opportunity croaks

i first heard them in thailand: a resonating om from the marshes and swamps, low and vibrating like a bow across a cello's strings.  sometimes their voices pitched up in question, then, as if answering themselves, pitched-down.  for weeks, i was entranced, and whenever i heard the om-thrum, i stood as near to it as i could calculate, listening and smiling.  i could never find the singers, though; shy, i think, their voices always hidden in the thickest part of the reeds and weeds.  until one day in malaysia, traveling from melaka to the cameron highlands, the bus from ipoh to tanah rata broke down in the station, and everyplace nearby refused to deal with fixing it.  so we barreled down the rain-slick highway (naturally, in the opposite direction from our intended destination), smoking oil, fume-clouds drifting from the engine-chamber through the body of the bus, to the bus company's home base, for the necessary part.  it's raining, and dark, and there are no real snacks to be had, and you would think that this might suck.  but then the resonant om appears, deeply echoing and close, and finally i get to see the little round guys who have charmed and fascinated me so many evenings.  they are in the sewers, surrounded by trash, keeping it beautiful.

i've neither seen nor heard them since.