It’s one of these three cats. Im not sure which one, but I know it was one of them.
On most of my oversea trips I encourage the people who are traveling with me to follow a few simple rules. One, no open toed shoes (too easy to cut your toes and sanitation is a bit lower in most of the rest of the world). Two, eat only cooked food or peeled food. Raw vegetables and unpeeled fruits are one of the key ways that people get intestinal distress. Three, don’t pet the cats and dogs.
Animals in foreign countries are unpredictable. While many of us have dogs and cats as pets, in much of the Middle East and Africa, there is a different relationship. Most don’t have owners or tags. They frequently don’t have vaccinations. They are not always ready to be petted. It’s best to take a photo and observe them from a distance.
While I was on sabbatical, we traveled to Turkey. Turkey has a very different animal culture than the other places I have traveled. The dogs and cats are everywhere. Most have been “fixed.” It’s standard practice for the animal control people to pick-up the animals. They give them their shots, do preventative reproductive surgery, tag their ears and then release them back on the streets.
The people are responsible for feeding the animals, so many of the shops we entered sold animal food. It was very inexpensive to bag a baggie of kibble bits. Restaurants seemed very cooperative to help people take their leftovers into the streets to feed the animals. Table begging is a regular occurrence.
On one of the very last days of our trip, I violated my own rules. I had some extra food and decided to share it with the group of cats at my feet. I wanted them to share so I divided the food into three piles. I tossed some to one cat. Then I fed a second cat and was about to set some down for the third cat, when it suddenly rose on its back legs, stuck out its paws, extended its claws and slashed at my hand in an attempt to get the food. Its razor sharp talon slid across my fingernail and sank deep into the side of my finger.
I jerked my had back from the pain and the little knife edge slid to the tip of my finger. It throbbed and bled. The cat was not apologetic at all. I wrapped my finger in a napkin which quickly was soaked with blood. The cat twitched its ears at me. I changed the bandage and tried to clean it with hand sanitizer. My finger seemed to grow double in size.
Sometimes helping others hurts. Help people anyway.