The four K's in my life: KAKA

Forever Friends

Welcome to Eco BnB! It's your lucky day if you step in and see a chubby (okok, fat) cat with pointy, white whiskers and large, mesmerizing eyes, gazing in your direction. 

This beauty with glistening, jet black fur and a long tail is KAKA, our mascot (cat) at Eco BnB. 

She loves all the attention she can get from us homo sapiens, and is one of the gentlest cats ever. I named her KAKA as she doesn't ever mew, she only utters ''ka...ka". 

Our paths crossed when KaKa sneaked into the laundry room at Eco to give birth to two handsome boys in December 2014. She was a really skinny little cat then, malnourished and with dull, flaky fur.

All of us dote on KaKa as she is such a loving, responsive, people-centered cat.

Alas, she lost her kittens tragically one after the other last year. KitKit, the more adventurous of the pair, went out one evening and never made it home. He was only 4 months old. We combed the whole neighbourhood but to no avail. KatKat, whom I had developed a really deep affection for, was mauled by stray dogs on his evening stroll soon after. He returned home to Eco one late evening, with a gaping hole in his thigh, blood oozing from little holes punctured in his tiny furry body, omigosh!!!...recalling it brings back the anguish. 

I was desperately calling up every animal hospital listed in JB, but none of them was willing to attend to KatKat, as it was almost 9 pm. Finally, I was so grateful that Dr Edwin @Wondervet arranged for his staff to attend to KatKat. But the infection had gone too deep. Even after hospitalisation and treatment, KatKat was called home to be with the Lord. We buried KatKat in our garden. All of us were devastated. And KaKa could not eat for three whole weeks.

To coax her to start eating normally again, we fed her...and fed her...and before you could say ''whamslambam", KaKa went from size XXXS to XL. So guests at Eco would inquire, "oh, she's so pretty, but is she pregnant?'' The answer is no, she's been sterilised, and that's part of what we do here at Eco BnB: whatever funds we raise is ploughed back to feed, nurse and neuter the street cats and dogs. But we don't call them strays anymore, as we manage and care for them. We call them Community cats and dogs.