Baron Oscar Sebastian Grayson Cooper

a.k.a Handsome Teddy Bear Boy.

That's what our new rescue will be called if we lined up all the finalists.

Let's see all the entries again:

1. Teddy
2. Bear
3. Teddy Bear + 5 votes
4. Menanggung
5. Baron +4 votes
6. Cooper +4 votes
7. Dante
8. Oscar + 7 votes
9. Caesar
10. Sebastian +15 votes
11. Handsome Boy +6 votes
12. Grayson + 2 votes

According to the tally here is the position:

1. Sebastian (15)
2. Oscar (7)
3. Handsome Boy (6)
4. Teddy Bear (5)
6. Baron and Cooper (4)
7. Grayson (2)
8. Teddy, Bear, Menanggung, Dante, Caesar on the last places.

Until late Sept 23, 2013, it seems like the fate of Sebastian has been sealed. The name burst out of a sudden like a shooting star, until suddenly, near midnight, our email indicated last entry for the contest. Cooper catches up with 7 more votes.

It's such a sprint, though still not enough to zoom pass through Sebastian; but it seems like the voter realize that too, because five minutes later this fervent supporter added 13 more votes to Cooper, totalling 20 more votes for the name that represent the coppery colour of our rescue's captivating eyes.

So the last result is:

1. Cooper 24 votes

2. Sebastian 15 votes
3. Oscar 7 votes
4. Handsome Boy 6 votes
6. Teddy Bear 5 votes
7. Baron 4 votes
7. Grayson 2 votes
8. Teddy, Bear, Menanggung, Dante, Caesar on the last places.

We thank you for all the contestants. In our utmost honestly, we have never dreamed that our event will  be so merry with numerous entries because we can only offer a humble handbag and pouch.

We also thank our benefactress Lori Skaggs, who, taking the opportunity of the game, is fanning the fire by challenging every contestant to vote like crazy because each vote and, or entry will be matched. This coinciding challenge literally brought the game to a new height, in which everyone can have fun, win prizes, do good, and double the impact.

However, the ultimate joy in our hearts does not come from the festivities of the game. It comes from knowing that although we are ridiculed, abused, neglected on the streets of our own homeland, we have fellow cats and their people rooting on us, cheering us along the way, and share the joys and sorrows of our Quest to Canaan together. It gives us strength, and warmth, and power to put one more paw in front of the other, with hope that maybe, we will be liberated on the next step.

Thank you again, your participation means more than just donation. It means more than a heart beat.

Now, when we are all heating up for a new name, what does the subject do?

Congratulations to Trish Geidel from Australia for winning through her entry "Cooper" and Thank You for loving "Cooper" truly, madly, deeply. Since Google and Blogger kick us out, we will be sending your gifts on the first week of October.

One Moment in Time

As appeared in a post by Lori Skaggs on Facebook

Hi all Lori again.

I wanted to let you know that Josie may not be on much for the next few days. She's working on upgrading the website and I promised to watch over the FB page for her. So I'm here talking to each and every one of you. You know Josie and you know the awesome work she does. You may not know this however. October is the start of monsoon season in Indonesia. In a few weeks, Josie will once again be fighting that horrific bacterial infection that takes so many of Banding' s street cats. She will also be facing flooding in the sactuary.

There's something we can help her with that will help keep the kitties living in the sanctuary dry and healthy...That's donations. You all know I'm doing what I can to rally you all to donate $5 or $10 each so we can make sure the cats have what they need but the truth is that the $700 to $800 we raise each month doesn't leave any extra for things like building a cat tree for the kitties to play on or a drain to keep the kitties dry or an isolation area for sick kitties. We are like the little boy who put his finger in the hole in the same to keep it from breaking. We get the job done but it's not the fix that is needed. On behalf of Josie and the Syndicate, I am asking each of you to do what you can this month to make it the best month we've given Josie. There are now 166 friends on this page. If each of us donated just $10 that would be $1,660 and enough to make the sanctuary even safer, dryer and healthier for the cats. We need your help. It's that simple.

