Silent Tide

Few
nights ago, when I was working late, I felt like someone was watching me; but when I glimpsed at the dark backyard, I saw nothing, so I return my attention to my computer. The latest flavour of Ubuntu had given me enough troubles with mobile broadband that I want to dump them and returned to Windows (if only Windows is not sold at one million Rupiah per install in Indonesia), so like usual, I tried to work around the issues while trying to keep in mind that they helped animals and wildlife with each of their copies.


The feeling continues, though, so while laughing at my own idea of a handsome (or hungry) vampire keeping an eye on me, I looked out from the window and find Tortie curling up on its frame, watching me. That explains why I can't see her with a glimpse. She is, well - a tortoiseshell, and her condition give her a solid motivation to be stealthy.

The cat's charm took over me. Immediately I forgot my computing and play with her at the window, stroking her soft and fluffy fur and praise her for being such a marvellous member of the Whiskers' Syndicate, when I realized that she's been with us for a year now. She was a star May last year when I submitted her story to celebrate Mother's Day in Animal Rescue Chase.

Then I heard soft scratches from the door behind me. Another mother is waiting to share the night with me.

Unlike America that celebrate Mother's day in May, Indonesia celebrate Mother's day in December 22nd (no idea why).

A few days before Indonesia Mother's Day last year, I met Estebel.

It was a few days before my final day at the office; an emotional time as I remembered it was this office that brought me to Bandung, and get me to start Whiskers' Syndicate. Also because the office and their self-proclaimed loyal underling did whatever they can to make me miserable. That office consists of old time, dead wood employees who climbed their corporate ladder by licking the asses of those above them, and they sure hate shooting star employees who rise and shine with their aptitude. Every single day someone would come to my cubicle and try to scratch some information on a company secret that they can use, or trying to get me to talk bad about someone above them, although they know I sewn my mouth shut.

A particular day was different, when an errand boy who knows I used to pick up street cats came into my cubicle and lean on me to whisper: "Mam, there's a street cat, a beautiful one, with two kittens, in the security post and I think you should get them"

I raised my eyebrow and smile. He continues, "The drivers and I had been trying to hide them, because they are not noisy or dirty and they are good looking; but my supervisor found out and I was ordered to throw them away into the river"

Then I stop smiling. That errand boy's supervisor is one of those loyal underlings.

"What you think I should do? This is office hour. You'd be in trouble if your supervisor found out"

"I put them in a box", he said, "I put holes at the side, and hid them under the drivers' bench. The drivers know. All of them vote that I should tell you because you wouldn't have allow the cats to be killed. It's beautiful. They are dark grey, not black, not grey, but like those in the movies. You can see it by yourself later"

I got his point. " When your supervisor gone to the boss to report his daily work, call me from the kitchen"

He went out as fast as he went in.

He will make a very good informant, or spy, in a James Bond movie, I think, or some direct selling salesman.

The call came near lunch time, and I rushed out to the security posts. There are some drivers there but when they saw me walked leisurely toward them they either pretend they didn't see me or walk away.

I went inside, grab the only box under the bench, and walk out like nothing happened.

This started to sound like a suspense movie.

I walk straight to the block across, where a pair of dog rescuer lives. The kind husband and wife are relative to a pet shop owner to which I frequent (the only one in Bandung who would risk her business advocating people to spay and neuter and stop breeding).


Like I thought, they were out. Both of them are running an architecture business so they gone out often, but their maids knew me and my business.

The maid who answered my door bell opens the gate and when she heard rustling sound from the box, she guided me directly to an empty space in a garage.

I put down the box and told her that I will be coming back after 5 pm, and to inform her bosses when they came back home.

When I walked out from the office at 5pm, the errand boy from earlier was standing right at the doorway and when I passed, he went to the other way and as he passed me whispered, "Thank you, mam, you're not going to be sorry"

I was almost convinced that I was in a spy movie.

That time, the one who answer my door bell at the rescuer's house was the wife herself.

"Your cat is diligent" she said. "When I got home the box was already empty. I found her and her two kittens in a corner. They came out from the air hole at the side, clawing it bit by bit until it's large enough for her and her kittens to go out"

"How do you know it was her?" I asked. She also keep several cats after they got neutered before returned on the street.

