I fed hungry rats on a railway platform the other day... a hot vegetable puff straight out of the vendor's oven. They looked so hungry, hunting all day for leftovers, scurrying about, afraid someone would see them and harm them. At first I was disgusted. Their grey scrawny bodies, running on the platforms, with their long sweeping tails, diving into holes. Then I looked closer, and saw their shining eyes. And then it struck me... that they have a right to live too. Who said humans could rule the world. Who said we had to wipe out every other creature that didn't benefit us? Who exactly made us the authority to decide who dies and who lives. Suddenly I thought of Darwin and The survival of the fittest. Did he ever say that the fit could just stamp on the weak and encroach on their space for no reason? Why is it that these rats don't have a home and why do they have to be scared? Where is the space for them to live in this world.

I threw a pice of the crunchy puff. At first one came forward... peeping its head out... it ran out of its hole to grab it with both paws... and in one fleeting moment hurried inside as if it could see a stick coming down on it's body. A stolen feast for dinner. Soon more came. Almost like the word was spreading about some magical dinner buffet for the family! Big lumps of food raining from the heavens above! The excitement was driving them crazy... dizzy with happiness... The whole family got to all the holes and cracks around, each hole had a few small sniffing noses peeping out, long whiskers reaching out, some heads popping in and out, so excited, and yet so scared. Then they came, each one giving confidence to the other. No rat traps, no food stuffed with rat poison, no man waiting to beat them dead. "Really? You have GOT to be kiddin!" It was a rat party they could never dream of... unless of course, there were more crazy people like me.

I threw the last piece in my hand... looked at their dancing black eyes under the lamppost in the railway station and suddenly I wasn't hungry. It was a peaceful feeling... as if I had just been fed at a feast.