In response to this heart touching post:

Josie T Liem

As my sister Lori has indicated, the domain registration for The Whiskers' Syndicate will end on October 5 this year. It's not supposed to be a problem if the rule is the same like the previous year. However, this year Google is changing the game. Instead of allowing us to pay with Paypal, they required all subscribers (Blogger/Blogspot) to pay through their own payment gateway which called Google checkout or Google Wallet or credit card. Google Checkout/wallet is only available in USA or UK, and I don't have a credit card. Indonesian debit card is not accepted elsewhere in the world. This means I have to move the entire website to other place, or The Whiskers' Syndicate is history.

If you all care enough to drop by to www.whiskerssyndicate.com, you will have the chance to go through our journey to Canaan since 2010, when I was given the domain name "whiskerssyndicate.com" as birthday gift from a supporter in Sweden, and through the website, has since have met the most wonderful, generous, kind hearted people all over the world who join our quest through their comments, emails, supports, and shares. I do not want such precious bonds been thrown to the "recycle bin", erased, deleted, dumped - whatever the term used, by some techno geek in a gigantic company who might not even know what he/she is deleting, nor take chance to understand that without the website, Whiskers Syndicate will no longer exist to give hope to as much as 750,000 (and most likely more) stray animals (dog, cats, birds, macaque monkey, etc) who count on their survival in a tiny packets of food dropped on the street which they can drag to a safe place to eat.

I can guarantee you that beyond the borders of Google's Blogspot, the price is going to be swollen because we have to pay for our own hosting, and typing our own code. But once again, I refuse to just sit and weep, and for this resolution I am given two wonderful sisters and friends: Lori And Ekeim, and as I scramble to move the entire website to a new place only within one week, I will count on them to speak on behalf of the abused and neglected animals who fend themselves on unforgiving Bandung streets.

Can they count on you as well? Only you can answer.

Yesterday Once More

Just because cats are known to be low maintenance, it doesn't mean that their life is as cheap; but in this breeder capital of Indonesia, where people see all living being (human included, of course) as source of free money, I don't think anyone care.

And then, there's that outdated, idiotic misconception that doing business should "use as less to no resources as possible, to gain as much profit as possible"

So in every corner of slums in this metropolitanpuritan city, you will see cats living in rabbit cage, with plain rice and water, or a pinch of Friskies, and a  plate of sand to discharge, spending their life. Their only chance of going out of that box is when they are about to meet their mate, or if their breeder got enough of him/her and find someone else stupid enough to believe in the effortless profit maker myth and buy the overly bred cat.

What if the cat is sick? Go back to the equation. If the amount of resources needed to rear the "asset" is the same or higher than its price, throw it away on the street.

Chances are, someone will pick it up, or at least you will never see it again. Out of sight, out of mind. Life goes on.

But if you happen to bring your asset cat to meet the vet, thinking that it will cost you a little, but ended up have to pay more?

Cheat. Plain and simple.

It's so happened last month. A homemade breeder bring his cat to the vet clinic, complaining that his cat does not pee for quite some time and is being a nuisance. The vet gave the cat a look, and tell the owner that he got UTI (Urinary Tract Infection), most probably caused by bad quality feed. The vets put catheter into the cat, prescribe the medicine, and urge the owner to change the feed into better quality food, if they cannot afford the best. As a value adding service, the vet give his cat a free, self-made elizabeth collar to match his cat, so that it will not pull the catheter out.

Looking heart broken, the owner said that he feels so sorry for his cat, and ask if the vet can hold on for a moment because he wants to borrow a car from his relative, so that the cat will be more comfortable with all his new wardrobe and accessories on his way home.

You guess? The owner never return.

That way he doesn't have to pay any money for any service right?.

So, similar with his old days, this cat - dubbed BooBoo by the vets - spends his life in a cage, with Elizabeth collar that bump everywhere he move, and a catheter that irk his rear most of the time.

Yet he doesn't complain. For a cat that was bred for profit, he probably learn that life at its best is sitting nicely inside of a barred box waiting to be mated.

Life is a little bit better for BooBoo, when under the care of not only one, but three vets who all love cat, his UTI cleared out and he is off his bumpy collar and irksome catheter. However, since the clinic doesn't have boarding, and it's uber busy from morning to late night, he still got to live his life in the cage and go out only for one or two hours a day when the patients are all gone and the vets take some break to have supper before they all go home, and BooBoo has to go back to his jail.

