Will miss you Chicklet...

In my three-year stay in Pakistan, which hopefully draws to a close  soon, I had never felt so helpless and miserable as when I saw my ten-month-old cat Chicklet, and two other kittens, poisoned to death last week.

I was poisoned to death. I was only
three-months-old

My husband and I had rescued Chicklet and his litter-mates from our neighbour’s washing machine last winter. Chicklet and his litter-mates were like little fur balls and we had to resist the temptation of adopting them because we already had six very territory-conscious indoor cats to take care of.

Yet soon enough Chicklet and his sister were in our backyard, the sister taking the lead and the brother following suit, and before we knew it they were ours. We were feeding them, rushing them to the vet, or saving them from stray Toms at 3 am!

Chicklet had a knack of getting himself into trouble and we had to go around requesting neighbours to let us into their houses and get him down their roofs or out of their backyards. He would be happy to see us rescue him, rub his chin against walls and roll on the ground non-stop as if saying his “thank yous”.

This summer we got worried when Chicklet went missing for several hours. We were on our roof calling out for him; checking other rooftops and backyards for clues. We’d just given up our massive search when Chicklet obliged us by alighting from under the overhead tank of our Indonesian neighbour.

We threw food to him and then went begging to the neighbours’ to let us in. Chicklet saw me making my way up the ladder and launched his major “thank you act”; he rolled on the ground, rubbed hard against my legs and made me run all over the roof before letting me catch him.

Happy to be back in our backyard, he perched himself on his favourite place, the kitchen window sill, rubbing his cheeks against the iron grill and purring hard.

Chicklet grew up to be a big and healthy cat. He no longer had to be rescued from rooftops; but he still loved playing his little games with us – “I spy” by showing up at all windows and doors of our house and announcing his arrival with grand meows or turning up in our lawn and then wanting to be let inside the house to cross over to the backyard.

Chicklet showed symptoms of food poisoning on early September 14 (around 3.30 am). We were to take him to the vet in the morning, but Chicklet didn’t wait for us. We looked around for him on all rooftops, backyards, our street, but there was no trace of him. We hoped and prayed that he would return and announce his arrival with his grand meows once again. But that was not to be.

On September 16, around 5 pm, as I stepped out on our terrace to call out for him yet again I saw him lying dead on our Indonesian neighbour’s roof, on the same spot from where I’d rescued him in summer, with half a dozen crows and hordes of flies feasting on him. We got him down and gave him a burial.

If Chicklet’s death was not a blow enough for us, we saw two other kittens, who would stop by for food, poisoned. While the male died, the female has made it.

We were just getting over the two deaths post-Eid, when last Saturday, I noticed Chicklet’s sister and her three kittens, who were born in our backyard, showing similar symptoms.

Sadly the weakest in the litter could not make it. We used to jokingly call him “Wheezer”, because last month he had been treated for wheezing. Wheezer died a very painful death. His litter-mate, the friendliest kitten I have known, is still at the vet’s fighting it out.

Chicklet and the two kittens didn’t deserve to go the way they did, at least not in an Islamic Republic, because the Prophet is said to have liked cats and kept one too.