"All of my TNR are yellow. She is black and white, and she has two very sick kittens"

She wasn't kidding me when she said the kittens are sick. They looked fine in general, but their eyes were watery and there were plenty of crusts around their nose. So was their mother, actually, but since her nose was black the crusts were hard to be seen.

She was also not kidding about the mother cat being diligent. We put her into another box, and put holes at the side, and she stuck her paw out and start digging. In fifteen minutes all three of them were out again. We did it about three times with various boxes until we settled with a crate. I brought her directly to the vet and the two kittens were diagnosed with severe pneumonia and Chlamydia. One of them has blue fur but it's not the real blue. It was black that fade because of malnourishment.

I called the mother Estebel (eSaved by The Bell (boy)) and the two kittens Shadowfax because of the grey coat (and I like Lord Of The Rings) and Lightningstrike because of white lightning mark on his black forehead (I don't really keen on Harry Potter). (

Estebel cared deeply for her two kittens. She never stop trying to get her kittens to nurse and milk although her kittens stop drinking as their condition deteriorate, and she keeps herself well. She eats a lot, she sleeps a lot, she drink her medicine. I have never seen a cat so willingly swallow medicine before.

Although we tried, the two kittens died two weeks later. Estebel mourned properly. She kiss her kittens, she licks them, she sits by them as I left them alone for a while, and she watched all the way when I bury her kittens.

Her habitual self care didn't cease, however. She still eats a lot, she still clean a lot, and I notice her tummy were getting bigger and harder. I gave her de-wormer, and she lets out quite a number of worm, but her tummy didn't stop growing, while her body seems to stay thin. So I brought her back to the vet and see if she get tape worm. That time, the vet's verdict was a shock: Estebel is pregnant, and judging from the USG, she has been pregnant when I took her home.

So Estebel has been carrying babies while caring for two sick kittens, and I have never had trouble with her whatsoever.

Estebel carried her pregnancy during the most turbulent times in my life. She entered my life when I was most troubled of the rat race that consumed my life, she gone through with me as I tried to balance my new life as a full time rescuer, she sit steady when my confidence gone wobbly and in panic I took another job, she was with me when I go through the most troublesome job in my entire life, for a month, and then she gave birth when I hit bottom.

I was in the middle of trying to drag myself up after I lost Chase, and I am not keen on anything at that time. I keep tending to the cats, I feed them, I cleaned their litter boxes and their play ground. I give medicine to the sick one, but I was pretty much a walking dead. I didn't do anything special to prepare Estebel and her babies except giving her vitamins and extra food, and when I think of it now, I felt guilty because I was sort of neglecting her.

In exchange, Estebel took part in changing the direction of my life that end of April. I left her at the backyard to enjoy the sun, the way she always liked to do after she got breakfast, but I didn't let her in until somewhere in the afternoon. I took my medicine and fall asleep, but then awakened by the sound of a baby kitten right under my room's window.

Half tumbling, I ran out to find that Estebel has been licking on a new born black baby, and its cries were getting the attention of the other. Without much thinking I grab my towel (that I use to take a bath) and wrap her and her babies and take them inside. I got a cage ready at the living room, just in case I rescued a panic cat, so  I pretty much just lay her and her babies inside the cage with the towel, get a bed linen and cover the cage. I boil some water, prepare a bowl of warm cat milk, and put it inside the cage at the corner with some food.

By that time she already gave birth to the second. A black and white baby that has a black smear on its nose and mouth just like her. And then the third.

Then I heard the fourth born (I can't replicate the sound, just the sound of a cat baby being born), but I didn't hear any cry. I thought Estebel was working on it so I just sit quietly in front of the covered cage.

After a few minutes, I heard a rustling sound and my curiosity got over me, so I peeked and found her licking a baby excessively, but it didn't move, so I ran to get some drinking straw, took the baby and try to blow some air inside.

It was a stillborn after all.

She stared at me all the time, so I looked back at her and tell her "It was a stillborn, Estebel. It was never there to begin with. I am sorry"

I was about to leave her with the stillborn when I heard another sound. I peeked in and another one was delivered safely.

No wonder her tummy was so big. She was carrying five babies, and delivering it in such a nice order. Black, B/W, another black, the stillborn (it was black), and B/W. All the B/W are medium hair, while the blacks are short haired. One of the B/W has long tail, the other one has short tail. One of the blacks also have short tail, and the other one long tail.

Talking about being well organized, eh, Estebel? Are you mocking me?