BooBoo's right eye were swollen when he got a fight back from the clinic resident cat, and he was sulking in his sand box the whole day.

home, perhaps

With all sort of patients going back and forth everyday the whole day, it is only a matter of time before he got stressed and start clawing everyone around, especially the two resident cats who shares the same house.

To that point, BooBoo's only part in my life is when I lost Mama Cat. One of the vets who knows what is going on was trying to soothe us by telling his story, and I got to pet his head once or twice for self-consolation.

He replied my sorrowful vibes with his copper eyes, looking at me with such a curious glint; a spark of liveliness that told me that he is more than a doll-like cat who likes to sit and watch life goes by.

Still, until yesterday we hope that his owner didn't really mean to abandon him and will return with whatever reason to take him back. Even if he told us flat that he got no money at that time we would still understand and the vets won't charge anything more than the cost of the initial treatment. 

Besides, it's beyond reason that someone would rather abandon his cat for only a minor infection that cleared out within a week. Can't he just make sure that the cat's UTI is incurable before dumping it just like that?

After one month had passed and a few weeks more in waiting, however, we can no longer deny that whisper in our heart that BooBoo is indeed, dumped away.

What is in a name? a rose by any other name will be as sweet. Certainly, Shakespeare, what's in a name? in late 2011 I pull out a purebred silpoint Persian named Boo who was abandoned in another clinic, and now we have a Persian mix named BooBoo with similar fate?

The vets has two choice: give him to the friend of the silly seaweed chip volunteer, or have someone else (meaning whoever) adopted him by putting an ad in facebook.

Both options gave me goosebumps, so I step forward and give them the third choice: I will pay all his charges and pull him out.

It's (again) a stupid idea. My house is full and the fund raising seems to be rather stuck these days. I also have Martha who currently need the most medical attention, but here I am gambling my luck away and pull a cat out.

I seems to lose a lot of intelligence lately, but honestly, I just can't stand by and have those coppery glint of liveliness goes into yet another home to get into yet another cage.

The rest is the same old story, I took several more freelance job, and bring my carrier to the vet's clinic and pay.

The vets waive the catheter, the UTI medicine and the food they spend on BooBoo, but I got to pay for his vaccine and neutering; and half a million Rupiah moved from my ATM to their drawer, and I went home with a new cat to care for.

BooBoo still got to stay in a cage, but only for one night. The next morning I was kind of expecting a little fuss because he doesn't want to go out of the cage in the clinic, but he voluntarily jumped out of the cage as soon as I open the door. 

Since the vets told me he will try to fight with other cats, I watch him like a hawk when he meets the other cats, but to my surprise, he just sniff them up a little bit, turn around continue exploring.

It's not a surprise that The Whiskers' Syndicate no longer care about bullying new cat because there are so many come and go in their lifetime.

Unlike Abba Tealca who fight his way with almost every one in the Syndicate,  BooBoo arrived with no incident at all. He just lay down and doze off like my house is his all along, and blend in effortlessly. Perhaps because he used to be a house cat, so a household environment is more familiar (thus less stressful or agitating) for him, but I can't talk to him, and I'd freak out if he talk to me, so I just shrug and have him do it his own way.

on ironing table

that closet behind him is where I store cat food and bowls. Go figure what he is doing :D

checking kitchen counter

Since I already have a cat named Boo, I have to change his name to avoid confusion. Besides, the "original" Boo is already irritated when I called out "Boo" and he comes over only to find out I was talking with the other.

That said, why not have an early trick or treat? Help me find a good (new) name for this handsome boy and win this bag:

Courtesy of Whiscraft, this bag is made of patchwork of cotton fabric featuring fresh flower and a smiling cat. It is 26 centimeter (10.2 inches) wide, 18 centimeter (7 inches) tall, and 8 centimeter (3.1 inches) in depth. Patches may vary depending on available coordinating colours.

Here is how to join the naming game:

1. Make a single USD 5 donation through our Pitch In Box on the top right of the website page, and enter your suggested name in the "message" box.

