Pet Thoughts

WARNING: Lengthy and wordy post ahead!

So... I'm back! After almost 10 months of absence... Yup, university and life commitments make me put off blog posting. It was something that I mentioned that I would try to keep up with but it wasn't a priority. Anyway, back to what I came here for. It's somewhat like a late night musing for me which I wanted to record down.

It's the exam period right now and I had 2 papers done and over with, leaving with just 1 last paper coming this Saturday in 2 days time!! So to procrastinate doing my revisions (I'm a rebel :P), I went on to Facebook to you know... catch up on the in things and to stalk check up on current things that my friends are up to. However today, there were a couple of postings regarding a similar issue that has got me thinking for a while now. Coincidence?

Those postings were about a bear being a roadkill which was an accident and then a Taiwanese celebrity (but down-to-earth) couple losing their pet dog of 14 years. 

Regarding the bear, it was an unfortunate incident since in Brunei, we don't really get to see many of these wildlife animals roaming around (but we do get a lot of those pesky, cheeky monkeys though). It kind of baffled me as to how some people were blaming the driver for the death of the bear. Well, I don't see how it's possible to have a car having to brake in time and stop for the bear when it (most probably) came out of nowhere. Where's the compassion and understanding amongst the people?

Then as I scrolled further down my Facebook feed, there came a picture with the husband caressing their pet dog of 14 years with the caption written in Chinese (I've translated it into English over here) saying:

"It's Thanksgiving Day today... the pet dog we raised for 14 years has gone back to heaven. We are really upset and reluctant... We are thankful for the 14 years of companionship. We shall meet again in heaven."

Now... that actually made my tears free fall from my peepers because it was making me think back on what I've actually been thinking over the past few days (or more so, it was something that has been at the back of my mind for a long time but only during the past few days, I've gave it a serious thought).

All my life, I've always wanted to raise a dog as a pet. My ideal pet dog has always been a Golden Retriever. I mean... come on, look at those doggies. They're so fluffy and cuddly and too adorable. How can anyone not like them yeah? I feel so happy whenever I see pictures of them and it fills me with so much adoration for those dogs that I want to drown them in my love and force them to love me back! HAHA!!

However, my parents were always against the idea of us raising a dog as a pet. Well... to be fair, there were a few reasons that we can't keep dogs as pets, such as we're not living in a dog-friendly environment, we were (note: past tense) lacking of responsibility in taking care of pets and our houses that we had lived in were too small to keep such an active dog. I admit those and it was fair thinking for the dog too if we were to get one.

Earlier this evening after dinner, I came across a posting of dogs evolving after 100 years of selective breeding which made me go into searching about Golden Retrievers. I felt a little sad reading this post below. How can people do this to animals just so that they can get a blue ribbon for it?!

I wikipedia-ed "Golden Retriever" to dig up for more information about it and instead of being all hyped up about getting one (since we are moving to our own place with has a bigger area and now, dog-friendly), it actually made me think twice about getting one now.

It seemed like this breed of dogs get sick really easily with cancer and aches and pains and what-nots. WOW!! It was pretty overwhelming reading about so much how much pain one dog can go through and it hurt my heart just thinking about it. Then came the Facebook posts that got me thinking even more!

I'm a person with attachment issues. Yes, you read it right - attachment issues. I'm pretty attached to the people that I'm close with or feel comfortable with, things that I own (no, I'm not a hoarder :P) and also animals that I come in contact with. Being too attached has caused me quite some heartache because people come and go (in a good way) like leaving for further studies and what not and I even cried and bawled my eyes out when I had to flush down the guppy that we kept and raised for more than a year when it went belly up!

When we first moved into this place I'm currently staying at, there was a stray cat that was always at our place and it didn't seem like it had an owner so I decided to take her in and keep her as mine. I named her Mimi (how unoriginal I know) and I was pretty attached to her too. We left for a very short vacation and upon returning, she's gone. Like forever. Not sure what happened though but I hope it's not an accident like what the neighbour's maid actually said. You can't see it but I felt really upset on the inside losing Mimi.

There are many stray cats around my neighbourhood and to not let them die of starvation, my dad and I gave out free cat food in our backyard. An action that my mum frowned upon on the outside but I think she has a soft spot for the cats secretly on the inside. A few cats actually stay in our backyard and right now there's 2 of them but I feel really sorry towards them because I refuse to get close to them like what I did to Mimi. The mortality rates of the stray cats in my neighbourhood is pretty high as we or more so my dad has had to bury so many of them especially kittens.

What happens if I do actually get close to them and making them mine exactly only to have them part from me if they do actually die? So the only relationship I have with the cats is to feed them. As simple as that. Okay.. I've sidetracked TOO MUCH. Back to the topic.

So... if I were to get a dog... will I be able to withstand the heartache that comes with it should it get sick or even die? What happens if my dog gets sick? What will I do? Do I put it down to sleep or let it fight it's sickness just because of my own selfish attachment issues with my dog? What hurts me even more is that animals can't talk. They can't exactly tell you where they're hurting or what they need. If that situation were to happen, I can't think of what I will do? I can't bear to watch it waste away in front of my eyes, neither do I want to part from it.

With these, it made me think a little more whether if I want to actually keep a pet because I don't think I can handle the emotional and attachment issues that comes with it well. So.. this shall be one of the things that I'll be brooding on for the time to come.