After five babies, Estebel went for recharge

It was watching her giving birth that mostly changed my life. I lost some income and got through some trouble and lost a beloved pet, and I trashed about like a mad man, while Estebel endures all the pain of carrying babies and raising two kittens, losing both of them the same day, cure herself of Chlamydia while pregnant, and still go through every single thing silently.

I am embarrassed of myself for being so weak and as punishment I pull myself up, dust myself, and put back the armour of courage and acceptance that I have scattered around during last month. Life goes on, and so do we.

That's not all. Estebel continue to eat a lot, ask for milk (as soon as she learn that I got kitty milk heh), drink her vitamin, chew fish oil capsules (I did the grinning and ugly face for her), swallow dewormer, anything I gave her, she finished it. Estebel never left her babies. She just stay in the cage silently and wait for the next ration. She slips out of the cage when the towel is dirty and go straight back into nursing as soon as I replace it.

After her babies started to crawl out of the cage, the kitty season begin, and I saved four more dire kittens from the street, starting with a white and yellow tabby I called Freed (story coming soon!) all of whom she allows to nurse from her.

Freed tried to snuggle. Estebel later adopted him

With her growing family, Estebel ask for more food. She can eat up to four portion of cat food in one day, not to mention her milk, but I understand she is trying to produce milk as much as possible, so I never refuse to give her more.

She nursed her kitten so well that it grows healthy and strong, and beautiful, and big (I mean fat).

The litter and the free-loader

Besides, Estebel saved my life. I was at the crossroads with a cloudy human mind, and Estebel come across and going through what she meant to be, and that reminded me of what I meant to be, and go through with it.

Estebel taught me that changing lives, and world, starts with me. She care for herself not out of selfishness but because she wants to give her best to her children. If I am to change the worlds of so many street cats I should first have enough of myself to be able to give my best for them. I needed to stay healthy to be able to go around feeding the feral, I needed enough sleep to write properly, I needed to be healthy to get some job and pay the bills.

Estebel reminded me of my own advice, a line long forgotten in the mess of my nowadays: Life goes on, and so do we. She taught me to let go by allowing two of her kittens to pass, and told me to move forward by raising four, and adopted extra four.

All the books that I read ask me to think of others first, and I totally agree with that, but this mother cat showed me that in order to do that, I should start with myself, and let the ripples that comes afterwards do its own part.

My rambling mind goes right back at the door when it's finally opened. Estebel has been diligently scratching, and scratching, and scratching, and the law of attraction returns her calling.

I jumped off from the bed and meet her round eyes in that middle of the night.
"Happy Mother's day, Estebel. You want some milk? Night snack?"
She just turn her back and walk straight to the refrigerator.

Better than me, it seems like she knows what she wanted after all. As I follow her, I thought that maybe, I got the answer of why ancient people worship animal God, and while they did, their culture were so much advanced than those who adores fellow human.

I know that Mother's day hype had passed, but May is still around for a couple of days, and I need names for Estebel's kittens.

If you would like to send me some suggestion, one name for one kitty,  click the "comment" and then choose "name/url". Enter your name and email and your suggestion by citing the number of which kitten you would like to name (see pictures below). I will edit all entries by hiding your email address and show only your name, so it's safe!

If you want to vote for one name that others submitting, also leave a comment about your support on one name.

If you are not interested to enter but have something to say? That's OK too. Go ahead and comment, it'll be a pleasure!

If you are not joining but would like to help a little, that'd be highly appreciated. June is only a week away and our donation can are still empty (see the blue Pitch In box at the top right)

We are open for suggestion until May 31st.

Four chosen one (one for each kitten) will have this:

Whiscraft handmade mat! It's 67 cm (26.3 inches) long and 45 cm (17.7 inches) wide. 

When you win I will contact you by email to confirm your choice. You can make it into your room mat, give it to your cat, hang it on the wall, use it as a table runner, or use it as your sleeping pillow's case. You name the colour. Just tell me!

Strangers In The Night

 for our friend Susie Bunn: here goes your lucky number!

Today is a full moon; and unlike any other day, the sky is clear, so I can see the round moon clearly as it peeks from behind the wisp of the wild bamboo bushes across the street. At times, wind are playing with the young tips, lifting it up and down that the moon looks like it is a bright lantern hanging is an ancient oriental gardens.

