Toy Says Square

What I'm going to feed you to if you keep playing your Madonna CDs










Speaking of speaking parrots, N'kisi here has a vocabulary of almost a thousand words, according to the BBC.

Here's a transcript of him having a conversation. Note how he alters the words of Old McDonald to reflect his taste in pop music:

Aimee: Ok, ya ready? (Aimee pushes button, toy says 'square' and makes music.)
N'Kisi: (Enthusiastic tone) That's so cool!
Aimee: Isn't it?
N'Kisi: Can ya hear (music is playing). There's a square.
(Aimee pushes button again; toy says 'square')
N'Kisi: Lemme try (? inaudible). Look, there's a square!
(Aimee pushes button again; toy says 'square')
N'Kisi: Can you see that?
Aimee: Yeah!
N'Kisi: Look!
Aimee: Isn't it cool?
N'Kisi: (sound). Lemme (? inaudible) the turquoise. (referentiality unknown; toy has many colors on it.) Wow, there's a square.
(Aimee pushes button again, toy says 'square')
N'Kisi: Lemme write there's a little square. (Aimee pushes button again.) Old Madonna, E-I-O quack quack quack, here a quack there; there a quack, there a quack. Lemme show you. Look at the square. (Aimee holds toy up to cage so that N'Kisi can push the buttons.N'Kisi selects the 'square' button (out of several possible buttons) and pushes it; toy says 'square'.)
N'Kisi: Listen!
Aimee: Isn't that cool?
(N'Kisi pushes button again, toy says 'square')
N'Kisi: List...
Aimee: Wow!
(Aimee pushes the button; toy says 'square')
N'Kisi: Wow! there's a me...
Aimee: You like that?
N'Kisi: There's a square.
Aimee: Yeah.
N'Kisi: Can ya hear (makes cat-like mew sound)
Aimee: Ya wanna hear the kitty? Listen.
(Aimee pushes other button on toy; it makes meow sound and mewing music.)
N'Kisi: (laughter)
Aimee: (laughter)
N'Kisi: That's so cool!
Aimee: Isn't it?
N'Kisi: Could push the button.
Aimee: Yeah.
N'Kisi: You could try-angle. (word play, due to grammatical context)
Aimee: OK. (Aimee pushes another button, toy says 'triangle'.) See? (pushes it again, 'triangle').
N'Kisi: Look at the square.
(Aimee pushes the button that says 'square'.)
N'Kisi: There's a square.
Aimee: Yeah. (Aimee pushes it again; toy says 'square'.)
N'Kisi: Star.
Aimee: OK. (Aimee pushes another button on toy, it says 'star'.)
N'Kisi: Sta... (whistle).
(Aimee pushes button again; toy says 'star'.)
N'Kisi: You pushed the button.
Aimee: I did, I pushed it!

And if you don't believe me, listen to the conversation for yourself:
http://www.sheldrake.org/nkisi/nkisi1_text.html