Dad’s struggle with Xiaohei

Isn't this cute? Playing with something on the floor. That's outside my house.









I like this picture. I think this is the only time Xiaohei has 'posed' so nicely for me! :D







I think Xiaohei has started to identify our house already! He (still cannot identify he or she, anyway, just use ‘he’ as a generic term lah) appears very frequently at our doorstep nowadays.

For those who have forgotten or do not know who Xiaohei is, he is our neighbourhood pet cat. He moves around at the void deck of my block and is loved by all, er….perhaps more correct to say, loved by a lot of people at our block. People play with him, feed him, etc, etc. Xiaohei is the name given by Ms Maomie. I think he has another name called Chantek (beautiful, in Malay).

He sure has an attitude. If he is just fed, he will probably ignore your calls for him. He won’t want you to touch or caress him. But when he is in a playful mood, hahaha, one whistle can send him flying to you out of nowhere. That’s my lovely Chantek Xiaohei.

Occasionally, we will find Xiaohei outside our door (it’s 12 storey high, mind you). A few times, he flew into the lift with us before we noticed it. And refuses to get out until the door shut and opened at another floor. Anyway, usually when we see him outside, we (or rather, I) will play with him, and when we are going out, he will follow us to the lift and again fly into the lift with us, to get down.

But nowadays, his trip up to our house is more frequent, and seems like routine! We (Or rather I, haha) would not mind him up here if not for the fact that I have Mao Mao at home. (For the benefit of those who forgot or do not know, Mao Mao is my house pet hamster) Mao Mao runs about or sleeps on the floor cordoned off with a card box. We worry that Xiaohei may dash into the house and ‘play’ with Mao Mao who will probably have a tragic end! (For your info, Xiaohei sneaked in once while dad was watering the plants. We didn’t realize until dad came in and actually saw Xiaohei walking out from his room! Thank goodness he didn’t notice my Mao Mao!)

Xiaohei used to just sit ‘guai guai’ (obediently) at the door, but lately he has been trying to find ways to come into the house. Nothing I do can trick him away (and once, he even scratched me accidently while I was carrying him away to let dad step out of the door). Dad is most affected, unfortunately. Every morning, he needs to move in and out of the house to water the plants, pray pray so with Xiaohei loitering outside he finds it very difficult and most inconvenient to move in and out.

One morning at 5plus in the morning, I was still sleeping, I heard some commotion outside. Judging from the noise I heard, I was sure dad is having some problem with the cattie again so I woke up. Hahaha, it was so funny (but dad sure didn’t find it funny at that point, he was irritated to the core!) seeing dad standing inside the house but unable to get out because Xiaohei was guarding just outside and seemed to be charging into the house any moment. So dad was stuck from inside and Xiaohei stuck outside. So funny! So I tried to lure that cattie away lor, and that’s when I got scratched! There was another day I heard someone knocking at the door (nowadays we keep our door closed for fear Xiaohei may come in without us noticing). I opened the door and guess whose at the door – Xiaohei! Aiyoh, now he actually comes up and ‘knocks’ our door. We believe that's when he is really hungry!

And he is so intelligent that he knows when we try to trick him back downstairs, he simply refuses to get into the lift with us!

Sweat!

27 Jan 2008 (8.43am)