Growing up we weren’t well to do. We lived in a one bedroom police barrack where my late father used to serve as a policemen back in the late 70s.
And when he left the police force to pave a better life for his growing family, we moved to a kampong and lived in a house built by my father and his friends, right next to my grandma.
My grandma has a little sundry shop that she operated at the small entrance of her house. She sells daily necessities items and non-perishable foodstuffs to snacks to the villagers. My favourite section are the snacks. That’s my first encounter with entrepreneurship. I used to help collect money from the customers on behalf of grandma whenever they come to buy. I see her weigh rice, flour, salt and sugar using the old school weighing apparatus. She does her book keeping by counting using the abacus, yes my grandma is a smart woman!
Life is so simple, we have no flushed toilet back then and we collect water from a manmade well.
One thing for sure, since then, I always have animals around me.
My late father is an animal lover. While staying in the wooden house, I recalled having 20 cats (most of it came to our house and never left, and some I brought back from the street or school) at once and a crane. The crane was injured when my father found him. He nursed it to well until it could fly again. He still hang out near our home for a few months until one day we never see him again. And when we moved to a brick walled home (compensated by the Government) when they took my grandma’s land, my father adopted a German Shepard puppy (Johnny) and we have fishes in a large aquarium.
So yes, that’s the story of my childhood – how I first got to know about animals is by living with them.
Today is a story about Booty. Booty is a stray female cat we adopted a year plus ago. Well her name was initially Beauty, but it ended spelt and pronounced as Booty because she responded well to it instead.
We found her heavily pregnant and seems lost at the neighbourhood.
Now, our home is always a stopover for stray cats and sometimes dogs to come for shelter, food and water. We have bowls for them outside the house in case they want to eat/drink. I always make sure we have a jar of pet biscuit in the car too, and one point of time I used to have two packets of wet food in my working bag for the just in case moments. I can’t bear looking at strays hungry or thirsty.
One of the cats we feed
I can almost feel what it’s like to be hungry, I too went through the hungry moments when my parents split up and my mom (single mom) raised us with the barely enough income. We have gone through days of eating just porridge with salted fish or salted egg, and green veggies. Even at recess, I would split a meal with my sister so we both don’t go hungry.
I usually get weird looks from strangers whenever I feed strays. Once, I purposely bought a fried chicken at the mamak (because they don’t have anything else suitable for animals) just to feed a hungry cat. And going uphill like Cameron Highlands, I would buy two loaves of bread so I can threw some bread to feed the dogs (perhaps owned by the orang asli) as we drive up. It’s disheartening to see most of them scavenge for food at the roadside from the rubbish left behind by visitors. I am sure these dogs owners could barely feed themselves to buy food for them too.
Now Booty came to us uninvited. She was heavily pregnant, dragging her huge belly whenever she walks and I knew she needed a place to deliver her babies. She was friendly, tame and very talkative to humans. That’s when I suspected she’s been abandoned. So we fed her food and make sure she’s comfortable outside our home. She will still roam the neighbourhood and comes back to the house to eat and rest.
Heavily pregnant
Then one day it occurs to me that there is no way her babies can survive when she delivers them out there. So I invited her to our home and a week and half later she was in labour. I got her a box, old cloth and monitored her. It wasn’t an easy labour it seems. She delivered 6 babies, 2 died. 3 female and 1 male survives.
2 weeks after giving birth, Booty went missing. There is no way she would just vanish like that. She dotted on her babies so much! She would be upset with me even when I go take a peep and check on her babies. I couldn’t resist new born kittens! She moved her babies to two different locations in the house because she didn’t want us to touch her babies.
So Booty went missing for a week. Frantically I searched everywhere, calling her. Googled the internet for answer on why cat go missing and within that period I had to play mom to 4 of her babies, that’s right! These babies have yet to open eyes yet and depended on their mother for feeding.
Since I have experience taking care of orphaned animals, I never expected to take care 4 at once! Imagine feeding warm milk every 4 hours, stimulating them to poo/pee one by one. And mind you, whenever I have appointments outside, I had to cut short my meetings so I can go home and check on the babies. You have no idea how worried I was if I missed their feeding time.
