Maui Girl

These stories from Donna Austin come from her rich Maui history and heritage.

06 November 2006

Chapter 4: Teaching the Parrot!

“I thought it would be fun to teach that parrot something other than the usual ‘Good morning’ or ‘Hello, Polly wants a cracker’ bit of boring parrot talk. It was hard work saying the same thing over and over again when no one was around. Of course you helped a lot. In fact I think you wholeheartedly endorsed the idea in the first place,” mused Tony.
“Yes”, confessed João, “I did think it was a great idea. But I never realized we’d get in so much trouble for it!”
Tony laughed and said, “I will never forget the brothers white, shocked faces looking on in horror as the parrot bellowed loud and clear, ‘Hello, you son of a bitch!’ I thought I would fall over laughing and then I was afraid I’d give myself away for enjoying the joke so much. But when I looked around, I realized I wasn’t the only one laughing because all the other boys were roaring with laughter too.”
“Yes, we were all looking bad and laughing together at the brothers faces. I was proud of the class when they kept their mouths shut and didn’t tattle on us. Brother Timothy stalked up and down those aisles asking for a confession and looking at each of our faces and deciding we all looked guilty. He must have asked ten times which one of us did it. All of our answers were the same. ‘I don’t know anything about who taught the parrot’ As he searched our eyes for a flicker of guilt.” Breathed João with a sigh. “That was tough to keep a straight face and look innocent.”

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