2. Ask your friend and family to vote for you!

Here is how to vote:

1. Make a single USD 3 donation to our Pitch In on the top right of the page. If you donate USD 9, you have 3 votes!

2. Enter your voted name in the "message" box.

3. Ask your friends and family to join!

Names with most vote got the bag!

Aw, no prize for the voter?

Whoever vote the most get this:

Also courtesy of Whiscraft, this cute porcupine pouch is made of patchwork cotton. It is 13 centimeter (5.1 inches) wide and 10 centimeter (3.9 inches) tall.

All name entry will be displayed on our facebook page, our Google + page and on a box right here under the post.

The party ends on Monday, September 23, 2012. So don't miss it!


Name entry up to  Sept 17, 2013:
1. Teddy
2. Bear
3. Teddy Bear
4. Menanggung

Additional name entry Sept 18, 2013:

5. Baron (because he looks majestic)
6. Cooper (from Copper eyes)
7. Dante (writer of the infamous "Inferno". Inferno is due to the coat colour of the cat)
8. Oscar (of "Oscar Madison" in the motion picture "The Odd Couple").
There are also entries of other Oscar of "Oscar Wilde" and "Oscar the cat" so the name "Oscar" now has 3 votes, which put this name ahead of the other.

Entry Update Sept 19, 2013:

5. Baron + 4 votes
6. Cooper + 4 votes
8. Oscar + 3 votes
9. Caesar (because the cat look awesome)
10. Sebastian +15 votes

Sebastian is now a leading name choice.

It seems like the naming game escalates into a vote racing game. Everyone is busy campaigning! So, for you who hasn't join yet, get on your running shoes before you miss the fun.

Here is the name entry list up to Sept 20, 2013:

1. Teddy
2. Bear
3. Teddy Bear + 5 votes
4. Menanggung
5. Baron + 4 votes
6. Cooper + 4 votes
7. Dante
8. Oscar + 3 votes
9. Caesar
10. Sebastian +15 votes
11. Handsome Boy +6 votes

"Sebastian" is still leading with 15 votes. Any challenger?

Entry update up to Sept 21, 2013:

1. Teddy
2. Bear
3. Teddy Bear + 5 votes
4. Menanggung
5. Baron + 4 votes
6. Cooper + 4 votes
7. Dante
8. Oscar + 7 votes
9. Caesar
10. Sebastian +15 votes
11. Handsome Boy +6 votes

It's getting hotter here.

You can vote for one (or more) of the name above or submit your own up to Sept 23, 2013. Don't miss it!

Entry update up to Sept 22, 2013:

1. Teddy
2. Bear
3. Teddy Bear + 5 votes
4. Menanggung
5. Baron + 4 votes
6. Cooper + 4 votes
7. Dante
8. Oscar + 7 votes
9. Caesar
10. Sebastian +15 votes
11. Handsome Boy +6 votes
12. Grayson +1 votes

One more day to go. Make sure your name entry wins by inviting your friends and family to vote for you!.

On the last day of the game, here is the final entry

1. Teddy
2. Bear
3. Teddy Bear + 5 votes
4. Menanggung
5. Baron +4 votes
6. Cooper +4 votes
7. Dante
8. Oscar + 7 votes
9. Caesar
10. Sebastian +15 votes
11. Handsome Boy +6 votes
12. Grayson + 2 votes

According to the tally here is the position:

1. Sebastian (15)
2. Oscar (7)
3. Handsome Boy (6)
4. Teddy Bear (5)
6. Baron and Cooper (4)
7. Grayson (2)
8. Teddy, Bear, Menanggung, Dante, Caesar on the last places.

There are still a few hours left if you would like to vote or submit your own entry. May the best name win!

Dr. Jekyll, Ms. Hyde

Simply put, I screwed up, and worse than anything else, I drag one of my precious rescue with me.

At least, it is what I feel about Martha.

A few weeks ago I brought two kittens: Chicco and Mio for a check up at the vet clinic, only to be tangled in one of their very many emergency. It's an old, new story: I open one of the empty cages, throw Chicco and Mio inside, and get my hand dirty.

I peeked on the two kittens from time to time, and they seems to mind their own business. They eat the food inside the cage,they went into a small box inside the cage and roll all over, and they pat each other's cheek; so in a glimpse I knew they were OK and I too, go back to my own business.

