One day, as I was crawling through different websites searching about nature, I unknowingly ended up in Wikipedia. There, as I scrolled down the page of “The List of National Birds” something very intriguing stuck my conscience. I looked at each and every nation and compared its state of existence with the birds beside it. Surprisingly, they matched in a quite even manner.

Let’s look at our own nation “India” for example. India’s national bird is the Indian Peacock. Needless to say, peacock is one of the most beautiful birds with its elegant torquise tail adding to its flightless splendour. Now look at these two characteristics carefully – flightless and beautiful. Contradictory, isn’t it? Now look at our nation. India undoubtedly has achieved much brilliance – From being the hub of education back in 200BC to be known as the land of gold in 16^th century. As times progressed, it also overcame the alien domination to become the largest democratic nation in 1961 and nation with the highest percentage in growth of literacy rate according to the 2001 census. Great men, great philosophies, and great teachings – everything began in this subcontinent. However, it’s sad to see people criticizing the nation as a “developing” nation – one filled with corruption and unruliness. Here, it’s not awkward to see that the state of affairs existing in our nation is somewhat similar to a ‘peacock’.

Now if we look at Chile, we find that their national bird is Andean Condor – a species of Vulture which is critically endangered. From a tourist’s point of view, it is shocking to see that this nation doesn’t attract much tourists save for microscopic minority who go to study about the Easter Island statues, the first “human face sculptures” art made by any known civilisation on earth.

Angola has the fastest bird Peregrine Falcon as its national bird. Just like a 300km/h flight speed of the falcon bird, Angola’s capital city Luanda has enrolled its name into the 10 most expensive cities of the world and becoming Africa’s second (Cape Town, the earlier one and currently out of the list) Within the last twenty years, it has given rise to a number of celebrities like Leila Lopes (Miss Universe 2011) or Mantorras (retired footballer of Benefica FC) to name a few.

Nepal’s bird Himalayan Monal has a sweet name, a heavy stature (1.5 – 2 kilograms) and a sweet voice. The heavy stature of this small bird gives us an idea of the largest peaks of the world situated in this nation. The beauty and culture are no different, like its national bird.

We have often received a text message saying “Attitude matters. Birds look for shelter while the Eagle finds shelter by flying above the clouds!” As you all know, the Bald Eagle is the national bird of the United States. It’s this attitude of the nation which makes the States as one of the most powerful nations in the world.

Save for these five, the other ones among listless examples which had its fate almost close to the national birds of their nation were Palestine with a newly proposed Palestine Sunbird which somewhat shows a picture of its reconstructions from a terror stricken nation or the Tundra Swan of Russia, which has its wings heavier than any of its swan counterparts throughout the world symbolising the chill of the cold nation, to name a few. It’s obvious. Nature has its own way of relating itself to the human lives, and so does the birds, a part of our extended animal family.