Head straight for livenudecats.com: those two cats show it all!
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Tag: Animals
La folle du 15 (suite) [fr]
Suite à l’épisode précédent, j’ai reçu une réponse de la gérance:
Nous nous référons à votre courrier du 19 janvier 2002 dont le contenu a retenu toute notre attention.
Nous portons à votre connaissance que votre plainte, pour être valable juridiquement doit être signée par plusieurs locataires de l’immeuble que vous occupez et sommes au regret de vous informer que nous ne pouvons pas intervenir.
Au vu de ce qui précède, nous vous conseillons de déposer une plainte pénale auprès du Juge.
[Salutations d’usage]
J’ai immédiatement appelé la gérance pour leur expliquer que je voyais mal les autres locataires de l’immeuble signer une plainte concernant des coups de fil que je recevais et qui menaçaient mon chat. J’ai aussi expliqué que mon but n’était pas de faire mettre cette dame hors de son appartement, mais qu’elle cesse de m’importuner.
Rien à faire. Je me suis heurtée à un vieux disque rayé – dont la voix paraissait pourtant jeune.
La police m’a confirmé qu’une plainte pénale n’avait pas beaucoup de chances d’aboutir. La fréquence des coups de fil n’est pas assez élevée pour légitimer une plainte pour harcèlement, et des menaces contre un chat n’ont semble-t-il rien d’illégal. Sans compter que cela me semble un peu dramatique de me lancer dans une histoire de plaintes pénales et de juges… N’y a-t-il pas de solution un peu plus “light”? *soupir*
Inévitablement, la première réaction à mon histoire est “essayez de garder votre chat dedans”. Ça me ferait bien rire si je n’étais pas inquiète.
Prochaine étape: lettre au Juge d’instruction exposant la situation et demandant son conseil. Copie à la gérance (avec quelques précisions concernant leur réponse un peu ridicule, et une demande de séance de conciliation). Eventuelle copie à la dame en question.
Autres suggestions?
Non, je ne veux pas déménager. Ni garder mon chat dedans toute la journée.
La folle du 15 [fr]
Je vous ai déjà parlé d’elle ici, ici, là , et encore là .
Durant la dernière année, elle a continué à me laisser régulièrement des messages sur mon répondeur – que je me suis fait une joie d’ignorer.
J’ai décidé d’écouter celui qu’elle m’a laissé ce soir. La dernière fois, il y a quelques semaines, j’avais décidé que si elle récidivait j’allais agir. Il fallait donc que je sache ce qu’elle me racontait. Je le retranscris ici, espérant que cela vous amusera (consternera?) autant que moi.
Comme j’ai des scrupules concernant le lavage de linge sale sur le web, je vous fais grâce du nom de la dame (et de sa voix inimitable).
C’est G. K. Cette fois j’en ai par-dessus la tête, je ne suis pas la seule d’ailleurs, mais je suis la seule à oser vous le dire.
Votre chat était sur mon paillasson à hurler à la mort. Je l’ai mis dehors, il est bientôt sept heures (il est six heures vingt), il fait froid, alors vous allez vous occuper de votre chat, parce qu’encore une fois comme ça et je vous garantis que votre chat, vous ne le trouvez plus!
Des menaces? Demain matin, j’appelle la gérance.
Si vous êtes tentés de me dire que je prends les choses trop à coeur et qu’il faut dédramatiser, merci de vous en abstenir.
Kitty mania [en]
Bagha has developed a new habit during these last few weeks. He’s discovered he has a tail. And he’s having a nice time chasing it.
For some strange reason, he seems to enjoy doing it in the bath-tub. I am thus greeted by dirty paw-marks on the white enamel and a fair amount of fur when I rise for my morning shower.
Now tell me – why did he have to wait until he was five to discover he had a tail? That’s something kittens usually do, don’t they?
Double Life [en]
I came back home a bit late this evening. Bagha was not waiting for me in front of the building, as he often does, so I toured the neighbourhood to find him.
It gave me a chance to talk to a couple who live in the block behind mine, and who saw me pick Bagha up from their ground-floor balcony, where they were having a late supper.
