Tsunami Cat's Big Adventure

In March 2011 the terrible tsunami devastated much of Japan. Most of the town of Ofunato, in the Iwate Prefecture was destroyed. Kazuko Yamagishi and Takeo Yamagishi were lucky in that their home escaped destruction, though they had to endure the horror of living in a town that had been laid waste and whose neighbours were now homeless. They were also separated from Suika, their cat. In the three months after the tsunami the Yamagishis searched for Suika but then came to the conclusion that they would probably never see their cat again.

However in April this year another couple spotted a cat curled up in a nearby forest - a friendly cat wearing a collar. They brought it to the Ofunato Health Centre, which placed an ad in the local paper when no one came forward to claim it. But then one of the employees in the health centre notice the Yamagishis' name and number written in faded letters on his collar, and was able to reunite him with his owners.

The Yamagishis are overjoyed to have Suika back after all these years. Suika is being more guarded with his opinions.
More (BBC)

Even more (Asahi Shimbun)

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Cats get lost, cats get found

Pets often go missing. Owners of missing pets then post up photographs of their animals, asking people to keep an eye out for them and report them if found. For a while now I have been photographing these lost animal notices and posting them to a Flickr album and to Facebook. I find the pictures interesting in and of themselves but I do also like to think that maybe, just maybe, sharing the photos online will help the lost animals find their way home.

Today I was waking home from work a bit later than usual along the canal near the Luas Bridge, by the Hilton, when I saw a cat nosing around. Something about the cat seemed a bit odd, like it was almost approaching people but not quite, not a behaviour I generally see in our feline friends. And it looked a bit familiar. I fumbled for my mobile phone and looked at pictures of lost cats I had posted to Facebook, and thought that this one looked rather like one I had posted last January. Could it be the same one? I hurriedly wrote down one of the numbers on the poster and rang the number, leaving a somewhat confused phone message. Then I sent a more detailed text message to the phone numbers.

I watched the cat as it prowled around in the grass beside the canal, intently eyeing the birds swimming in the water. Perhaps it was hoping to chance upon a chick or a small bird ashore, or an unwary rodent. But it did not and moved away from the water. It came close to me, seeming to neither beg for food and attention nor to exhibit any obvious fear of humans. I thought of trying to catch it, which I think would have been easy enough, but I had no idea how long it would take the owners to come back to me. It would be a bit annoying if I was holding an angry cat when a message reached me that the owners had recovered their tiddles months previously. So I watched it for a bit longer and then decided to slink home lest I be arrested as one of those shifty characters who loiters outside hotels.

And then when I was nearly home I received a text message form the owners thanking me and saying that they had recovered the cat by the hotel. Jurassic Park.

Pets - Lost and Found

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