Saving Little Kitten

Once I was casually walking around my home at my native and heard a soft cry; it was a kitten. I was aware that there were three kittens in the back yard and so I ignored the cry. But the cry was becoming louder and with increasing frequency – as if something is wrong or ‘help me out of this trouble’. I glanced around and discovered that a kitten got itself stuck in a broken piece of PVC pipe, with its head and front legs in one end while its hind legs in another. Clearly it got itself trapped inside the pipe and desperately wanted help. By a short distance from the trapped kitten was its mother, who was also meowing.

I wanted to help this kitten out of the trap, but didn’t know how. I being the engineer plus MBA was thinking abut the diameter of the pipe and assumed that if the kitten did not cry and exhaled, its stomach would shrink and then I can probably push it with a long stick. Or may be if it was left starving for some time, its stomach would shrink and then I could help it get out. But all the while I kept an eye on the mother cat, because it might attack me thinking I was troubling its little one.

I also thought of pouring some water mixed with detergent powder on to the kitten so that the pipe might get lubricated and the kitten could get away. All the while the kitten was crying aloud and little did I know that the mother was scared to come near the kitten as it was apparently worried of my presence. I have almost made a plan, but was scared to get near the kitten fearing its scratch. So I decided to wait until it is asleep, buying myself some time to design a method for its rescue.

My son came along and I warned him not to go near the kitten; so he was also beside me and so was my wife. We began discussing how to save the kitten. Unaware of this my grandmother (aged about 94) walked in and asked me what we were discussing. I explained the situation and warned her not to go near the kitten as its mother was close by. Grandma did not listen to me, walked towards the kitten, grabbed the pipe with kitten still in it and gave it a shake.

The next thing we see was the kitten running to its mother. Grandma walked away as if nothing happened.

It took us a while to realize what happened and to close our open jaws.

Just for laughs

Random comments from my 4 year old son

He was assigning characters to all of us from his story book– he was the puppy, his mom was the squirrel and then he turned to me and asked “Achan kozhiyaano?” [Loosely translated : He wanted to ask "And Dad, are you the hen?" but colloquially it meant "Dad, are you a womanizer?"]

Some characters in an animated movie talks about all things that go fast are made in Japan. He liked this thought and connected everything that moves fast were made in Japan. So he used to say ‘Acha, look at that bike, that’s a racing bike and that is made in Japan’, ‘Acha look at that red car, that is moving very fast, That is sure made in Japan”. So once we came across this man who was jogging wearing his sweat-pants. He took a look at this person  who ran past us and commented. “Acha, aa appoppane Japanil undakiyatha” [Dad, that person is made in Japan]

He was staring for long at the calendar hanging on the wall and suddenly exclaimed “Ho  pathu mani aayi, acha” [Oh, it’s ten o’clock, dad!]