Playing Styrakal

This article first appeared in MSN:
http://content.msn.co.in/Contribute/Others/UCStory5960.htm


One fine day in Sydney, old farmer McDonald was digging in his farm. He was using a long wooden stick and when suddenly he hit upon something hard. He dug further and carefully picked up an egg shaped thing. It looked very strange and immediately, he called the police.

'Hello, Mr. Policeman. This is farmer McDonald. I have found something very strange in my farm. Can you please come and take a look?'

'Oh! sure! ' said the Policeman. 'We will be there in a few minutes'

A few minutes later, farmer McDonald heard the familiar Police siren at the distance. WOOOOWWWWW ....He was happy. At last, the Police was there.

'Hello, Mr Policeman. How are you? ' said McDonald

'I am fine. Thank you. Where is the strange thing?'

'It is right here. Come and take a look' McDonald said leading their way.

'Oh. It's a fossil. I will call Styrakal' said the Policeman and dialled a number. ' Hello, is it Mr Styrakal?'
"Oh! hi! This is Styrakal. Is this the Policeman? Have you found a fossil?"
"Oh yes Mr Styrakal. Can you please come and help us? We don't know what it is."
"I know that you don't know. But I know because I am a Palentologist. I know all about dinosaurs. I think you have found a dinosaur fossil. Maybe you have found a T rex's nail or maybe even the whole skeleton of a Baryonyx. Anyways, I will come and see. I will take a helicopter and come because I am not in sydney. I am in New zealand and I want to come there as soon as possible. ok? See you soon. Bye."

Styrakal, the palentologist, is my four year old. He always wants to be the best character in the game and I who is old McDonald get to do nothing but dig on the empty floor and pick up a mould of dino egg and keep it carefully. The Policeman exists in our imagination!!!

A few seconds later, farmer old McDonald, saw the familiar yellow helicopter coming towards him.
'Hello, Mr Styrakal. I am farmer McDonald. How are you?'
"I am fine. But where is the strange thing that you found. I want to see it.'
"This is what I found Mr Styrakal. It looks very strange. What do you think it could be?"
"Oh! This is dinosaur fossil. Let me try to dig it and see what is inside. You see, this is my special equipment (as he takes out some brush and cutting and digging tools that are part of the 'dig the dino fossil kit'!) and I can use this to dig out the dino from here. But I wonder what dino it could be?"

A few minutes later, after a lot of effort from my side to not get angry for the worry of the mud mould getting on the carpet and my son always wanting to do the digging and the cutting with a lot of enthusiasm, there is an 'aha' moment.

'You see, this is the dinosaur skeleton. This is an Ankylosaurus. We have to be very careful about this fossil because we should not break it. I think we should carefully take it to the Museum now' said Styrakal.

"What is an Ankylosaurus?' asked McDonald because he didn't know anything about dinosaurs.
'Oh, an Ankylosaurus is a dinosaur which was there when all the other dinos like t rex, brachiosaurus and all was there. Ankylo was there in N America and it was a herbivore. Now, I think, we will take it to the Natural History Museum Sydney and keep it in a glass case so that all the kids can come and see and learn also.'

So, Old McDonald and Syrakal drive to the Sydney Natural History Museum and keep the Ankylosaurus for the rest of the world to see.

Once we come to the end of the game, the lil fella wants to play Feroz the Herpetologist and I farmer McDonald will find a few snakes in my farm and who else to my rescue than ofcourse my friend Feroz. My kiddo's recent interest in flags has also turned him into a vexillologist!!! So, one fine day, old McDonald comes across a whole bunch of flags so, he has no one to look up to except our friend Vaxo who happens to be a vexillologist!!!! But, why do I get to be only McDonald is anybody's guess but why should I be old????Once my lil one said - you need to be an old farmer so that you can be big and strong enough to dig and only then, I get to be old like 74 years so that, I can also be big, old and strong!!!!