It so happened that in addition to working at the school, I also gave private math and physics lessons at students’ homes. One day, Dianka (that was the name of one of my students) and I were solving problems in her small, cozy apartment. Suddenly, to my surprise, something flew into the room and began moving very quickly from one wall to the other, flying at different heights. It turned out to be a small green, red, and yellow parrot, but I didn’t realize it right away—only after it chose my shoulder as a landing spot.
“It’s Kesha. Don’t pay any attention to him,” the student commented.
Confused, I glanced sideways at the creature sitting a few centimeters from my left ear.
“He won’t hurt you; don’t worry,” Dianka tried to reassure me, probably sensing my tension. “Okay,” I replied to her, smiling.
We worked with numbers and formulas, and Kesha watched us attentively.
A few minutes passed, and I completely forgot about his presence on my shoulder. After all, he sat there without moving.
A quarter of an hour later, I was telling Dianka about the essence of an interesting physical phenomenon:
“So, as the distance from the Earth’s surface increases, air pressure decreases, and at lower atmospheric pressure, water can boil not at 100 degrees Celsius but at a lower temperature. That is, unlike on the Earth’s surface, where water boils at 100 degrees Celsius. Can you imagine, Dianka?”
And at that moment, I heard an unnaturally loud but squeaky voice say in my ear:
“Are you sure?”
I glanced at the girl, bewildered, and she, covering her mouth with her right hand from laughter, pointed with her left at the parrot crouched on her shoulder. Of course, it was he who had uttered the unexpected phrase.
Then Dianka told me that Kesha had recently moved in with her. In the winter, she’d accidentally found him freezing in the snow under a tree. No one had taught the parrot to talk; perhaps his previous owner had. Either way, the small, colorful creature could pronounce a few words quite clearly.
Ukraine, 2025
About the Author
Yurii Tokar was born in 1967 in the USSR. In 1988, he began teaching mathematics in the region affected by the Chernobyl disaster. His stories, essays, and poems have been published in Ukraine, Germany, the USA, and elsewhere. His work has appeared in the Russian-language magazine “Чайка” (Washington), Litbreak magazine (USA), and StylusLit journal (Australia), among others.