When it's finally my turn, I just go back to the cage and found out that Chicco and Mio were not alone. They were poking around with a tiny Tortoiseshell kitten, who is so small she was drowned inside the small box there.

"Hey, where's this Tortie came from?"

Stupid question. Since no one went near the cage, it suppose to be logical to think that the tiny kitty was there to begin with and I overlook her when I just throw my two kittens inside.

One of the vet came closer and tell me story about how the janitor found a small kitten inside a box right under the door the morning before. The janitor had thought someone was throwing away a box full of newspaper shreds and was about to throw it away to the fire, when he found out hat there's a small cat in there giving him eyeballs.

OK, so I am not the only one who missed the catling.

The story became interesting when the vet continue with "She comes with a love letter"

I raise one of the tips of my lips.

The vet continue and said that the love letter was attached to the kitten, and demands that the kitten be well cared for and given good food.

I scratched my head. Whoever throw the kitten must have been a fan of Moses, though fortunately they are smart enough not to have the box drifted in the river, or being thrown away from speeding car.

The end of the story is, when we are done with Chicco and Mio, the ever eyeball-ing (I swear her eyes are huge, and she can stare at you forever) tortie-la chip came home with me.

Or rather Godzilla, if only I knew.

I call her Martha (from "Martopo Veterinary Clinic") and she came with a quirk: she has very short attention span.

And what I mean "very short" is very short. VERY short. She was a bottle kitten but when I tried to feed her with syringe, she will jerk away and claw my hand after a few drops, running in circle around the living room, and come back to me 10 laps later. Another few drops and she dashed into the kitchen, crashed onto one of the cabinets, and came back to me scrambling to cope with her dizziness (I guessed)

Honestly I thought she was just showing off her Tortie-tude, and that includes when she cross the speed limit, dove into her milk bowl head first and ended up looking like a Santa Clauws.

I thought it's her way of saying she had enough, but she chased me with a lot of grumble when I took her bowl to the sink.

Then her cute antics become annoying. Sometimes she is as sweet as caramel and sugar (look at her colour!) a second later she is as fiery as hell flame (again, look at her colour). We were having fun giving her milk and all of a sudden she will bite my hand and claw it to shreds., then go away and amuse herself with toys. When I was bewildered at what I might do wrong she will come to me and give me head bonks and purring "I love you" out loud.

One time she walks around leisurely like Pretty Woman and all of a sudden she will growl and lunged at a sleeping cat (who of course, either run away in fear or growl back and give her some beating)

At another time she allow me to pick her up and cradle her in my arms, and a few minutes later she suddenly bite me very hard and jump off my arms though she lands on the floor belly first. Then she will do her usual laps and won't stop until she crashes onto some wall.

As days passed Martha grow away from a cute kitty to a diabolic annoying kitten. She continue to shift from her light, sweet personality, to her dark, diabolic personality more often, as if she is truly living out Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, the cat way.

I won't join the two face game and herewith made a public statement that I lost my patience handling Martha, especially when she ask for food and when I give her some, plunge into the bowl, step all over it, dash somewhere else and leave the floor dirty. I tried to be patient and think that she might want some other food, so I gave her her favourite Fancy Feast only to see her lick once or twice, bite a teeeny tiny bit, kick the bowl upside down and hide under the fridge as I practice my anger management techniques.

And the more I angry, the more she acted up. My love for her dissipates in a speed of light as my hatred blew up like Hiroshima.

No matter how angry I am, however, when the night come, she always darts into my room and keep herself busy destroying it as I work, stopping only when I either lost my mind or too exhausted to care for whatever she wrecked and flop onto the bed.

Then she will creep under the blanket and sleep beside me, sometimes on top of me. Even at certain days when I completely ignore her, or put her down on the mat to sleep alone, she will climb back onto the bed and find her true love in my stomach.

On certain days, however, I succumbed to my curiosity and snap some pictures to find out how a sleeping cat with tortie-tude will look like.

Can I be angry to something that look like this?

Watching her sleep quench the fire inside me. A storm by day, Martha is just an ordinary, cuteness overdose kitten when she sleeps.

