Sunday 28 August 2011

Fit Birds

I was reading about vultures after a phone conversation with my friend Dave led to a dispute over pigeons. He thought carrier pigeons were called passenger pigeons. I thought that sounds like nonsense I also had the internet and checked, expecting to find no valid entries for passenger pigeons. Interestingly passenger pigeons did exist but are now extinct, and no they didn't carry passengers or stuff for humans (like carrier pigeons did and still do) as far as I know. Wikipedia them here. It's a sad dodoesque sort of story.

As an attempt to move on from the passenger pigeon debaucle Dave dropped a bit more unsubstantiated knowledge. This time about vulture behaviour, sort of implying that they have ESP and that's how they all gather around a kill from miles away. This may or may not be the case my Google Search found nothing relevant in the first 2 minutes and I sort of gave up, but it did lead to the discovery of this cool safari safety fact.


As the above image shows, if vultures in Africa are sitting in trees around a fresh kill, even if it at first appears to be unattended there is usually a large predator in the vicinity. So DO NOT approach to try and cut a steak off the zebra because Simba has grown up and is now the Lion King and he WILL eat you.

On the subject of lions I was in Cornwall surfing and after my lovely surf at Widemouth Bay we went to a pub in Bude and had a few drinks and discussed cupping. For anybody who doesn't know, cupping is the sort of cup shape you make with your hand when you are cupping something, such as a boob.

It was unanimously decided that the best cupping scene in all of film history was... 

The Lion King - monkey cups lion's bum.

 

A text-book cub-cup. This cup can be found at 2:49 and lasts for a mere 2.5 secs but the epic soundtrack that precedes and follows this particular cup puts it up there as the best movie cup of all time. The cupping sound effect is also so self-assured and confident, a true marvel of recording.

As a bonus fact, this is an actual translation of what the African bloke is shouting at the beginning of the tune.

Nants ingonyama bagithi Baba  [Here comes a lion, Father]
Sithi uhm ingonyama           [Oh yes, it's a lion]

Nants ingonyama bagithi baba  [Here comes a lion, Father]
Sithi uhhmm ingonyama         [Oh yes, it's a lion]
Ingonyama                     [Lion]

Siyo Nqoba                    [We're going to conquer]
Ingonyama                     [Lion]
Ingonyama nengw' enamabala    [A lion and a leopard come to this open place]


I never particularly wandered what he was shouting but now I know, and it seems pretty sweet.








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