والله : a.k.a., WA'ALLAH!

We start today's blog post with a blatant cut and paste from Wikipedia:

Wa'allah (Arabic)

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

By Allah (Arabic: Wallah, والله) is Arabic expression meaning "[I promise] by God" used to make a promise or express great credibility on an expression. It is considered a sin among Muslim to use this phrase and follow it up with a lie. Also, some Muslims argue that this is one of the few valid ways of making a promise, the variant "I promise on myself" or "I promise on my own soul" not being allowed, in contrast to "I promise by the one who holds my soul" ie God. An alternative is Wallaahi, "By my God", often contracted by non-Arab populations in Africa to Wallai.

Another meaning is "Really?", "Is that so?" (referring to "Do you swear on it?", used in spoken Arabic), "By God!" (this meaning has been adopted by Modern Hebrew slang as well).

{Your Correspondent chimes in here to say that wala in Hindi means someone who sells something, like a street vendor. In Bombay the walas often have little ryming songs they sing to attract customers and give info about their wares. Our little Wa'Allah has a song - he sing it for you anytime.}

And now we introduce the reason for this post:

This is the baby African Grey we purchased last night. We don't know its gender, but I have a strong inclination it's a girl. Every time I've had a strong inclination about gender (being pregnant, with our previous Grey, Cosmo), I've been WRONG. Therefore, this is probably a boy. For now, we'll use the masculine pronoun, "he."

We bought him from a pet shop at the souq. These shops are questionable at best, and pet owners typically sharply divided into one of two reactions (1) So what? They're just animals or (2) OH MY GOD HOW COULD YOU EVER BUY SOMETHING FROM THOSE HEATHENS AND FUND THEIR HORRIBLE TREATMENT OF ANIMALS! BLAAAAAAAAA! That "Bla" at the end is where the hysterical person either attempts to attack you physically or runs away in terror and disgust at the sight of you.

When we first moved here, I tended towards the second group and swore to find a "reputable" and "kind" and "clean" breeder. Guess what? No such thing exists in Doha. So you are left with these options (although I say "bird," it applies to "dog," "cat," "turtle," "chicken," "goldfish," and "turnip," too):

1. Rescue/adopt a bird.
   There are no bird shelters in Doha...so this is an issue of random luck. That's where our adventure with Habib started.
2. Import your bird.
   We tried that, and the poor Wildlife guy had a triple bypass and didn't get our paperwork done in time. The backlog is 6-8 months to export from the US, and trying to do that from Doha would be a nightmare. El Jefe is also with his new owner 8,000 miles away, and I'm not in a position to ask for him back.
3. Don't have a pet.
   This is always an option but not one I wanted to choose. We need a creature to make our family complete.
4. Buy one from the souq (or similar) dealers.

I actually would have crumbled into option 4 late last summer, after we talked to vets, scoured online info, and talked to people: no other "good" options existed. If Habib hadn't come to us, I would have been at the souq with my money...but the struggle in the summer was also that there were no young birds. They were all fully adult and, somehow, up to 50% more expensive than a baby. I don't understand that price difference...maybe because these older birds could talk?

So when we found out Habib was going to Saudi, we started keeping our eyes open at the souq. About two weeks ago, there was a perfect little gentle baby (~ four months old) that I really wanted. However, we weren't sure Habib would make it to Saudi, so we were in limbo. I went back to the same animal dealer three days later, and the baby had been sold.

Last night, we went back again. The young boys weren't in the mood for any souq adventures, we got a late start, and Hannah was getting grumpy. The parking lot was full. Conditions did not look good. I promised we would walk straight to the pet area, look around quickly, and leave. We walked straight to the pet area, immediately spotted this bird, handled it and talked to the shop owner, and decided he must come home with us.

His name is Wa'allah (pronounced Wa-lah), and you've seen what that means above. We chose Wa'allah because it's fun to say, not offensive, and fits the situation in many ways. The kids asked me about a dozen times, "Do you really promise? Can we keep this one?" So Wa'allah is a promise. Wa'allah is also a promise to the bird to take good care of him. Wa'allah is "sent from God," because I think there was a reason I had to wait and go back last night--there's a reason we didn't buy a bird last summer or even two weeks ago. This one was meant for us. Yes, I'm a blithering romantic fool, but I believe it. Finally, Wa'allah informally means "Really?" as in "Really? You really just went out a bought a bird--who will live about 75 years--in five minutes?" Yes, really. Wa'allah!

Wa'allah is still getting hand-fed twice per day (and the shop people sold us the feeding supplies for that). We're comfortable with this from our experience hand-raising El Jefe many moons ago.

Notice how his eyes are dark grey--that is a sign that he's still rather young. Notice also that little metal band around his left foot (visible in the top photo). That's crucial--it means he was bred in captivity and is the central item ensuring we'll be able to bring him home with us (navigating through export/import permits).

Wa'allah's super sweet--doesn't know anything about biting and makes precious little baby chirping noises. He's also not expert at balancing or moving yet--he sort of moves in a clumsy way like a toddler. He won't show signs of talking for several more months, but he likes to cuddle up under your neck and is very loving. We're a lucky bunch after all.