The only thing I can genuinely appreciate about Martha is that she is a fast learner. She weans herself off KMR early, and she even show the right way to do it by pushing an older, bigger cat off its bowl and take over all the kibbles.

Still, I should have known at that time that something is wrong with this kid, but that time, my attention was taken by Mama Cat and later on, Bobtail.


My journey with Mama Cat alone drains me, even for days after she passed away. The long fight that I have put up for her for the whole week leave me with nothing left in my mind but tears. I know I need to dust myself up and continue walking. I prayed for all my friends who lost a pet that week that they be given strength to move forward. It's just embarrassing that I myself was unable to pick myself up and move forward, although I pray for it.

During that time Bobtail was still delicate. He had a bad self concept and literally lost his trust to human due to his experience, so I try to be as calm and steady as possible not to resonate bad vibes that might make him more anxious.

The whole week when I was busy with Mama Cat and Bobtail, Martha is completely forsaken. I just let her destroy anything she likes and when I need to go to the clinic, I'll just leave her with a bowl of Fancy Feast, heck if she wants to eat it or mess with it. I am often too tired and stirred up (emotionally) when I arrive home from the clinic down town so no matter how savage Martha became toward me, I just brush her off and put her on autopilot.

She is back to my attention when I heard her breath grunting like a pig. Martha caught cold, and unless I move faster than her dashes, we're going to have that nasty endemic bacteria again.

So I went back down town with her and while I met the vet, I give her the payment for Mama Cat. The fund raiser missed the target by USD 90, but I have to pay none the less, so I gave what I have.

The vets refused the money.

Because the surgery is not completed they decided to waive the fee, so I only need to pay for Bobtail. They also told me that they know I was trying to safe a street cat, and as fellow cat lovers it is their way to share the load.

When I wait for Martha finishing her nebulizer at the clinic, I praise the Lord that what came at first as a lack of fund, now become a surplus.

I was wondering what I should do with all the money we raise, and with careful consideration and advice from the vets, I decided to use the spare money to buy a nebulizer.

Our new nebulizer.

A nebulizer (or nebuliser) is a drug delivery device used to administer medication in the form of a mist inhaled into the lungs. Though it has been used widely by veterinarian and pet parents in the more advanced part of the world, it is only recently that the inhalation treatment been introduced to Indonesia to help cats with respiratory troubles who otherwise can only rely on conventional pills and injection (that adds the misery to the suffocating animal). With thorough training and information, a nebulizer is a quick and safe solution to nasal blockage. There will be another monsoon (that sent us back to rainy season) in October, and the street cats natural genocide will start over again. A nebulizer will help me safe the life of more cats in less time, or in severe cases will help me buy some time until I can go all the way down town to get vet service.

At that time Martha already lose a lot of weight. She has not been eating properly (and instead mess her food no matter what I put inside). It doesn't help that she has nasal blockage so she cannot smell her food, which in turn make her stop eating. She was dehydrated and her outlook is not looking any better.

I know what will come if I keep my autopilot. I am still burned out and it takes time until I am back fighting again, but Martha's life depending on correct timing, so I re-ignites my engine. Every morning I give Martha her sub-q fluid, and in the afternoon, 20 minutes of Nebulizer.  At that time I can't be more glad that we now have a nebulizer, that hopefully will help her calm down and handles her nasal blockage, courtesy of the donations from our supporters.

Unfortunately, her switching personality made it difficult to feed her with syringe. Martha can jump onto my face any second, and it can be fatal if she decided to do it with the syringe in her mouth. The sub-q is just as testing. She can't stay put long enough that the both of us take turn to bleed because she pounced endlessly as I tried to insert the needle.

Then the riot ensues when it's time for her nebulizer. I know it's impossible to hold her and made her breathe through a mask, so I put her in a crate, wrap the crate in linen, pluck the mouthpiece into the crate and turn it on. I hope the darkness will help her calm down, but instead she yells and trash around like crazy. The more I tried to calm her down, the more mad she become.

It was then when I stumble upon a paediatric forum that said that it is all right if babies cry or move around when they have nasal blockage (as long as they are under supervision) because the more they cry, the more they move, the more they breathe.