I wouldn't have been able to see such scenic rarity from my boarding house, or rented space in the city. It will be full with passing vehicle and their noises, the punks who gone out in hordes to try and get money from passer by with their generic line "rather than we rob you, it is better that we beg money from you in exchange to our singing...(then they continue to yell unharmonious melodies and gibberish lyrics)"

But then maybe I was wrong. Maybe the beauty of a full moon on a clear sky is not good enough, because the other houses were all closed. It's 9 pm so probably people are getting ready to sleep, or is enjoying cable TV that recently taken the trend in "home entertainment"

In contrary, I have just got home from my work.

As the result of my panic for dwindling finances, I took a coming job offer in panic; and though I am grateful that the process lead me to a memorable rescue, the job itself is not that much fun.

In normal situation, my new workplace is only 45 minutes ride. However, it is an industrial area in a remote part of Bandung, a newly developed area where there's no decent road, far away from everything, and has only one road leading and out of there, unless you want to go round the town using highway.

Needless to say it's always jammed, especially in Monday morning, and in any given moment where huge trucks try to make a turn; even when there are only few more trucks than usual. The traffic is so bad that once you trapped in it, it will take at least two hours to get to my workplace instead of fourty five minutes. And I have been using public transport too... There's only one kind of public transport from my area to my workplace, and keeping in mind that Indonesia is a third world country, I guess I have no choice.

So, worse than my previous job, I have to leave the house at 6 am in the morning so I can reach the factory at 8 am, when it start, and although I leave at 5 pm - as soon as the working hour ends - since everyone else is doing the same, I'd reach my house no earlier than 8 pm. When I have to make a stop to buy cat food or medicine, it will be like today, 9 pm, sometimes 9:30. No going round for the stray, no leaving food and boxes and blankets for the ferals, no street cat business until the weekend.

But that's not what bugging me, at least tonight.

It's that cat's mew I have been hearing coming and going from across the street.

I peeked out of my window once again. Nothing. In fact, I have been going back and forth checking the road and its surrounding gutters looking for abandoned kitten, but I can't find anything. The desperate mews stopped as soon as I step onto the road side.

An old man that has been standing there, watching the moon from the street side since I went home, is getting curious. He started asking me what I am looking for, but I didn't answer him except with a courtesy smile.

I am almost certain where the questions lead to: nowhere. People in Bandung, especially in a semi rural areas like here doesn't care about animals. They care about money, and booze, and sex. Especially sex. A street gang named "Exalt To Coitus" is very famous here. Most of the time when I go out at night to tend the cats people, especially young males, will ask me question where I was heading, what I am doing or the like, and when they learn that I actually take care of street cat instead of just ignore me they took the time to harass me, and some times gone as far as trying to touch me, which is the reason I got into so many street fights in my short span of rescue life. I come to learn that this city is Sodom or Gomorrah, or maybe both in one. I lose my trust in fellow countrymen, especially male, and I come to learn - in a very hard way - to be as hard as a clamp.

So the old man ask me again, what I am trying to do, going back and forth from the house to the street and back again, and I smile again, when that desperate mew re-started, straight from my back.

I turn back all at once, running to its direction. It's from the gutter below, but when I run there with my flash light on I can't find anything. I heard the mew moving to across the street, from the direction of the Bamboo bushes, so I too cross the street. That voice enough convinced me that the owner of the mew is panicking.

A few meters above (the road that lead to my house climbed up) I heard a motorcycle screeching its brake and its rider got busy hush-hushing.

That must be it. I run back up, trying to defeat 45 degrees road with a pair of rubber sandals. Part of my heart was grateful for the urban legend. Some story that said that if you ran over a cat on the road, and do not treat them as you would treat human, you will die as miserably as the cat, on the road.

But urban legend fade, and I have come to see so many many cats, especially kittens, ran over by vehicle on the road and left there, flattened on the road.

As I passed him that old man said "Are you looking for a cat"

I just turn my head to him for a second and nod. There's his answer. So now be quiet and let me do my job.

I saw it. A silhouette of a thin, black kitten with roused up hair trying to cross the street in panic. It went back, and forth, and criss cross in the middle of the street, trying to avoid coming motorcycles while losing its way somewhere in between, resulting him running around in a messy circle in the middle of a rather crowded road. It's around 5 to 10 meters from my house, and if only the road leading there wasn't so steep I'd be able to grab it sooner.

