Hear it from my friends:

Pashu the plankton: Hi I’m part of the family of tiny creatures called Microorganisms, they call me plankton. Planktons are very very small creatures, which you can’t even see with the naked eye. Mungoo is very important for us because we eat fallen mangrove leaves and other material that fall into the sea. Then we make important nutrients out of them for Mungoo and his family! Because we are healthy- thanks to mangroves-we can provide food for other animals like fish and shrimp, who eat us as well.

Mariam the shrimp and Hinny the crab Mariam the shrimps: HEHEHE we’re the ones everybody is dying to get their hands on, I mean animals want us and all the human people keep asking the fishermen to catch more of us. We lay our eggs amongst these mangroves, and this is our home! Our young ones are able to grow here and when they become big they go out into the sea, where the other fish and humans can eat us. But everything would go wrong if it weren’t for Mungoo. If the mangroves are gone we would not have a place to lay our eggs and we would all die.

Hinny the crabs: Shellfish, sardines, palla and other fish live or spend at least some part of their lives in the mangroves with us! We provide food for birds, mammals and people. Basically without the mangroves we would have no where to go and then humans would never be able to eat seafood!

Falku: What are migratory birds, Aunty Sluzz?

Twuzz the flamingo: I will tell you what they are! I’m Twuzz the flamingo, and I am a migratory bird myself! You see birds are very hyper and restless creatures, well some of them like us are at least! We cannot stay in one place for one reason or another. Winters are very cold where we come from, and it is impossible to get any food. We feed on pink algae among other food, that’s is why we are pink in colour by the way. We were not like this from birth. We are originally white, but the pink algae dye our feathers pink! Anyway, during winter, the river freezes over, so there is no algae to feed on. So what we do, is that we grab our suitcases and say farewell to friends and take off on our wings! We keep flying, until we find a good place to live in. Somewhere where we feel comfortable and happy. That is until we get restless again and want to go back home! Usually we like to make the Karachi mangroves our summer vacation home. We love it here.

Affu the Dolphin: And Falku, other mammals like jackals and herds of camels also come around to the mangroves to eat their leaves. Mangroves are also important for three other species of dolphins!

Falku: Wow Mungoo uncle, you seem very popular around here! But how did all your friends help you when you were dying?

Mungoo: well you haven’t met my best friend yet. Humans! Humans are not less funny than us plants. If they want to they can destroy themselves, and us too, but if there are good humans like our friend Shariq, then the plant and human world can both compromise and live happily!

Falku: I don’t like humans. They put out these big nets and take all my friends away. One of them even took away my daddy!

Shariq the boy enters.

Shariq: Well those must be very bad humans Falku!

Everyone greets Shariq but Falku is too scared.

Shariq: Don’t be scared. I’m not going to do you any harm. After all you are one of the most important creatures in my life!

Affu: That’s right Falku. If it weren’t for Shariq here, we wouldn’t have been able to save Uncle Mungoo at all!

Shariq: See Falku, the thing is that some villagers use mangroves as fuel because they do not have any gas and need wood to light fires to cook food. They also need the leaves to feed their animals. They like to catch crabs, shrimps and fish. They catch those and sell them in our local markets, or export them to other countries. This helps to bring in money for them to be able to live. Don’t take humans wrong, but they have to do this. It’s what we call the lifecycle. Us humans have to make money so that Pakistan can become a success! The mangroves are main sources of production, protection and shelter for these sea animals!

Affu: That’s right my dear. Last year, when we saw Mungoo in such a devastating state, we didn’t know what to do. Then Sluzz said that he saw a boy around in the area, Shariq, who was usually playing in the plants and seemed to like nature. He was our only hope. We went to him and told him our problems. At first he was confused like us, but then he got some more friends and together we convinced them to help us.

Mungoo: That’s right. See if humans don’t help us, there really isn’t much we can do. There are so many problems that we have to deal with. For example, the water in Indus deltaic region becomes very saline, or salty, because of which some of our species cannot survive. Other than that sometimes these huge cyclones and high winds come our way and we have to deal with those. And now, because some people are cutting down trees at a very huge rate, the whole world is becoming warmer. This is called global warming. Because of this the ice up in the North Pole is melting, and so the sea level is rising. We can only survive at a certain sea level, and may be cope with slightly higher, but not as high as it is going to become! 

Affu: I know, Mungoo. On top of all that, factories and farmers throw away all their bad chemicals into the rivers. Even the rubbish from homes and sewage ends up in the rivers. To make life even tough, some very rude people throw rubbish out of their cars or at the beaches. You know that the plastic bags people throw away, or the candy wrappers people carelessly leave on the streets, come into the rivers with the help of wind. So our poor friends like turtles and other fish species think that they are food and eat them. Plastic is so dangerous for humans also, and there is absolutely no way to digest it, or even swallow it. So many of us sea creatures die because we choke on the rubbish some humans throw out.

Shariq: You just need one human to make a difference frankly. When your friends here all approached me to ask me for help, all I had to do was to collect a few friends of mine and tell them what they are doing wrong. They told their families, who told their friends, who told their families who told more friends and the cycle goes on. That way we were able to raise a big enough group to start new mangrove plantations. You see all these new friends that Mungoo has, which are still just babies, were planted by some of us. With this huge mangrove belt even big cyclones have been successfully diverted. You see Mungoo and his friends protect us from storms and cyclones. That’s is the reason why cyclones hit our neighbouring countries and not us. All of the humans have to realise that. We should try and stop pollution. Even a small thing makes a difference.

Mungoo: That is true. All of us here, would like to request you, humans, to help us. All you have to do is a few very simple things. For example, stop littering please because it is very painful to die by choking I’m sure. Try to use the least amount of water, because the water in the world is running short. Don’t keep your taps on unnecessarily. Try and recycle your waste. Even such small things can prove to be big help to us! We need you! I was lucky that I have good human friends like Shariq and all my sea friends. But some mangrove out there must be dying right now, and the only one who can help him is you…so are you going to help us?

Shariq: Yes people, we children have to make the difference. Pass the message on to your school friends and your family. Even if one person stops throwing away rubbish, it will make a very big difference. Let’s prove to these plants and animals, that we can be nice if we want to!

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