Flower With So Blooming Many!

Our little flower, Ah Fa's given birth to a HUGE litter of healthy little ones about a month ago.

Before we could rehome her, the vet found that she already had the little ones on the way. What surprised us the nine fur bundles that emerged!!! She's undoubtedly had her paws full with their constant demand to be fed. To date, all but three of the puppies have been found a home.

Unfortunately because it was still in the early days when we were trying to provide her with adequate nutrition to restore some basic level of health that she conceived, having this blooming big litter has taken its toil on her drastically. She's lost a significant amount of weight and sadly she looks even worse off than when we first met her. Not confident that she's being well taken care of at the current vet's, we're planning to move her this weekend to board with a recommended vet.

Ah Fa's been sterilised so no more of that to tax her health. Now to work on finding her a safe and caring home.

Back to work on getting her on her feet again and in good health. The positive thing is she's in good spirits and holding her tail high with a good smile. We certainly have some way to go.

Waiting for Miss Purr-fect

There’s something to be said for a broken routine. It’s disconcerting and throws things out of balance not to mention the out-of-sortness that feeds the growing edginess. It’s been four weeks now. First I waited impatiently, then I tried waiting patiently.

This was the story four weeks ago.
Three weeks on- me and feral cat, Miss Purr-fect, self-instituted resident at the hotel we currently call Home, have struck up a taciturn friendship as breakfast companions. I’m convinced she’s been taking note of the time I appear for my breakfast feed although I’ve never been able to figure out the mystery of an animal’s punctuality. If she doesn’t appear as if by magic when I’ve sat down, I stroll over to the hedge and call for her. Often she’s taken the hidden paths known only to creatures of her height. Who me?- she questions me with her eyes, stopping in her tracks. Come on over to my table if you want to, I say to her, returning to my seat. She trails behind me but is always sure to keep that little distance between us as her feral wisdom dictates.

Now that we’ve got the best table, what’s the best thing for breakfast? I run through my mental list of the spread, familiarised through 21 days of the same with some token variation thrown in now and then. Least I misrepresent the efforts and standard of the hotel, I must add that there is ample variety (though repeated) and quantity provided. I’ve offered Purr-fect the sausages and ham which are often rejected. Perhaps that explains her svelte silhouette. Not the processed food, please. Ok I get it- you Cat, me Slave. Back to the buffet table to fetch her other temptations. I take her advice anyway and follow suit- give the lovely processed food preservatives a miss. We concur on the freshly prepared options which we both wolf down in respectable portions.

I settle down to read a chapter over a coffee while she attends to her grooming, missing a grubby patch at the kink of her tail, I noted. I know some catty ways too!

I decide we’ve been acquainted long enough to attempt to give her a fond scratch under the chin. Do NOT touch me, she hisses emphatically and uses her claws in punctuation. Feral cats DO NOT subscribe to caresses, she reminds me. Another reminder from her to keep to the boundaries within mutual respect.

And so we sit in silence together, warmed by the morning sun, enjoying this taciturn relationship for all its routine. What could be more perfect!

Purrfect's breakfast later includes fresh fish picked off the beach, courtesy of the fishermen who have no interest in the juveniles snagged in their nets.

-----That was four weeks ago. We were away from the hotel for two weeks in between and she hasn’t made her appearance since. I can only hope that it was all over a territorial dispute with another cat and not some more unfortunate fate. Perhaps she has found another home by now. Such is the fragility, and heartache, of attempting to build a relationship with feral animals. For that moment in time we attempt to understand each other and I hope, find some connection, maybe affection and mutual respect.

For me it is also a clear and good reminder that we do not always call the shots and that is not always a bad thing. The issue of control, as many reinforcements in our lives might support us to believe otherwise, is not the most important achievement. This may be as Good As It Gets, and there is Much and Enough in itself.

-----Just this week, waiting for Miss Purrfect, another little one has turned up. We’ve nicknamed her Smarty Pants as she displays no fear strutting her way around at breakfast time. An altogether different character to get to know, hardly feral. I have a new breakfast companion and I enjoy the pleasure while I can, remembering Miss Purrfect and how transient many things are.

The Gathering of 24 Thousand

Last week we had a visit from K. She was in KL on a stopover back to Australia, after her tour of Europe. Her enthusiastic accounts of visits and experiences to many famous sites in Europe inspired us to drag her off to see one of Malaysia’s famed sights-the Blue Mosque. We hopped on a train out to Shah Alam to visit the state mosque of Selangor.

Officially known as the the Sultan Salahuddin Abdul Aziz Shah Mosque, (its easy to see why it's simply called the Blue Mosque!) it's the second largest mosque in Southeast Asia, crowned by a 51.2m-diameter blue and silver dome sitting majestically at a height of 106.7m above the ground. Here 24 thousand gather to express their faith.

Four minarets rising 142.2m, the second tallest in the world, carry reverberations of the call to prayer for miles around.

Towering columns and archways accentuate the feeling of lightness and openness. Light and silence surge in to fill every corner.

The elevated inner courtyard, held up by pillars and arches, a typical architectural feature of mosques, stand mute in hushed quietness- a space separated from the world outside.

Only the whisper of the winds stir through the corridors. White marble floor and walls, cool to the touch, reflect everything.

The achromatic architecture changes its mood by the moment, finding life in reflections captured. Storm clouds moving in dim and paint the passages grey, glaring bone-bleached white hurts the eyes where sun rays break through, verdant green peeps through the latticework.





The main prayer hall where only a Muslim may enter, softly lit by sunlight filtered through stained glass.

Happy New Year