Peshy

Without aim we were strolling through the narrow, unknown streets of Peshawar. The street of the needleworkers, cobblers and knifegrinders we had left behind, when we saw him at the bird-seller bazaar.
In the corner of a cage timidly a wet featherbunch was cowering, watching us with his wise large owleyes. Helpless, captured, begging for rescue.
This put us in front of a  serious decision. Could we save this young owl from a life in captivity, within a cage or tied by his leg to a short rope? Or even from death? Because for us it looked like the small bird would not  make it through the next days under the conditions of the bird shop.
Against the wish of instant help stood, that we did not have any experience with birds, exept a budgerigar in Ewalds childhood.
We had no idea, how long it takes for a young owl to leave the nest. And we did not know how long we would stay in northern Pakistan. Neither could we imagine a life with an owl in the Jahmobil, where we had very little space.
Nevertheless we decided for rescue.

From the seller we got to know, that we now were the ``owners´´ of a two weeks old male specimen of a small sized owl, that had to be feeded with pieces of raw meat.
Each piece we gave to him with a pincette. Water we dripped on his beak, so that he got enough liquid. In the beginning he used his wings to keep balance. Slowly, after days of gathering strength, Peshy Pürzel slowly started to hop to and fro on the newspaper we had laid out for him.
We named the small largeeyed bunch Peshy, after the town of  Peshawar, where we found him, Pürzel for the many small heaps he left.

The daytime, while we were driving, Peshy spent sleeping in his cage. The place for the night we arranged for him on the kitchenplate. Beneath was the stove, which always made cooking in the bus a bit difficult.
One night Peshy managed to visit us in our bed, he ``flew´´ over the small passage between bed and kitchen board, hopped on on the blanket, untill he reached our heads, and pulled our hair with his beak.
This soon regulary disturbed our sleep, as noone wanted Peshy to ``pürzel´´ on his head.
Peshy never showed a wild shy behavior. Rather did he enjoy the life in his unusual nest with the two funny giants. But all his activities were limited to the inner space of the Jahmobil.

But we wanted to prepare Peshy for a life outside. To help him to get outside, so that he could see, what is happening in the daytime of the owl, the night, in wild nature, we opened the small triangular window in the roof of the car. Branches in the inner space should ease the ascent for Peshy. We placed Peshy there, but he would not go outside.
One night, tap-tap, we heard his claws on the roof of the bus for the first time. Soon nocturnal visits at the camp-fire, flights to trees in the neighborhood  and  to other interesting things followed.

While we were driving slowly through the north of Pakistan, Peshy started his first nocturnal expeditions. Late in the morning he came back to the Jahmobil tired and hungry. But he still was not able tosupply himself with food on his own, by shortening his food rations we tried to waken Peshys natural hunting instincts.
The method worked. It was time to unhumanize Peshy.
Because of urgent repairs at the Jahmobil we took lodge in a guesthouse in Gilgit for two weeks. From there Peshy should start into freedom.

He choose a vine-arbour for his new home. In the Jahmobil it had become too lonely for him, as we had also moved to a house.
Only rarely we offered him a meal. But every evening when we were sitting on the terrace he came for a visit and landed on our shoulders. On one of his approaches he miscalculated his flight path and crashed against a window pane. The injure of the right wing was not bad, but for some days he could not fly, depending on our help completely again.
Our time ran short again, we had to go back to Peshawar to organize our continuation of the journey to Afghanistan.

Kajum, the landlord of the house in Gilgit where we lived, gave us the promise to care for Peshy, provide food for him and not to keep him captive.
Peshy was dislodged to the toilet beside the gardenhouse, after a hard goodbye and the promise of coming back, we headed for Afghanistan.

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