Yesterday I thought I was being cagey by keeping my poolside sandwich under a tin cover. I knew enough to take precautions because of Scott’s previous crow incident early on here. Well, i wasn’t the only one who had her sights set on that delicious chicken tikka kathi roll as I slipped it out from under the plate cover….from behind, before I could say ‘yummm!’, a huge crow swooped in and under my umbrella grazing my hand and carrying away half my sandwich, the rest of it spilled all over me and my beach towel! “You F**CKER!!!!!” inadvertantly came out of my mouth ( testiment to the huge loss that Indian specialty dish represented as I don’t usually swear like that). Laughter all around me even from a few poolside Russians who never crack a smile.

Later that evening Scott and I are approached in the lobby by a manager. He apologizes to us about the birds. Scott a.k.a. “Ideabox” comes up with 3 ideas for the hotel to try to solve the problem. The manager says they’ve tried everything including laser beam guns. scott’s ideas:

1) put up predator decoys of the crows’ enemies like we put owls up on buildings in the states.

2) put down razor strips on edges of buildings so the crows won’t land there.

3) use scarecrows wisely….a dummy dressed up as the actual guard with the cap gun strategically placed on the roof top would probably make the crows think twice.

The manager liked all of Scott’s ideas enough to whip out his notebook and write them down.

By the way, the hotel does hire guards with rifles to shoot caps at the crows. They patrol the outdoor breakfast area while we are eating. JB and Scott discussed what a fabulous job that is…every little boy’s fantasy gig to get paid for shooting crows with a beebie gun!