Then the same panic strike me. Sooner than later someone is going to run over that cat because it's difficult to spot a fidgety black kitten on a dark asphalt in a dark night, no matter how big the full moon above. So I ran straight, in the middle of the road, adjusting my direction as the kitten jumps here and there trying to keep both of us in a straight line as much as possible. If the riders can't see the kitten they can always see that there's a crazy woman running like crazy in the middle of the road so they can at least turn to the side. Heck with the swearing as they pass me.

When my stretched hand just about to get to the poor thing, a motorbike is honking like crazy instead of avoiding me, ten inches from my nose.

"Cat! Cat! move to the side!" I yelled, pointing at the now freezing kitten.

The riders, two males, run straight over it, with a loud, bitter, sneering laugh.

And I saw the kitten rolled behind the front wheel after being ran over, and after that, got run over by the rear wheel a few seconds later.

Then it flew away with a hustling sound when it hits the bamboo bushes.

All the while, their laugh continues.

I don't try to stop the motorcycle, I don't even try to get their license. What would I do with a liscense? go to the police? I'll make a good laugh for those corrupt officers. So I turn over to the bamboo bushes and start looking.

"You crazy bastards! You'll die on the street!I hope miserably!" I think that's the voice of the old man, but I don't care.

"Go further up, young woman", I heard him again from across, behind me. "Go further up"

My mind was so messy I can only half digest what he was trying to say while the rest of my limbs works like a zombie.

It's getting easier for my brain to freeze lately. I know it comes from the exhaustion with my day job, but I can't turn back now. I tried to hit the brake, slow down a little, but I still have to move on, so I choose to put my stress aside and keep moving. I know the drill.

I can hear the meow; hurt and lost. One, two, weakly, but the kitten is alive. I start to call out, as gently as I can, though I doubt my voice is friendly enough in all its trembles and vibrates "Baby kitty, baby kitty..."

The kitten answers, but I cannot find him. The bamboo bushes is just too thick for my flash light to go through, much less the moon. I have to climb a small cliff knee high to get to the bushes, but the rain the day before made the soil slippery. Both my had already muddy, sweeping the ground, while the old man's voice still trying to encourage me to go inside the bushes.

I was out of breath, half an hour later, and my mind refused to listen. Then I mumble, in autopilot "Lord, what shall I do? My brain is freezing. Lead me the way. What shall I do?"

And then some hand touched my shoulder and ask carefully "What are you looking for?"
I snapped around, and my wild eyes find a young man looking at me curiously. He uses dark shirt, with some hard metal rock band gory Gothic drawing on it. Oh yes, out of all people in time like this.

The voice inside me yells "Harassment alert! Don't talk to strangers!"

I gape in front of him for a moment, and then turn around and go back looking.

"What are you looking for? something valuable?", he ask again.

The word "something valuable" hit my alarm the second time.

I was about to say "nothing" but the old man beats me to it "A cat. A kitten. Up there, to her right. I saw it just now"

The young man look back at me. I just freeze there, gaping like an idiot.

And then a little yelp coming from the bushes.

The young man take my hand. "Here, hold this", he was pushing a plastic bag into my muddy hand. He search into his pocket, get his cell phone, and turn it on as a flash light.

Using a big rock just at my right, he jumped into the bushes, drowned to his ankle into the muddy soil.

Then the old man started again "More to the right, to the right..."

I stare at the plastic bag in my hand; and recognize what's in there: food.

And then the corner of my eye, glimpsed a sparkle I am so familiar with, as the man's flash light brush around. That sparkle, is a cat's eye.

Automatically, my hand reached out to the sparkle, and swipe the bushes open.

A black kitten, almost frozen, with dilated pupil, meowing in auto pilot every two minutes. He was stuck between bamboo trunks and shoots.

The man grab its back, trying to let it out of the shoots, push it inside his vest, and then looked at me. "Stay there, don't move"

I froze. Only my eyes were moving, fixated to the kitten.

He use my shoulder to hold on as he jumped down the slippery bamboo bush. Then he pulls the kitten out, and hand it over to me, the way someone would hand over a stick.

The kitten's soft fur in my arms some how defrost me. "Thanks", I whispers. By that time all my panic buttons ran lose and crashes with my good senses.

