A myna miracle

[Disclaimer: No animals were harmed in the writing of this blog entry]

My first trip to Sydney, Australia, I needed to pay a visit to the Modern Languages Department of the University of South Wales. The Department was housed on the upper floor of a two-storey building, a little way off campus. As I walked up to the building, I noticed a lot of myna birds feeding on the grass. Mynas, a kind of Himalayan starling, are popular cagebirds, and once they escape, they are very good at establishing a feral population. What struck me about them, though, was that, although there were several cats on the grass amongst them, the mynas were ignoring them. Equally, the cats seemed to be taking no notice of the birds.
After completing my business with the people in the Department, I mentioned the strange sight on the grass outside, and asked why on earth the birds were not scared of the cats.
"Did you notice anything unusual about  the cats' eyes? No? Well, have a look at them when you go." They also told me that the ground floor was occupied by some kind of ophthalmic research institute. It turned out they were experimenting with various kinds of contact lenses. All the cats had contact lenses in, couldn't see a damn thing, and the myna birds knew it.
A lawnful of nonchalant myna birds and short-sighted cats. That's what I call bizarre.