Meet Tsingy!

Surrounded by terriers!

Tsingy is a new addition to my household. She is a young female cat, about 2 years old, quite small as all camp cats are. The picture above was taken this morning--she's been here about 36 hours and has already stopped hissing at the dogs and lets them get quite close to her, even lick her (we don't think she had ever seen dogs before Wednesday afternoon). She hasn't left the office yet on her own but I think that she will soon enough. Right now, Tsingy (sing-GEE with a hard g) is asleep behind me and Mimi is curled up on the dog bed to my left.

My friends Paul and Lou-Anne were her former owners. She is a "houseboy" cat, a young stray that wandered into the houseboy camp, later carried to P and L-A's house by their houseboy, and thus adopted by them. The houseboys also take sick and wounded cats to westerners who they know have a soft spot for cats. The houseboys obviously have soft spots for cats too but they don't have the resources to care for them. Houseboys aren't allowed to be members of the Kennel Club (the vet clinic) so taking cats and kittens to people like Paul and Lou-Anne is the best option.

P and L-A recently adopted another cat, a young male cat, solid black and totally beautiful. When their houseboy brought it to them, the cat was horribly torn up and they didn't think it would live but they carried it to the vet clinic where they were told, he'll live, we'll have him back to you in two weeks. So they've kept him ever since. It appears this little black cat was beat up by other cats--and that continued in their house. Tsingy literally hunted the little black cat and beat him up when she could.

So to keep peace, they had to separate Tsingy and their other cat, an orange tom, from the little black one. That wasn't really working out--they are not used to dealing with barriers, who is in, whose turn is it to come into the family room, etc.

I had dinner at their place and mentioned casually that I was interested in acquiring a cat. Do you know that none of my dogs lived without cats? There were always a couple of them around. I figured the terriers would be okay with this.

Well, I have to watch those casual mentions of things around Paul--he jumped right up and said, are you interested in Tsingy? After he explained all of the drama, I thought she might be feisty enough to deal with the terriers and young enough to be flexible and able to learn to live with the dogs.

So here she is. She is white with a partially black head, a black tail, and a black spot on one rear leg.

Tsingy was so worn out from playing with her toys all night long that she didn't hear me come back in with the dogs from the jebels this morning. She didn't wake up until I said her name.

I should explain about the stuffed tiger. Tsingy slept in the guest bedroom at P and L-A's curled up next to this stuffed toy. It was a brilliant stroke of luck that they brought it along. I made her a little nest with it the first day and I think it helped make her feel safer.

Both dogs were utterly fascinated with her and spent the first evening hovering around the puppy gate in the door to the office. When I introduced them to Tsingy yesterday, one at a time, they simply walked up to her and sniffed her. At that early stage, Tsingy got all puffed up and hissed and growled but she stood her ground. So it was a case of the dog not barking in the night, that is, nothing happened. It was a nonevent. Mimi still has to check that Tsingy is here every time we come back in the house from a walk, even a potty trip. Harry is quite a bit more blase about her now. But even when both dogs rush into the office and stand almost on top of her, Tsingy just sits there and purrs.

Here is Mimi meeting Tsingy the first day. Tsingy is not particularly happy about it--defensive crouch, ears back, and she was growling. Tsingy doesn't seem to be as worried about the dogs now.

She meows and starts purring whenever she sees me and is very affectionate and playful.

I think she'll do fine.

Update: Last night (Friday night), Tsingy joined me and Harry on the couch to watch BBC Antiques Roadshow while dinner simmered on the stove. She curled up in my lap and purred herself to sleep. Aww!