Articles

A Somber Struggle For Life
By Sunny Tripathy

�I would like a lemon chicken with sweet and sour sauce, and she will have the spicy salmon, with the pork fried rice on the side.�

Your waiter at the Chinese restaurant took your order before he hurried off into a large kitchen, in which the meal was to be prepared...

* * * *

The newborn chick tries to keep up with her mother, as they head towards the seed for the morning feast. This newborn chicken, Daniel, was born about 3 weeks ago, and his eyes are now prepared to bring him the sights of the world. Yet, all he could see was a fence, between his family and the world. The brilliant sun would strike the sky with red and orange each morning, yet it rose and set behind the fence. The free ducks would soar high above the trees, singing with the bloom of spring but, it too was on the other side of the fence. Daniel tried to understand the good things in life, his mother Henny and his two brothers, yet his tale lay a sad one:

A day when the frozen wind of winter bit upon our defensive fur, my mother was walked out of her cage by some giant creature, which had the power to open and close the fence. Petrified, I desperately tried to slip through the fence gate with her, but I was kicked back in, and only my mother went out.

My young eyes, twinkling with fear, grew blurry from my gathering tears and made it difficult for me to follow their path. Finally, after about 100 yards, the man stopped, and held my mother against a small plateau from a tree, and held a large object close to her neck. He held it back, and swung with might, and my mother�s head rolled onto the grass while her loving blood soaked into the dark soil.

Her precious head bounced and lolled across the dirt raising dust, and landed upon my feet. Her hazel almond eyes lay staring at me, and her handsome red head lay vibrantly contrasted against the mahogany pale dirt. My brain grew moist with my eyes, and thunder jolting pain shocked my body. Like snowflakes, my invisible tears glided to the ground, making dark spots on the dirt. With every bit of muscle and strength, concealing the pain, I was able to lift my head and my eyes groped for an explanation.

Her body and flapping wings were taken to a small booth, upon which they ripped off her feathers as a deer rips the grass, and peeled her bleeding skin off her precious body. They knew not the virtue of her wings, and they knew not her soul within. They sliced her body into pieces, parting her organs from her body, recklessly washing off her blood along with her pride. And without bother the blood that Henny spent years building, the blood that was given to her from her parents, and the blood in which lay her dignity and soul, now washed down the drain.

Her body parts which lay asunder, were placed in a plastic bag and shipped off to a market, from where a Chinese restaurant bought it. And Henny now lies in pieces in a freezer, waiting for her precious muscles to be fried and mixed with spices, so it may be served to a hungry human.

* * * *

�I would like a lemon chicken with sweet and sour sauce, and she will have the spicy salmon, with the pork fried rice on the side.�

* * * *

The raging stream fought ferociously against her, but a young mother salmon fought back, and she used every muscle in her body to reach her nest upstream, Alaska. The stream bought her pain and fatigue, but in the hopes to allow her eggs to live, and to ensure her kind, she put her final strength into a powerful jump and finally found herself in her nest. She prepared to lay her eggs, completely oblivious to the giant who sits patiently above her. Without having eaten in weeks, when the mother saw a juicy worm dangling in front of her, she couldn�t help but to feed her growling stomach. Her mouth opened and as she put her mouth over the worm, a sudden wince of pain came upon here, as a wide and long sharp hook drove its way through the top of her mouth. The pain a thousand lightning bolts could not bring, ripped at her mouth, and she was lifted out of the water by a hook in her mouth. Like a drowning human in a pool, she tried her hardest to break through, but she had a nail in her mouth, heavy children in her stomach, and no oxygen to her lungs. She was finally taken off of the hook, yet she was not sent back to the water, but was lifted further away of her home, and was dropped onto a hard ground.

There she shuddered, from lack of oxygen even though her life was still there. However, a giant grabbed a large marble pole, probably ten times heavier than her weight, and bashed her head, shattering her skull, and damaging her tiny brain, until her blood had stained the ground, and her poor life was destroyed. Her young children that lay inside of her will never have a future.

Her body was cut into pieces, and her head sliced inclemently from her body. And that tail that had battled a raging river as a mother, was also violently parted from her. The pieces were again placed in a plastic bag, and sold to a market. And this bag too was sold to a Chinese restaurant, which stores this courageous mother in the freezer, so she may be served with chili and spice to another hungry human.

* * * *

�I would like a lemon chicken with sweet and sour sauce, and she will have the spicy salmon, with the pork fried rice on the side.�

* * * *

I need not explain the story of the pig, or any animal for that matter, for a point is to be made. I am 14 years old, and had not understood the importance of other animals� lives until recently. I had gone to a market, and came upon a young goat hanging by its intestines, and his head left for the flies. I came upon chickens who were picked upon live. Since then, I have become a vegetarian and have not eaten meat.

�Eat some salmon, it is nutritious and good for your body,� say my friends.

�Sorry, but I shall not take the life of another to help benefit my own,� is my only reply.

One goes to a restaurant and just orders something, but never thinks about where it has come from. One never thinks the lives that have gone into their full stomachs. A helpless bird with brains the size of a nut, who cannot even defend itself from a vicious human looses its life. We humans were given the bigger, smarter brains to use guns and weapons? We humans were given the bigger, smarter brains to kill and do crimes? Were we humans given the bigger, smarter brains to eat other lives? If that is true than I shall ask for a smaller, stupider brain for I shall not wish to be a part of this species.

Understandable it is, for a lion to eat deer, for God had designed it with a brain whose thoughts are meant to be such. Yet, God had not made humans smarter so they would eat animals, kill animals, and destroy nature! Let Henny, the salmon, and all animals for that matter live in peace.

There shall be a day where the villain of today will lie the victim of tomorrow, but that day is not today and a chance has been given to make tomorrow the way it should be. That future lays upon your decisions and only your decisions on an animal�s SOMBER STRUGGLE FOR LIFE.

*****

�I would like a lemon chicken with sweet and sour sauce, and she will have the spicy salmon, with the pork fried rice on the side. Wait... actually i�ll have the spicy, garlic green beans, and she will have the tofu curry with the stir-fry vegetable on the side...