I hand over his plastic bag back to him. "Your dinner"

He smiled. "I live in this house" he pointed to the house right next to the bamboo. "I saw what happened. Stray cat is sacred property of Street God. I hope those two man die miserably on the street, soon"

Still in autopilot, I dig into my pocket and get some money. It's what I do when I was exhausted and cornered by some street punk. Get bank notes and throw it in the air before running away.

The man shakes his head "No, I am sincere. I know boys here, the punks, harass you a lot. You are pretty, and you are Chinese. But I am sincere. Go take your kitty home"

I put the money inside the plastic bag, and cross the street.

"Thanks, sir" I nodded as I pass the old man.

He smiled back. "You are famous around here. Residential complex, house number 3, is a street cat lady"

I certainly don't know about the famous part, but I am grateful anyway. At least the cat is safe. At least God didn't turn his sight away from the little kitten.

For a few days, the kitten is all right. He is noisy and rambunctious and cannot stay put. Not a single picture I took of him have a clear image. It is almost like nothing happened to him. I tried to consult a visiting vet, and she said that sometimes things like that happened, even to human. Living being has enormous strength in the face of disaster, often beyond comprehension. Further she said, "Let's hope he is all right. He lost no limb, but two of his nine lives"

So I call him Seven, in the hope that he lost nothing but two lives in the incident, and in honour of a friend in England, who wishes she was lucky enough to go out of her way to help more animals (frankly, she already did).

However, on day five, his right eye start to get watery, and then swollen. Every day, pus start coming out.

 

After that, his right ear start getting watery as well. My worry grow back as Seven loses his appetite and becoming more quiet.

I called the vet back, and she told me that without thorough X ray and special device, it is impossible to pinpoint the location of the damage. However, X ray are only available in Jakarta, and the only vet who owns the special device is the most expensive vet in the country. Her question is whether Seven can endure a long, stressful trip to Jakarta back and forth in his condition. He was a street cat and we didn't know how great is his endurance.

Looking at his condition closely, anyway, the vet is clear that both his left ears and left eyes will be permanently damaged, though can be healed.

So now I have a kitten with only seven lives, one eye and one ear, but that's OK. When I saved Monday, I made a promise that whatever happened, I will do what I can, so I will do what I can. When I saved Monday I prayed that God would take care of the small kitten, and when Seven was rescued I prayued the same and God listens. So I took the vet's prescription I continue to give eye ointments and clean the ear every day. The vet guide me through all the stages, what will happen to his eyes and ears, and what should become of him if I did it right.

Compared to the other rescued cats, Seven made a much much slower progress. However, every time I got home from work, late at night, He'd made himself stand, and try to meow, and as I stroke him I renew my promise that I will do what I can, that we will go through this together, whether we win or not.

One day, the water from his eye will dry out, and what remains of his bursting right eye will fall off. The same with his right ear, one day it will dry out, as he lost his sense of hearing.

 

But meanwhile, he got a roof to stay under, enough food to sustain him, medication, and whole new line of friends and family. He was a lucky strike, and guess what, though I passed the house the young man pointed to great many times after the incident, I never saw him again. I never saw the old man again.

I am not sure it's a miracle, and I am still overly cautious to male, and especially punks who seems to hang out in any given street in Bandung; but once in a while, maybe, there's a few good men left even in Sodom and Gomorrah just in case some innocent animals are in distress. I hope so.

Though I would never know which one is which, just like the lottery.

Edited on April 20, 2013 to incorporate more detail and background leading to the story. I have to. I am utterly embarrassed with my previous poor writing, in which I feel like someone else.

My Sister's Keeper

 for our beloved friend Christine Stewart
and our beautiful sister Ekeim Teeuwisse 

Until a few months ago, I would still be asking how it feels to have a sister. I was born first and the only female out of four siblings, and I always think how nice it should have been to have someone to share a lot of commons.

Of course, I have heard about the sibling rivalry, and it can went really messy with girls, but still, I guess, even though I would occasionally fight with my sister, if I ever have one, it would still be great to have one. I imagine what we would talk about to each other, what we would share, what we would fight over, and how would we make up with the other.

Ten minutes walk from our new sanctuary, you will meet a valley. A huge green bowl spotted with little orange dots where the houses' rooftop stand.

I found that place when I was looking for a house, and I went there again a few days after we finished building the water tower for the sanctuary, as a little reward for our accomplishment. I took the above picture while standing on top of a big rock at the edge of the hills, when I heard some noise from the bushes below me, and moved away as soon as possible fearing that I might step onto some animal's nest.

