"Wanna teckle?"

The day before yesterday Sarabi suddenly uttered:

"Wanna teckle?"

What she actually said was "want a tickle", i.e. that she wanted to be scratched on the head, but she pronounced tickle with an e, I mean how cute is that? :D Since then she has been asking me to tickle her every now and then (okay, I admit it, she's asked me quite often). Especially during the evenings and in the mornings. Every time she says the sentence "wanna tickle" or just the word "tickle" I immidiately reinforce it by telling her what a good girl she is (in a very, very excited tone. Positive reinforcement is the key!) and give her a good head scratch. African Greys are very smart birds so it didn't take long for Sarabi to get the idea and make the connection between the sentence (specifically the word "tickle") and the action itself. The connection between the word and the action or object is very important. Talking to your grey and telling it about what you're doing and introducing different objects (and letting your grey "beak it", i.e. examine it) is the way to go if you want your avian companion to have a greater understanding for the spoken language instead of just using words in a stereotypical "parrot-mimicking-way."