He had been coming to their house very regularly during the last weeks (months?), sleeping there during the day, and eating too. They bought canned food (oh my God!) and fish to feed him. They actually gave him a name, thinking he was a stray.
I was wondering why Bagha’s appetite seemed to have diminished since I left for India.
I knew very well that the unfaithful feline found his way into other people’s flats. I also suspected that he probably got more to eat in his day than what I fed him (he did spend his youth stealing from kitchens in India, so he has the practice). I knew he could charm people. But I never suspected he had actually been adopted.
I think I’m really going to put some fancy collar around his neck with a notice in a bottle: “Hello, my name is Bagha. My mistress lives in the neighbourhood and feeds me very well. Please do not give me anything to eat, even if I know how to be quite persuasive!”
Monkeys [en]
Yesterday, I was watching monkeys running about in one of the hotel buildings, when I heard a nasty yowl and saw a commotion. One of the monkeys had caught the cat I had spotted roaming around the area earlier – and the cat wasn’t happy about it. It escaped. The monkeys went after it a little, and gave up.
Yesterday too, Anne-Marie was nipped and scratched on the arm by a monkey on Ram Jhoola. Superficial bleeding – but still. The day before that, a monkey had been trying to open her door (it had got in before and ate some bananas).
A few days back, a monkey on Laxman Jhoola caught Archana’s dupatta and playfully pulled on it when it realized she was afraid.
A day after our arrival in the hotel, a monkey came running in the corridor of our building. Florence set off to take a picture, and as she was approaching the animal, aiming with her camera, it bared its teeth and made a fierce jump at her. She retreated into the room pretty quickly.
I don’t remember the monkeys being so aggressive two years ago. Are they suffering from overpopulation?
Arrival [en]
IUCAA, 14 August 01
The journey to Pune was rather uneventful – which is good. Bombay, seen by night from the rainy sky, consists of patches of blurred flickering orange lights. Landing there has something to do with entering the uncharted territories: all the rules our world goes by are abandoned behind in the plane, and one is left alone to face India.
Nevertheless, I was very satisfied to find myself immediately at home. No stress, no worries (even when we had to change busses because there were only four people travelling to Pune). It was as if I had never left the country.
Going through the arrival section of Bombay International Airport for the second time in my life, I was capable of understanding how this place had managed to paralyze me two years ago. Not only is it very Indian – it is actually “nasty Indian”. Not pretty for the least, unfinished, frightening. As if they had done it on purpose to scare the poor first-time foreigners out of their wits.
It was nice arriving in IUCAA and seeing Nisha and Shinde. I had a nap in my comfortable (by indian standards, of course, but I can appreciate that) hostel room, and was woken up by a shrieking telephone at the very worst moment possible of my sleep.
You know – that moment where sleep is deep, in which some loud persistent sound rips unconsciousness open and sees you stagger across the room to the source of the disturbance, completely disoriented, not knowing where you are and what language you are supposed to be speaking. Then follows the half-awake nausea which grumbles deep inside: “This is too hard, I was better in the land of dreams, let me escape reality for just a little longer…”
IUCAA without most of the people I know is starting to hit me. I keep expecting to bump into all these people who used to live here 18 months ago. No Aleika, no Taramai, no Bagha, no Suketu… It-s a bit spooky, and I’m not sure I like it.
Monsoon never makes things any better either – it’s simply dreary.
Vie [en]
Ce soir, le patriotisme s’écrit dans le ciel à coups de feux d’artifice plus ou moins bruyants. Je n’ai jamais eu trop de goût ni pour le patriotisme ni pour les explosions sonores, mais j’aime bien les jolies lumières dans la nuit. Le balcon de mon frère offre une vue privilégiée sur le spectacle réjouissant de la transformation de l’argent des contribuables des communes voisines en nuages de fumée colorée.
