Tribute to Mini Cat

Tribute to Mini Cat

Anisah
14 January 2009

"timid but very manja"

Mini Cat was called Mini because she looked exactly like mom, Bulu Cat, who is called Cat because of her tricolour tortoise shell coat.  Their only difference was Mini had a stubbier tail with a knot at the end, and mom has a longer, straight and more slender tail.  When she was no longer minute, she was sometimes called Mono. 

Mini was born in a packaging box on the afternoon of 3 March 2008 with her siblings, one who is now called Polo Pau because she looks like the colour of a very tastily baked bun(!) and one other a marmalade who did not survive her first night for she was killed by a feral male cat. Polo Pau is also called Pau Pau who is now getting more manja by the day.  While Mini was always quiet, Pau Pau is the loud one.  Her entire life was spent at home, only venturing out for trips to the vet for vaccination.  She would never venture out even with the door on several occassions left unattendedly openned.

She was the more timid of the two kittens.  What she lacked in bravery, she compensated doubly (or triply) with her affectionate behaviour.  She was inseparable from mom Bulu and later Pau Pau.  She would lick Bulu and Pau Pau from head to tail, including behind the ears and inside the ears!  At seven months she was still trying to suckle from Bulu who most of the time allowed her.  From their days in their birth box, Mini and Pau Pau slept either one of top of the other, or curled up against one another, each using their bodies as pillow and cushion for the other.  They curled up in baskets, pails, boxes, sofas, and even the dustpan! 

When they were younger, Mini was always the underdog (undercat?) when it came to sisterly wrestling.  Pau Pau would strive to immobolise Mini by sitting on her with her heavier weight and slightly larger build.  Mini would adopt the 'undercat' position by laying on her back with her four paws kicking off Pau Pau from below.  Their numerous session will be played out on the vast living room floor. 

Mini copied everything Pau Pau did.  Not long after, Pau Pau could be found pinned under Mini.  When Pau Pau was running up the stairs at two months, Mini was going up and down like a coiled spring, jumping each step of the way.  When Pau Pau jumped up to sit on the dining chair, Mini pulled herself up before learning the art of jumping.  At five months or so when Pau Pau could reach the ceiling by climbing the security rails, Mini soon learned the trick although she usually had more difficulty coming down.  The only agility of Pau Pau which Mini never mastered was racing up the L-shaped stairs at top speed and then jumping onto the banister. 

However, Mini was the more meticulous of the two.  She was slower to graduate from toilet school, but she outdid Pau Pau.  Never once did she miss her 'aim' at her litter box and always covered up after doing her business.  For the last two times she went to the loo, although with no more energy to jump into the litter box, she crawled to the litter box.  Pau Pau has her peculiar habit of scratching the air instead of the sand post-bowel movements. 

 On her idle moments, Mini would sit on the edge of the first floor with her two front paws hanging down.  Although she knew she was not allowed, at any given opportunity she would sneak into the room and jump up to the foot of the bed to sleep with me.  She was also quite an accomplished little beggar.  She liked human food, although she knew she would not get any.  On the rare occassions when she succeeded, it would always be tiny pieces of chicken (no bones) with the salt and whatever sauce washed off.  She would go absolutely mad for milk, often lapping up one ladle-full in one session. 

Throughout her life, she had never had the need to be given a bath.  She never stank, every other waking moment not spent in chasing or cuddling up to Pau Pau or sleeping is spent in grooming.  She had two permanent toys, two blocks of soft wood to scratch her claws on.  She had many other improvised toys, toilet roll turned into 'paper flowers' with the help of Pau Pau, newspapers shredded to bits (again in concerto with Pau Pau), curtains which was always good for climbing up and playing hide and seek with Pau Pau and Bulu, and numerous table and chair legs to play 'go karting' with Pau Pau and Bulu in their uncountable chase-ups round the house. 

She would come up against you to rub herself against your feet, sometimes settling on your lap, or other times inching her body closer to you on the couch.  Her big saucer eyes, round as marbles, would take away the stress from a day's work.  She was really like a family member, with her own querky ways but always enduring, timid and manja.  As if endowed with the sixth sense, she would always be there to cheer you up with her presence whenever you were stressed out. 

Other than her last five days, she had a full life.  On Sunday she was photographed by a friend near the ceiling, having reached it via the metal grill.  I saw her standing on her hind legs peering through the window from the study when delivery men delivered a table to the house.  The evening after that, she was sitting in one her favourite foetal position cuddled up position on a book shelf.  She stopped eating on Monday, was brought to a vet by Tuesday, began to show signs of difficulty in breathing (dyspnea) by Wednesday.  She refused sardines and milk on Tuseday, only drinknig a few licks of glucose.  The vet had to hydrate her subcutaneously.  Her rectal temperature was constantly at 38C every day.  On Thursday her breating was getting more laboured.   X-rays did not give any alerts.  Her heart was strong.  Her condition deteriorated very quickly.  The vet could not find anything wrong with her.  She was given daily hydration to prevent dehydration, urinated several times.  She still had the will to kick with her legs at any attempt to hydrate her orally.  She had adopted a sitting position.  Her pupils did not react much to changes in light.  Her breathing movements extended to her abdomen.  With the lack of other symptoms, she was suspected of injury from a fall which would heal on its own.  She was given hydration, and multi-vitamin injection until she resumes eating, and antibiotic injection to counter / ward off infection.  In this part of the world, there are no facilities to do blood or histopathologic work on domestic animals.  Her condition never improved with the intervention.

On Friday morning, she showed signs of tachypnea (shortness of breath).  The vet usually opens at 10 a.m. and I had to go into work because there was no chance to cancel my class.  At 9:30, my housemate rang to say that Mini's condition had gone from bad to worse.  She was breathing from her mouth and was on her side, propped up by the kitchen slippers.  I rushed her to the vet but he had not arrived. 

Mini was always looking up at me, her head cradled in my left palm.  I propped her into a sitting position.  I spoke to her, stroked her, and she would respond by thumping her tail feebly and her left front paw would softly grasp my right palm.  There was no option of putting her to sleep.  At noon her temperature had dropped to 35.4C.  I held her body, she felt light.  She used to weigh 3 kilos when she was a bouncy cat, but later we found that she only weighed 2.22 kg.  Her little body was failing her wonderfully big spirit.  She breathed her last in my arms at 12:22, shortly before the Azan for Friday prayers.  I had told her to go in peace, and I asked her to forgive anything that I had or hadn't done, that all her food and everything is for her, that God willing, we would meet in heaven.  I said goodbye to her and she was gone. She was a very good companion, like a family member.  She was 9 months and 6 days.

Her post-mortem showed a condition called pleural effusion but with no pathology work, the cause of death could never be definitely determined.  It was confirmed as not tuberculosis.   It looked very much like chylothorax. 

I am very grateful for the compassion and care from the vet, his wife and his staff. 

She was always my best girl.  She now rests under the shade of the jambu tree in the front garden with wafts of sweet scent from a nearby pandan bush. 

Those who knew Mini, also called Mono were truly blessed.  She has now returned to her Creator.

Mini Cat @ Mono
3 March 2008 - 9 January 2009