Became instant mom to 4 furbabies
So one day, after arranging with another animal lover friend to care for the babies while we go for a short school holidays getaway, I heard a faint cry that sounded like Booty. I thought she must have been trapped in some neighbours home. Since I was rushing for work, I thought of looking for her when we get home in the evening. So we reached home around 9.45pm that day, I heard the cry again. So I urge hubby to trail the cry and he searched using a flashlight while I tend to her babies. Suddenly I heard him calling out to me and said he found her. He carried her to the house, she couldn’t stand. She seems too weak to even move but when I brought her babies back to her, she forced herself to tend to them, licking them – she was a good mother.
When we found her!
Then we realised she broke her legs. That explains why she couldn’t stand and just lied down.
It is almost 11pm that night, there isn’t any animal clinic nearby that opens so late. I called our regular vet but he can only see her tomorrow, but tomorrow we need to leave for the trip already! So I looked for a 24 hours animal hospital and found one in KL.
We brought her to the emergency and she was examined by a lady vet. She told us Booty was dehydrated (she must have been out of food/water for days) and she has a dislocated pelvic and a broken leg.
Booty warded at Animal Hospital at Jalan Tun Razak
We had to board her in the hospital that night as the doctor needs to make sure she is strong enough to go for surgery. So for the past 4 days we were away, my phone rings twice a day as the vets updated me on her condition. From her blood count/level to whether she can poo & pee herself. Every vets that updated me praised how strong Booty was. She fights on to live.
So the surgery took place on the fourth day, where they placed a metal piece to her pelvic to secure the fractured bone. They advised to fix the other leg later as she didn’t want her to be in so much pain during recovery. The bill came to us pretty high, and shamelessly I went on a crowdfunding drive and helpful friends came help to offer aid and that helps me a lot to reduce the burden at least by half.
When we took her home, not only I still have to feed her babies (again) but I also have to make sure she is given medicines twice a day for two weeks (3 types – antibiotic, nerve building tablet and a painkiller drop). She is cage ridden for almost a month. I had to change her soiled sheets and I recalled the first few nights when she cried in pain, hubby slept next to her cage to soothe her. I recalled massaging her leg gently to reduce swelling. When she can move her leg, I did simple rehab like pulling it gently so the blood flows.
I was a nanny, nurse, therapist and nutritionist all at once!
When we brought her for review to the vet, her pelvic healed well, but we were in dilemma to whether fix her broken leg or otherwise. The vet showed xray that it had healed by itself but the bone didn’t fused well, which means she will walk limping still. So I asked the vet if she will be in pain. He said no. So I decided not to put her in anymore pain, and let her leg healed by itself. She will be home bound anyways, so even if she walk limping or sits funnily, she is at home.
2 months later, we got her spayed and that’s when her life started as a home bounded cat. Her legs got stronger by the day, she is able to climb and run the stairs, cage.
It was one hell of a ride with Booty.
She’s very attached to me, following me where ever I go. I find so much joy in her. She has put so much weight now, and that makes her cuddly. Seeing her antics makes me laugh all the time!
Her babies are well mannered and I cannot escape from them whenever they hear my voice. They knew who their ‘mama’ is!
Look at how they have grown now!
So my plea to everyone is this, please give strays a chance.
Animals comes in all shapes and sizes and looks, whether they are imported breed or local, deep inside they are the same. They all know what love, pain and loneliness is all about. Just like humans. Local breed may not look attractive but they are the most loyal and easy to manage. I have NEVER bought animals all my life, they are usually adopted from the street or given away.
Saw this poor baby in Penang, fed her some food during breakfast
So open your heart and learn to love them too. You will be surprised what you can learn from them. If you are not used to having animals around you, don’t hurt them. Just feed them and let them seek shelter at the porch.
God puts animals on earth for reasons. Not just as food but to teach us about life and love.
I drew many version of Booty
Something About Angiechin28
Angie Chin is an Alpha Mom with a mission and founder of WonderWomen.Asia (coming soon), the first online portal in Malaysia that connects Women to affordable online learning, community activities, shareable contents, events, jobs and go-to market opportunities. At home, she’s a mommy to a 10 year old daughter, 6 furbabies + a grown babe. She loves travelling, cooking, exploring new food, reading and watching re-runs on Youtube.
Regularly posting up her ramblings and sharing contents (current favorities is Facebook & Instagram), she fell head over heels with Steemit after realising it’s the only platform that allows ANYONE to earn cryptocurrency by creating and posting up contents, even by liking, voting or commenting other people’s contents!
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To start earning, sign up for Steemit already! Post up your original contents and you can almost start seeing the ka-ching in your account before you know it.
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Life tagline (for now): Never be afraid to try anything once!
Drop her a note at wonderwomenasia@gmail.com