If you're still reading this until the end, good job on being so ever patient to read through the whole lot of my late night musings. It might be all over the place but that's how my mind is right now - all over the place. 

Much love,

Hannah ;)

To Tigger, with love

To those who have read some of my Twitter tweets a few days ago, I have found my cat, Tigger. Unfortunately, Tigger was found dead. It was pretty sick when I last saw him, vomiting clear liquid quite frequently and it won't take in any food or water. We suspected that it was either poisoned, or ate something deadly beforehand. The next thing I knew, he went missing and we weren't able to find him around and we were  keeping our fingers crossed, hoping that he would come home soon.

As some of you might know, I found Tigger in a drain late at night while it was raining. He was meowing very loudly because he was at the edge of the drain. If he falls, it would be the end of his life but he was so tiny at the time that he couldn't climb out of the shallow drain himself. My dad rescued him out and then he ran off. A couple of weeks later, we found out that my next-door neighbour was keeping him but due to certain circumstamces, they weren't able to keep him anymore so we took Tigger over.

Tigger was my favourite cat out of the 5 cats that I have. =) He was my favourite because he was the first cat that I took care of since my last cat who ran away a year ago. Tigger was the only male out of the litter and also the eldest and largest, so he took care of the other 4 young female kittens. Tigger was best friend with *Lily, good friend with **Snowie and was a fatherly figure to 2 very young kittens, ***Patches and Laces.

* Lily was the 2nd cat which we took in because it was abandoned and is kind of blind in one eye.

** Snowie is the 5th cat that we took in which was also abandoned outside our house during a night where it was raining heavily.

*** Patches and Laces were the 3rd & 4th cat that was abandoned outside our house with giant red ants all over them which left them swollen and in pain.

All of the cats that I have are all abandoned cats. They were all in bad condition when we found them but after some tender, loving care, they are now well. A few of them had cases of worms maybe because they were strays and were abandoned, not sure what they actually ate before they came to us(We did de-worm them though (= , so no worries). We feed them minimum 3 times a day with cat food, water and occasionally milk. The cats are bathe at least once a week. So, they are all taken good care off.

Well, it was sad thing that Tigger is now gone but at least he's no more in pain or suffering now. Tigger, thank you for giving me a beautiful memory to remember you by. :)

To Tigger, with love.

Hannah.

Disclaimer: All photos do not belong to me unless stated so. Credits to the original photo uploader.

Meow

I'm back after almost a week of no posts. Today, I can finally take a breather off school and tuition but not for my assignments though. Even if it's a no school day, there's still tuition and assignments. However, my tuition class has been cancelled today due to certain reasons. Yay!! No tuition = a happy girl. :D

It's the first week of the Fasting Month timetable at school. We start school later than usual, classes are shorter and we end classes earlier too. It's a nice timetable as it's a shorter and a more relaxed one to help ease the teachers, staffs and students who are fasting. With the shorter classes and all, there's not much time to do everything in class now so, there's more homework. How great. =.= I have been bombarded with a load of homework during my previous four days of school.. but, I'm sure the teachers and parents would be like, "since we end school earlier, there's more time to do homework right?". That's true but what a bummer. :(

It's been a hectic school week for me so there's nothing really interesting to share about today. Oooohh! I can think of only one. HAHA! I recently got a new cat, or strictly speaking a kitten. My dad had rescued this kitten before from a drain during a rain weeks ago. It kind of belonged to my neighbor for a while but the neighbor couldn't keep the kitten anymore, so the neighbor kindly asked if we would like to keep the kitten if not it will be a pity if it wasn't taken care of. So yeah. We got the kitten from the neighbor and it has been with us for 3 days.

The 3 days have been a challenging one for both my family and the kitten. The kitten, I assume, has been used to enter the house and it has always been scampering outside the kitchen wanting to be let in. Due to a strict no animals in the house rule, the kitten couldn't be kept inside the house. My domestic helper has been helping to keep an eye on the kitten so not to let it enter the house but it does get it's way in somehow and I always have to be the one to catch the kitten and carry the kitten outside. The kitten needs to learn the rule of not entering the house without permission.

I haven't been able to identify if the kitten's a male or a female. I can't seem to see any "male jewels" down there which can be presumably be identified as a female BUT there's a possibility that the kitten's "male jewels" is too small to be seen right? I haven't actually took a proper look down there because it's so hard to see as the kitten is VERY, VERY active. HAHA!! I shall do it one of these days. So, I can properly call the kitten a he or a she. Before that, the kitten shall be called "the kitten". HAHA! 

The kitten has a nice ginger coat. I quite like the name Tigger for the kitten because the kitten is always so active and bouncy just like Tigger from Winnie the Pooh but the name's not fixed yet. I shall properly name it after the gender has been identified. :P The kitten likes to gnaw on my foot or hand if I'm carrying or cuddling the kitten. It hurts but daddy says it's only a kitten. Kitten likes to play. So, I don't really mind at all unless it really, really hurts. It's been a joy to have the kitten around. I do have cats before which weren't actually ours but it kind of just stayed around. One died of diarrhea (a kitten named MooMoo) and one got lost after a family vacation overseas (an adult cat called MiMi). 

I prefer dogs over cats but I can't choose due to the current circumstances that I'm in which doesn't allow me to keep a dog as a pet. Cats are pretty good too so, the kitten is good for now. I would still like to have a dog as a pet in the time to come and when the situation allows. :)

Enjoying the kitty time,

Hannah