynas abide by most elements of a good conversation: relying on words familiar to the listener, keeping an even tone that is respectful, sticking to the point. Cocking their heads, they definitely sound and look as if they are interested in what others have to say. But the myna can't resist being the center of attention and they do not understand open-ended questions. They also tend to change the subject, repeat a lot, and ask too much.

Talking may not be doing, but it is about connecting.

I first saw a myna bird many years ago at the National Aviary in Pittsburgh. This tropical bird was kept in a display case that was two meters in height, width and depth - with a microphone. The walls were white and the Hill myna was alert, waiting on its roost for passersby. Sometimes the bird spoke and sometimes it did not. Sometimes the myna would speak only once the visitor started to walk away. Other times, the myna was on a roll, repeating words while cocking its head to listen.

I was only six years old at the time. but I felt sorry for the bird alone in its case. I visited the National Aviary earlier this year and asked about the myna but the staff members did not remember a creature who was once the popular star of the place. This is the myna I remembered for the scenes in Allure of Deceit.

Photo of Hill myna courtesy of  Spencer Wright and Wikimedia Commons; photo of parrot and open indoor space, courtesy of the National Aviary and D. Olsen. 

Heartbreaking

In Allure of Deceit, an antagonist incites murder of a rival by finding extremists and suggesting the woman destroyed a copy of the Koran.

Farfetched? Not really.

"Six-hundred people were charged today for the gruesome murder of a Pakistani Christian couple accused of desecrating the Quran in Punjab province," reports the Economic Times in India. The man and his pregnant wife, in their 30s and parents of four, were beaten and burned alive in a brick kiln where they worked after announcements in "two mosques of the village that Shahzad and his wife had committed blasphemy by burning pages of the holy Quran."

Entire families take on debt to work in such kilns. "According to the U.N., 21 percent of the population of  Pakistan lives below the poverty line and some are left with no choice but to take out loans in exchange for labor," reports the Borgen Project, which urges global leaders to make endign poverty a priority. "These loans can have very high interest rates, creating a cycle of bonded labor. Workers labor in the hot sun to pay off their debt and, many times, their family’s debt, which can be passed down through the generations."

Lies can be a form of self-defense or a motive for murder.

Photo courtesy of the Borgen Project.

Life imitates art

Authorities arrested 13 people in a Greater Manchester trafficking ring run by a gang, reports the BBC News. A 20-year-old woman from Slovakia was tricked into thinking she was traveling to visit a sister:

"She was met by a man who claimed to be her sister's friend and was taken to an address in Failsworth, Oldham before being sold to another man. In July, she was married under Sharia law in Rochdale. The woman was later taken to hospital for an appointment by a woman who acted as an interpreter and told staff she wanted an abortion."

An interpreter at the hospital uncovered the plot. Some gangs suggest that a pregnant wife is useful for securing immigration status in the UK.

Imagine the vulnerability of young women in a country where the CIA World Factbook reports the overall literacy rate is 28 percent,  12.6 percent for women; where the child labor rate is 25 percent; where more than 60 percent of the population is under the age of 24; the unemployment rate is estimated as high as 35 percent; and one third of the population lives below the poverty line.  Imagine a land where there is one physician for every 5000 people, one nurse or midwife for every 10,000 and one hospital bed for every 2000 people, as reported by the World Bank, with rates much lower for rural areas. The rates for Afghanistan are but a fraction of what's available in the developed nations like the United Kingdom.

Allure of Deceit is set in Afghanistan. No one should suggest that the tale of a sham abortion that haunts one caregiver, ruining the lives of many, is unrealistic.

Photo by Todd Huffman and from Wikimedia Commons under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 generic license. He writes: "A woman in conservative parts of the country without male support can do nothing but beg to survive."

Vote

US voters head to the polls on Tuesday, and their decisions have influence over daily routines for Americans and sometimes for the rest of the world - from climate change to global security:

"As globalization’s forces buffet the world..., the internal politics of any state can permanently alter course for other nations."

On the ballots is every seat for the House of Representatives and one third of the Senate. But turnout is low for the mid-terms when the presidency is not being decided: 37 percent of registered voters turned out for the 2010 congressional race compared with 54 percent for the 2012 presidential election, reports the Pew Research Center.

Compare that to Afghanistan turnout, despite threats of Taliban violence: 50 percent in the 2014 presidential race, 29 percent in the 2010 parliamentary race and 67 percent in the 2004 presidential race.

The percentage of women voting was 35 percent in the first round and 38 percent for the second.

Voting is not compulsory in either country.