Back in the day, when I was living in a small town in Korea, I was walking down the street with Jenna, a friend of mine. We were on our way to pick up some doughnuts and coffee for breakfast when out of nowhere a pigeon attacked her. The pigeon, in a blur or gray feathers and frantic flapping motions, tried its best to land on Jenna’s head while she ducked, screamed, and flailed her arms around. Eventually, the bird gave up and landed on the sidewalk next to us, cooing with disappointment.
“That pigeon tried to kill me,” Jenna said and, eventually, after I stopped laughing hysterically, we looked around to see if we could figure out why. There turned out to be no reason for the pigeon attack. No nest, no food. Nothing we could find seemed to be sufficient cause for the pigeon to enter attack mode. So we went about our way and were a little more wary of the birds around us.
The pigeon attack was one of my favorite moments in Korea. It even brought about the joke that if you ever wanted to take over the world with an army of darkness, pigeons would be ideal because they’re everywhere and they are ready and willing to attack. The pigeon army of darkness remained a joke until one day, after having moved to Japan, some friends of mine took me to a temple in Nagoya called Osu. We went there for big festival and there were booths and people everywhere. We ate crepes. I played a game in which you catch toy fish with a cup. The game was simple. Every toy fish you scoop with your cup, you get to keep. I did so poorly that the woman running the game gave me a handful of extra toy fish to compensate me for my shame.
Then we ran into a banana salesman who convinced one of my friends to buy a bundle of bananas and then explained the proper pronunciation of arigato to him for ten minutes against his will. Over all, it was a good day. I enjoyed the temple, so I decided to go there again on my own one hot summer day.
This time there wasn’t any festival, and all of the people had been replaced by pigeons. Hundreds of pigeons sat on the roofs of the temple and the surrounding buildings. It was a little unnerving yet fascinating at the same time, so I stayed and watched them for a little while. As I sat there watching them, a young couple passed by. They went to a little hut outside of the temple where the boy opened a window, took something out and handed it to the girl.
At that moment all of the pigeons were airborne. They swarmed down from the roofs and landed on the girl who was screaming in horror. She had pigeons on her arms, shoulders, hands, and even one or two stuck in her hair. She was terrified. The girl dropped whatever the boy had given her and ran as fast as she could, screaming from where she stood.
The boy followed her laughing. They probably didn’t date much after that. Once the pigeons had returned to their rooftop positions, I walked over to the little hut. There was nothing much inside. Just a coin box, plates of bird food, and a sign that said it cost fifty yen to feed the birds.
Being on my own and a little weary of what I had just seen, I didn’t purchase any bird seeds that day. The thought of the pigeons landing on my bare skin and in my hair wasn’t all too appealing. Instead I made a plan. A plan to use the pigeon army of darkness to my advantage when my brother came for Christmas.
Of course, prior to my brother’s visit, I visited the temple several other times. It was always fun to wander through the alleys and look at all the shops, before buying some food and sitting in a corner of the square, waiting to see someone try to feed the birds. The funniest and cruelest pigeon feed I saw was when some parents put their two children in the square for a photo opportunity and then handed them a plate of birds seeds and wouldn’t let them move until they’d taken a good picture. Of course, neither the birds nor the children were willing to sit still long enough to take a decent picture. Every time a bird landed on one of the children, that child would scream and bounce around trying to get it off, in the process flinging around more bird seeds causing all of the birds to fly up for a second, trying to get at the new batch of seeds and the children trying to escape before they landed again.
In the end, the number of birds on the children outweigh the children themselves. So after snapping one last picture the father put away the camera and the mother retrieved a tissue to try and clean the bird poop from the jackets of her wailing offspring. In theory, it would have made for a cute picture. In actuality, it had given these children a lifelong phobia of birds.
Finally, after months of patient waiting, my brother arrived. I took him to see all of the sights in town, one of them being Osu. When we arrived at Osu, we toured the temple before heading towards the shops.
“Hey, do you want to try something fun?” I asked my brother.
“What?” he asked. He was already on to me.
“Feed the birds.”
“No.”
My hopes of having a pigeon army of darkness descend on him had been crushed. Being disappointed and having nothing better to do, I decided to feed the birds myself. This time I had a jacket with a hood on, so I would be able to cover every inch of my body that the birds might land on. I bought the seeds and was instantly swarmed. The birds landed everywhere they could, trying to get at the seeds. It was rather a surreal experience walking around covered by birds and it was over in a matter of seconds. I ended up spilling most of the bird food on the ground and they lost all interest in me.
While I remained unscathed by my bird holding experience, my jacket needed to be washed and my brother still refused to feed the birds. Apparently seeing me do it had not made it any more appealing, but it had amused him greatly. Since that quiet winter morning, I have taken every visitor I’ve had to Osu to see my pigeon army of darkness, because, in all honesty, I still think it’s hilarious to see someone be swarmed by birds. Some of my guests are brave and try to feed the birds. Others just watch me do it before debating how long it would take me to get these birds to do my bidding.
Training a pigeon army of darkness aside, the best is yet to come. Jenna, my pigeon victimized friend from Korea, is planning on visiting me this summer and when she does, we will visit Osu. With any luck, we will be able to recreate that magical moment when a pigeon tried to land on her head, although I’m beginning to doubt she will be willing to be traumatized by another bird.