So the next day I lined the inside of the crate with towel, brace myself, put Martha inside, cover the crate with linen, and turn on the nebulizer for twenty minutes. It feels like forever. Like I predict she trashes around and yelling until her voice sore, but I am less worried because the towel inside will prevent her from getting hurt. I keep calling her name and ask her to calm down, but I am less panic because I know all those chaos inside that crate means she breathe a lot. 

On the day she is on a good personality, she stays calm and quiet inside the crate and the nebulizer session was less stressful, but I found out later that she is quiet because she chew the mouthpiece all the way.

Well, at least that will also mean she breathe her medicine straight from the source, and the chewing gave me a great insight of her actual mental condition. Now I know that Martha is not crazy. She just freaked out.

Martha is always exhausted when she came out of the crate, due to all the rioting, but her nose is very pink, and she breathe normally (which means the medication is working). Taking that chance, I usually give her a strong smelled food, and she starts eating, though still while running around.

One day I wondered out loud, asking her what is so good about eating while running, and I see it in her eyes that she is as disturbed as I do, having to do that. I came to realize that something might be wrong with her nerves and she probably doesn't have control over what she is doing. 

But we do not have an animal psychologist here, and the vets doesn't have any experience with it either, so we are on our own.

Putting what I learn during my four years in university, I talk to her whenever she is inside the nebulizer crate. I read the journals aloud or humming cheerful songs so she knows that I am around and am not angry, and it made her calmer.

It really kill me reading that almost all of the articles and journals that I read recommend euthanasia as a humane solution to save the cat from her "suffering". Here I am trying to drag myself to continue living while coping with the loss of Mama Cat, and all those expert told me to kill another cat because she is annoying. While Martha is clearly neurotic she doesn't seems to suffer. Martha is disturbed by herself, but she doesn't lost her mind completely. If Martha really lost herself, she wouldn't be creeping into my blanket and sleeo on my tummy. If Martha is insane she will not know that I am angry about the food she spoiled and hide under the fridge.

All those means to me that Martha is still sane and therefore, she deserved her birth right to be happy, to be safe, to be full, and grow old and have fun. Martha believes in me, so now it's my turn to return her faith.

Besides, I don't think God put her in my path to be euthanized. 

Now that I have better knowledge on what might be going on inside her small head, I can plan better. 

Whenever Martha is in the nebulizer, I talk to her about my hopes. I told her that I don't mind keeping her as she is, and I make sure I tell her that I love her, over and over and over. I know that Martha cannot speak human language, but I know she can understand me. 

When it's meal time, I get her into the same crate with her food, put the crate her in the middle of the other cats and stand by her side. At first she came trashing around again and have her food all over her, but after three days, she will eat calmly without diving into her bowl or dancing all over it. I can't put her in the crate when I give her fluid, so I just put her on the table and tell her over and over that she is loved, she is wanted, and she is a great girl when she is calm and sitting quietly like now. She is still fidgety, and she pounced on me from time to time, but after three days now, she is less anxious and stay still longer.

Martha is still young. She is only four months old and have a long way to go. I am not sure if she will stop being neurotic, and if she is not, it is going to be a great challenge for the both of us. There will be, inevitably, times when we think we will ended it right there, there will be times when we yelled our lungs out and pull our hair to the root, but even so, I decided to embrace Martha as she is and join her in her rocky road to life. She might be born with a demon inside, but as much as she believes in my good side, I am going to believe in her good side.


Until the day we both beat our demons.


And all of this, all of this intriguing adventure, started with a donation that everyone help us get. I wish this story can convince all of you that in the lonely planet of Whiskers' Syndicate, a little goes big way.

In an ongoing effort to overcome my grief over the loss of Mama Cat, I forced myself to write another story, in the hope I can shift my focus into what currently need my attention. However, although  am finally able to finish it, I an not satisfied with the result. I feel like a different person,  and therefore, feel compelled to revise this post as best as I can.

I tried re-writing this post three times already, and they all feel foreign to me. Then I remember the advice of a friend that it is all right to have a different, personal writing style that differs from "professional blogger" and that it is all right if I put my raw feelings/emotions into my writing because it is the real, honest me (Thank you StellChen!)

Although this post has been completely re-arranged, all the same fact remains the same. There are more details, more feelings, more emotion, and of course, more me. I hope that's all right.