A few minutes later, the ruler of the land poked out from the bushes, probably thinking that it chases away the intruder.

 

My adventure began at that point. I wonder why a cat would want to live at the edge of a ravine, and I am interested in offering her a better place in the sanctuary, so every morning after that sunny Sunday I went out earlier to leave cat food by the rock before I left for the office.

After a week I learned that the bushes - growing on the erect wall of the valley - is home to a small colony of cats. Five kittens and a calico teenager, or so I thought.

queuing for cat food. 

 

They always run away when I tried to get nearer, so I am trying to be as still as I can because I am afraid that one of them can trip and fall all the way down and kill himself. I am happy enough that they finally begin to trust me, because looking from their filthy condition, they lived there long enough - alone.

So I want to at least offer them some kindness. I know my sanctuary is much too full for another six cats, much less ideal for a batch of kinderkittengarten. I want to gain enough of their trust to be able to spay and neuter them when they are old enough, and release them back where they are, because they seems to be more familiar with the ravine, and more adept to climbing it than me.

But that was before I realize that something is weird about the teenage cat. She is a beautiful tabby-calico, and sometimes she moves real fast I thought she was the daughter of Spiderman and Catwoman. At other time, however, she was totally a different cat. She stares at me with a round, fearful eyes, and her stand was so wobbly I thought she can fall down any moment. Some other time she was walking with a tremor, and at other time she seems to always trip when walking. Then, all of a sudden, when I see her again, she is completely fine.

I thought she was probably epileptic, but the possibility just make me more curious about know how she survived in such steep terrain. I praise God for His grace and protection, and - needless to say - change my mind about letting them stay feral, at least the teenage cat.

Then all of a sudden, the kitten stop coming. One day, three days, a week; and my concern becomes worry. I continue to come, in the hope that the kittens' mother, who never appeared, will take her children back to the hillside if she finds food, or if the kittens are on their own, they will decide to come back if they know there's plenty of food, and no threat.

My hope diminish as days past and only small amount of food were eaten, maybe by other cat. I thought I lost them forever, when one Sunday, a lady called out to me as I turned back home empty handed.

She hurled a huge plastic bag full of traditional Indonesian snacks when I turned around.

"Thank you for feeding my cats when I wasn't around", she said, "I went to a hajj journey and was worried that the cats would die without me but thank Allah He sent you. My neighbour told me about you"

It is I who thank God, actually. At least I now I know that those little babies were save after all.

Then I learned that she is the owner of a big house across the street, overlooking the rock, and that she always left food on her large terrace for the stray cats around the area, and also that all five kittens and their mother were always there as soon as she came home from the hajj.

I asked her immediately if she knows a teenage calico cat that walk with a limp, and before she answered, I saw that cat sitting on the sofa inside her house.

"I thought you were fooled too", the lady laughed, "It wasn't her, it's her twin"

Hmmm.....A twin cat? Is that even possible?

"That's the one with the limp", she pointed behind me.

I looked around, and saw the exact same cat, limping quietly trying to go pass me into the lady's living room where her sister was sitting.

Heck, no wonder sometimes she is a cliffhanger, the other time a heart breaker. It's not a teenage cat that I saw, it was two.

It made me feels like reading Jekyll and Hyde, cat version.

Since the lady is nice, it takes only a short time before we know each other better. She was a midwife, a daughter of a farmer in a village a few hours from Bandung, and her father like cats and keep many of them in his barn. It's how she came to like cats, because her father's barn gang done a great job exterminating rats and keep their rice safe. She thinks cats are a gift from God that contribute to her present prosperity.

And then, for some unknown reason, we talked about birth control one day. We just drifted there I think, because we chit chat about whatever while feeding the feral cats. I took the opportunity to start campaigning about spaying or neutering her cats.

She said she knows that cats can have birth control, but she was made convinced that spay/neuter equals mutilation to a living being, and thus, a sin.

Don't laugh. Some vets (and especially breeder vets) said so. I am sure those breeder vets are lying, though I am not sure about the sin. If it is then I myself will definitely go to hell, considering the very many street cats that I spay and neuter all these years. But then, since I won't know for sure anyway, I just do what I can.

I told the lady that that at this moment, trap, neuter and returning feral cats is the most effective and humane way to handle overpopulation, avoid epidemic, and definitely curb the chance of street-tragedies.

