After Nishi’s rescue, I have become more compassionate towards strays. In a few months of raising Nishi, it felt like the experience have opened my eyes in such a way that I see the strays more often than I used to. I know they were there even before, but I was disconnected then, and oblivious to the stray population problem.
My husband is a runner and usually does his training in the middle of the night when road traffic dies down and crowd has mellowed. One night he came back saying he heard a crying cat somewhere along his route but couldn’t find where it’s coming from. He said he just gave up because it might be inside a building or a compound where he couldn’t access anyways.
The next evening, he trained again and went to the same route. Surprisingly, he heard the same cry. The cat has been crying for 24 hours now. He tried to look for it once more, as it bothered him so much that this cat has been in the same spot in the last 24 hours, miserable and crying. Finally, he found this little gray tabby kitten at the corner of some Jewish church. He called me up and I immediately went with food and water.
The kitten’s eyes were shut and full of discharge. It was also skinny and very filthy. It was a very scared kitty. I offered it some food. We couldn’t make up our minds what to do with the kitten. Obviously, in his condition, he will not survive on his own. The condo we were living in doesn’t allow pets and Nishi is already a secret. It is also close to impossible to sneak the tabby kitten because it just won’t stop crying. But we also did not have the heart to leave it like that, knowing that he will never make it by himself. We ended up driving to the 24 hour vet clinic and had the kitten treated, and then boarded him for the night.
It was St. Patrick’s day, and so we named him Patrick. It turned out that Patrick is suffering from a respiratory infection. After a week of being confined and treated in the vet clinic, we smuggled Patrick in the condo. We figured, Nishi could use a company. It wasn’t easy introducing the two to each other, but eventually, they loved each other.