Je suis rentrée chez moi à pied. Ce chemin que j’ai fait maintes fois avec Cali ces derniers mois, je l’ai fait seule pour ce qui est peut-être la deuxième ou la troisième fois. C’est étrange de me retrouver dans ces lieux familiers sans elle. Elle était comme une extension de moi-même, que je guidais d’un mot ou d’un geste, qui connaissait mes promenades aussi bien que moi.
Comme toute absence, la sienne est pénible parce qu’elle touche ma vie quotidienne. Je dois me refaire à tout. C’est étrange de quitter mon appartement sans Cali, sans pour autant devoir fermer la porte de ma chambre à coucher, sous peine de trouver sur mon duvet l’empreinte encore chaude d’un corps de chien – chien qui bien entendu me regarderait la tête de côté, hausserait un sourcil avec un air de dire “qu’est-ce que t’as? regarde comme je suis restée sagement à ma place pendant que tu étais loin!”
Mon appartement semble vide quand j’y rentre. Cali m’accueillait en remuant son arrière-train avec tant d’enthousiasme que cela lui valait souvent de s’étaler sur le parquet à mes pieds, ne sachant plus où placer ses trois pattes pour garder son équilibre. Bagha bien sûr m’accueille aussi, mais on le sait bien, les chats sont plus discrets que les chiens dans ce genre d’exercice (et leur préoccupation première semble tout de même être le contenu de leur assiette).
Avec le temps, je vais m’habituer à ce changement dans ma vie, re-baliser mon territoire en solitaire, retrouver un peu de liberté sacrifiée à ma compagne de près d’une année. Et surtout, à plus forte raison puisque ma meilleure amie s’y trouve à présent, je vais retourner à Birmingham cet automne.
Life without Cali [en]
Today is the night where patriotism is spellt with loud bangs and fire in the sky. I personally am not that enthusiastic about either the patriotism or the loud bangs, but I have to admit I appreciate the expensive fireworks which light up the sky.
I’ve just come home from my brother’s flat, whose balcony offers a splendid view of the neighbouring towns’ taxpayers’ money disappearing into a puff of smoke – though only after having offered a coloured show, and quite pleasing to the eye, too.
The reason this is notable enough to deserve mention in these pages is that today was my first day in Lausanne without Cali — and that during the last couple of months, I have walked back and forth numerous times with her between my brother’s flat and mine. It is so strange to be without her.
It’s strange to be home without her following me around or lurking in a corner. It’s strange to leave home “without the dog”, and not have to close the door to my bedroom (she’d take possession of my bed if I didn’t). It’s strange to arrive home without her greeting me. Bagha comes to greet me, of course, but we all know dogs are much more demonstrative than cats for this kind of thing. Cali, trying to make me believe I had been away for ever, would wag her tail with so much enthusiasm that her whole behind would sway to and fro, to the point where she would forget how to stay standing on my slippery wooden floor and end up on her belly, in my feet.
What makes her absence difficult is the way it impacts my life. It’s the same with any separation, by the way. All the places I would go to with her, all the things I used to do with her present, all our interactions, have all been chopped out of my life.
A dog, especially if well-trained and with a sweet character like Cali, becomes an extension of oneself. Cali knew my walks as well as I did; I could guide her with a word, a whistle or a sign of my hand. Everywhere I went, one of my eyes would be following her, and I would be giving out these little signals to her permanently. When I walk alone, it is no longer necessary. I don’t have to stop anymore before crossing roads to make her sit. No need to look out for nice green lawns she isn’t allowed on. No need to keep an eye open for the “dogs forbidden” signs.
These feelings will go away in a few weeks. I’ll get used to driving alone. I’ll get used to living with just Bagha. Of course, I’ll miss our walks around the university. I’ll miss encouraging her up the stairs, when she was tired or seemed to think it was a long way up (stairs aren’t easy when you have only one hind leg).
I’ll find a way to go to Birmingham in October. I will.
Life [en]
For any of you who were wondering, we made it home to Switzerland safely last night. Bagha was waiting for me, plump and hungry, and the temperature was so hot (even at 3:30 am!) that sleeping was near to impossible.
I’m deep in the Hitchhicker’s Guide to the Galaxy, and wondering how I managed to live so long without reading it.