Besides, since this lady seems to genuinely love cats, I might as well try to make the colony into a living example of how feral animals can live in harmony with humans.

A few visits and a couple afternoon tea convinced her that spay and neutering, when done correctly by a caring vet, will guarantee a better living for a cat, and of course, less burden for her (who provide food for the entire colony). I am still not sure whether or not it's a sin, though.

So, we made a deal. I will pay for the spay and neutering for every one of the colony, and she will continue to feed them, with additional term that I will adopt the tremor-ing teenage cat.

She refused.

She said, if I am to adopt the calico teen, I have to adopt both. She told me that she knows the twin at birth, and that the two cats have been inseparable, and she also told me that since I know more about cat care, I should try to cure the one with limps.

The lady named the two calicos Kunyit and Unyit (both means 'tumeric'), but when you call one, the other tag along and vice versa, so I only need one name for both of them. They eat from the same bowl (refusing a second bowl), they drink together, play together, sleep together, at the same place, scratch together... They even go to toilet together! Imagine a pair of twin cat defecating side by side...

When I took them for spaying, they were spayed at the same time, by two vets who happened to share the same first name (One is vet Dewi Maria, the other is vet Dewi Sumaryatin).

God sure has a big sense of humor.

The Unyit who has a black spot near her whiskers is the limp one.

Between the two, Unyit who walks with a limp is the more courageous one, but her sister usually followed one step behind. When she sense danger, however, the healthy one hiss first, and the limp Unyit will back off. When they were given food, the limp Unyit will arrive first, but she won't eat until her sister come and sniff, and if the food pass her test then the two will eat together, from one bowl, and no matter how little the portion, they never quarrel.


Healthy Unyit only plays with other cats with whom limp Unyit play with, and limp Unyit will avoid all other cats whom healthy Unyit avoids.

Unyit and Tamarin

My mom dropped a spoon

We figured the twin are perfectly synchronized

I don't know how they communicate with each other, but the two always seems to understand each other, count on each other, and naturally drawn to each other.

One day, when watching them playing, I wondered if healthy Unyit ever felt burdened with her extra job as her sister's keeper, if she ever have her own different mind from her sister.

My mother told me that, while I was at work, there were several time when healthy Tumeric managed to slip out of the house, and my mother was too slow to catch her. However, halfway to the stairs she always look back through the window, where limp Tumeric watched her sister in silence.

Then she said that healthy Tumeric always turn back into the house.

Now I know why the two Unyit never got out of the house again, even when the front door was opened in front of them.

When healthy Unyit fell severely sick last month, I saw the other Unyit tried hard to keep her comfortable. She sat by her sister, she comforted her by licking behind her sister's ear, and she bit my hand when I tried to keep her away because she might catch the same cold. In turn, limp Unyit tested the food for her sister, hiss when other cats try to get into their basket, and refuse to play with other cats until her sister is back healthy again.

And then when I register limp Tumeric into physiotherapy and acupuncture classes to heal her wobbly stand, healthy Tumeric voluntarily jump into the basket, and join her sister's session. Combined with my mother's magical Chinese herbs, Limp Tumeric's condition is getting better, albeit very slowly (I say this because she is fatter faster than she heals)

waiting for vet exam (with the same style)

When Limp Tumeric can finally jump over a table and land on her legs (instead of her tummy) I can sense her sister's happiness. When the limp Tumeric start to stand more steadily, has less tremor, and even run straight (without bumping or tripping), they start to be more lively. They play longer, and more mischievous, as if a whole new world - sans limitations - is opened for them to explore.

You think limp Unyit finally left alone?

Look again

Last week when my friend wrote me to say how much she missed me, and how much she has been looking forward to my writings, I was looking at the twins as they work together trying to rip my floor mat apart.

Then I realize that, without I know it, I have been looking at the answer of my questions about how it feels to have a sister.  All this time I have been living at the side of the greatest sisterhood that can be defined. A loving companionship, sheer loyalty, genuine trust, unconditional giving. Since the days when they lived at the lip of a ravine, to the days when they share a soft fleece bed in a warm home, they never change. All the good things about having a sister, has been taught to me, in real time, by a pair of a feral twin.

And then I remembered I once read that the most valuable treasure a girl can have is a sister.

Looking back at the twin, who chase each other back and forth around my refrigerator, I guess I don't even need to wonder if it's true.