"That's a rare skill?"

"Mom says it's like singing, so most everyone can do a little but some people are really bad no matter how hard they try, and most people can get really good if they practice for a long time but it's hard, and I'm like someone who has perfect pitch? And consistently looking and moving and acting like a specific thing is like singing a super hard and complicated song."

"Huh, that's an interesting analogy!"

"Thanks!"

"Hm... How fast do Amentan kids get big?"

"Amentans are physically grown up the spring we turn four, and pretty much adults mentally the year after."

"We're grown up mentally before we're done getting big. Most finish memorizing the history when they're three and a half, and can make decisions about themselves then. I could go off to apprentice with someone then, though I'd probably wait two or three more years and I wouldn't get a job until I was small-adult size at... I think twelve and a half? And I'd be at full-adult size at about twenty five."

"Right now are you about as mature as you look to us?"

"Pretty much? I'd do better on my own than a human kid my size, and I think humans grow up only a little bit slower than Amentans, but I think otherwise I'm similar?"

"That's helpful, it means people who meet you will have about the right expectations."

"Yeah. If I'd noticed being really different I probably would've adjusted my shape, though, but it's good I didn't have to."

"It's very strange that humans look so much like Amentans, isn't it? Do you know much about whether we have more differences that just aren't visually obvious or are you just going off what we look like to be shaped how we are?"

"This shape's convenient for a lot of stuff so I'm not surprised it could've evolved bunches? Like how dolphins look like fish but aren't. But humans have different hair and don't have castes and do some other stuff different, but I don't know all the stuff Amentans do, and I don't know what's physically different internally? Humans have more pets - there weren't a lot of animals around in the city - and humans have a weirdness instinct, and humans like having more nature I think? And are less crowded. We landed in a field and mom ran for a really long time to reach the city and I didn't see a single forest even very far away!"

"There are some forests, but mostly in places that aren't good for farms or cities, like up north."

"There's a national park close to our town! It's a really big forest. And mom says about a third of Earth's land area's forest? And there's also lots of grasslands and steppes and other stuff. Humans cut down a bunch of the forests for timber but then started complaining about all the trees and animals being gone so are trying to put the forests back and stop people hunting a lot of animals."

"They hunt a lot? We farm for our meat and other animal products instead."

"Most humans don't hunt? That's a rural thing, or a rich person thing. But some humans hunt a whole bunch of wild animals at a time for only a small part of the animal, like birds for their feathers, and it causes problems with the population, so mostly that's what's banned, though there's also fishing laws some places that're important fish nurseries. Non-fish meat's farmed but actual meat's expensive."

"Oh, fish we do often catch wild. And have to have laws about it, too."

"Some places a lot of humans don't eat meat, too. Like India!"

"Is meat bad for some humans? Or is it just that it's too expensive?"

"Some humans are allergic, but there's a religion in India that says you shouldn't eat cows and another that says you shouldn't eat pigs and another that says no meat at all."

"Huh. Do they think it's unclean?"

"Kind of a different concept?" She talks to her mom for a bit. "So cows are sacred to Hindus, so they don't eat them. And Muslims and Jews don't eat pigs, because pig meat is forbidden - I think it's kind of like being unclean there, since pigs can carry some really bad diseases - and Jews don't eat shellfish, but mom doesn't know if that's also Muslims. Jains and some Bhuddhists and Hindus don't eat meat at all because of nonviolence - they're not supposed to hurt other animals. Lots of religions also have fasts, when what you can eat's restricted a lot, and I think all fasts restrict meat?"

"What an interesting variety, I don't think any religions practiced on Amenta differ that strikingly."

"Huh. What're Amentan religions like?"

"It's more to do with taking care of yourself and other people and society. I'm not sure what it would even mean to decide an animal species was sacred."