Paalam Pochay

Several years ago I had the honor (and the surprise) of attending to my first cat birth courtesy of our weird pet Hospicia (hospy or poch for short). She was the lone daughter of our even weirder cat named Patricia. Together they formed the Mandirigma family. Why? Coz Patricia was far more scary than any guard dog imagined. She could take on the neighbors dogs and get them to scamper off our garage. We had a running joke in the family that we were Patricia's pets and not the other way around. She never let us touch her unless she was extremely ill. And she treated Poch the same way.

Anyway, after patricia died Hochay became the sole survivor of the mandirigma clan. She was always pregnant but rarely any of her babies live. She manages to turn psycho after a few weeks and abandons her kittens. Then she would suddenly become so sweet again. During her first ever pregnancy she decided that I was to be her nursemaid and on the moment she was about to give birth she literally jumped on my lap and started going into labor there! I was so shocked. But my mothering instinct pushed me not to throw her out right there and then. I even cut off the umbilical cord.

Through the years we had a love hate relationship. I loved her a lot coz she was so malambing and she had this weird way of sliding her head back everytime i carry her. She drove me crazy though everytime she tries to slip into the house with her newborn kittens and hide them wherever she felt "safe." She also had this habit of harassing polie my "favorite" baby. So there were times when I'd really smack her. But she loved me and I loved her still. She was loyal to the max. She was also the only cat that I had who ate the whiskas I would buy for them. Somehow our other babies are "jologs" at heart and prefers the leftover food.

Poch died the other day. Mom found her sleeping under my car. She was about 10 years old (70 years old in cat years). She has been struggling with her breathing the past months and finally her body gave up.

I feel sad that poch is dead. It means that the last of the great mandirigma's is now gone. Unfortunately none of her babies lived long enough to replace her. So now our gray haired cat is forever gone.

But I am happy too that the mother of century awardee among cats is finally at peace. She had a rough life. She lived well.

sayang lang i didnt get to say goodbye anymore. now i only have polie left. mom adopted 4 more cats recently--ani and three kittens. But since I am now here in KL, I am not part of their growing up years.

So goodbye poch... thanks for the lovely memories...