Did you know that snail poop is bigger than the snail?

I didn’t either till yesterday when Wow Dinga discovered a snail family under a flower pot.

The children were playing football in the garden,  enjoying a clear sunny day after two months of almost incessant rain. The ball went into the flower beds and Wow Dinga chased after it.
Suddenly,  he came up to Anna Shetty, carefully carrying something in his little hands.

“Look Aaie! It’s a snail!” he said excitedly. ” I found a snail family” and he proceeded to bring out four snails from under a flower pot in the garden, quickly forgetting the ball. One by one he carried them from their hiding place and placed them on a low wall.

A snail in the garden? So what , I hear you say.

But, for urban kids like my grandchildren, this was a unique experience. So far,  the only animal’s they’ve seen are the stray cats, pet dogs, cockroaches and mosquitoes. From time to time they shoo crows and pigeons who insist on making my verandah a public toilet and warily watch the kites swooping down. Occasionally they see a squirrel scurrying by. Once in a while they see moths and butterflies.

In mid-June  the little ones enjoyed swatting flies. But this by far was their most adventurous  ‘wildlife safari’. They spent a good five minutes watching the snails crawl along the wall and were fascinated by the huge amount of poop that came out of one.

We were surprised too!

Not only did I find that snail poop is bigger than the snail, but I also realised that I was so involved in my daily life that I failed to see the wonder around me.

Don’t you think we all need to see the world through the eyes of little ones?