The ancient Egyptians revered and even
mummified cats. They also immortalized them with stunning statues of
sitting cats, their legs elongated, necks arched, ears erect and a look
of arrogant disdain on their rounded faces.
There is no such reverence for cats today around the Eastern Mediterranean.
Roaming cats are synonymous with outdoor
restaurants throughout that part of the world. Usually they prowl warily
around table legs and human legs looking for bits of meat, but a
hierarchy is quickly established if a diner decides to make a
substantial contribution to the cats’ diet. At once, the old warriors
with torn ears and bare patches of skin where fights have torn off their
fur move in and take control.
Occasionally they hiss and claw at their fellow elders, but they basically manage to share the food. The younger cats, meanwhile, restlessly pace up and down at a safe distance, mewing their hunger and distress.
Occasionally they hiss and claw at their fellow elders, but they basically manage to share the food. The younger cats, meanwhile, restlessly pace up and down at a safe distance, mewing their hunger and distress.
Once, at such a restaurant on Crete, Greece’s
largest island, a sensible middle-aged British woman watched the cats,
particularly the scrawny younger ones, and said, sternly, “See here.”
She then shooed the old cats away — with difficulty as they hissed and
spat — and somehow managed to keep them at bay as she enticed the
younger ones to come to her for food. The little ones ate ravenously and
hastily, and constantly glanced over their shoulders to see if they
were about to be attacked. The tough old ones stalked, as close as they
dared, ears back, yellow eyes narrowed and tails twitching as they
barely controlled their rage at their hierarchy turned upside down.
Some years later, another group of hungry cats
greeted my husband and me on our first morning in a rented villa south
of Florence, Italy. When we opened the door we found four feral cats
sitting well apart from each other in our small front yard. They were so
grimy, scrawny and undernourished that we felt obliged to seek out a
nearby grocery store where a lovely young clerk thought us quite mad to
be buying latte for wild cats.
The cats, however, were delighted. Our four cats
quickly multiplied to well over a dozen. We found saucers and plastic
containers — anything that would hold milk. Though they would not allow
us to come close to them, the cats spent part of each day with us,
lounging under trees and bushes but always jumping to attention when my
husband appeared. They had no gratitude and hissed at him as he poured
the milk. Some even jumped up at him, claws bared.
Our final morning, as we contemplated the cats
and wondered what would happen to them after our departure (and whether
the next renter would curse us!), a mother cat came out of the bushes,
tail high, followed by five tiny kittens, their eyes just open. Her
timing was poor as the free restaurant was closing.
The lives of our scrawny visitors in no way
resembled the lives of their ancestors in ancient Egypt, where killing a
cat, even accidentally, could bring a death sentence. Nor would anyone
in today’s world ever consider shaving off his/her eyebrows in mourning
for the death of a cat.
But not all cats are fighters. Four plump, happy
cats entertained my husband and me one lovely, soft evening in Venice
as we ate dinner on the terrace/sidewalk outside a restaurant beside a
small canal. The lights from the street lamps threw bits of gold onto
the rippling canal water, creating reflections of crooked lamp posts and
shimmering lop-sided windows. An openwork stone fence edged the canal.
At sidewalk level there were half-circle holes, cut at regular intervals
for drainage. That evening each hole was filled with a cat. Their heads
stuck out over the canal and their gray, black and white furry haunches
jutted onto the terrace. Long tails stretched out behind them,
twitching back and forth as the cats studied the twinkling, ever varied
ribbons of gold on the black water. The cats seemed a bit irresponsible
with their exposed rear ends, but no tail was trampled, at least while
we were there.
A more sophisticated cat joined us as we dined
at a small restaurant in the old section of Istanbul. We were hardly
settled at our window table before a gray, well-fed cat leapt onto the
sill, in front of the closed window. The cat sat down, curled his tail
carefully around his haunches, and watched us eat. It was a little
disconcerting, but our visitor, with his unblinking, half-shut eyes, was
quiet and aloof and we tried to ignore him. About mid-way through our
dinner, however, he decided to try our entrees. Two steps onto the table
and we sternly backed him away. Ruffled, he turned his back on us and
sat tall and stiff staring out the window, occasionally glancing over
his shoulder to check on us with disdain and annoyance.
A year later, we returned to the same restaurant
— no cat in sight. We were well into our delicious dinner when my
husband let out a startled small scream and jumped to his feet. Silence
settled over our fellow diners and all eyes looked at us with alarm. It
was our gray cat. Quietly walking under our table, he playfully batted
the tablecloth and clawed my husband’s leg. Or was it revenge?
We never seemed to get away from cats. When we
rested under a tree outside the Athens Archeological Museum, two cats
had a wild, screeching fight above us in the tree, causing leaves and
twigs to rain down on us. Another, in Thessaloniki, in northern Greece,
stretched his black and white paw down from an overhead grape arbor to
create a long scratch on the top of my husband’s head.
The cats abused us, ignored us and were
unappreciative of our efforts to help them, but we still felt awed by
their scrappy efforts to survive, their unfailing independence and their
mysterious aloofness.
No wonder the ancient Egyptians worshipped them.
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