for Photo Friday: Peaceful

I thought about using a picture of one of the dogs for this challenge because they are naturally peaceful and mostly calm and always happy. I passed by many photos of my cat Naji because he is almost always sneaky or spiteful, and always unpeaceful. But this photo of him captures one of his quiet moments.

He was living outside before we met. He showed up at the front door one day while I was cleaning the living room with my mom. I heard a meow and went outside to see him walking around trying to peek inside. I called my mom out to look at him and we wondered who he belonged to. “Look, he’s so friendly and nice!” I said…

Of course, I fall in love with every animal I see so I started to pet him and within two strokes he had attempted to bite my hand. I was disappointed. “He’s not nice after all!”

But I started to feed him and slowly bring him inside with me. I wasn’t sure if he was 100% feral or had belonged to someone who just let him wander away. I named him Naji, since I had read somewhere that Naji means “safe” and it seemed fitting for him.

His first trip to the vet was interesting. The vet remarked, “I see he’s been scratching you,” looking at the streaks on my forearms. “Yeah, he’s a little aggressive,” I said. He would attack my arms at night and any other time he felt like it. The vet took his temperature, while Naji made obvious his hatred for thermometers. When the vet let him go, he quickly crawled across the table and pressed himself against my stomach as if to say “SAVE ME!” and I held him close while everyone in the room laughed in amusement at him.

He’s been with us for a long time but he’s currently living with my parents, after putting up such a fight to go back home in the car (he hates traveling, too).

He’s now mostly sweet but it took a few years to get him that way and he is still mischievous at times.

See, you guys didn’t even know Lailee got sick, that’s how out-of-the-loop you are as my readers. It’s all my fault.

Anyway, two days ago (middle of the night ~2am) Lailee vomited a little bit and suddenly collapsed on the floor! I thought she may be choking so I pried her mouth open to look for a blockage and there I noticed her gums were GREY! Like zombie-skin grey! At that moment, I began my total-and-complete-freak-out session, wailing and crying for Lailee to be okay. I haven’t cried so hard in a long, long time. We immediately rushed her to the vet (thank God for them being only seconds up the road) and they decided to keep her overnight for tests and monitoring.

We went back home and I worried about Lailee, thinking of anything we may have done to make her sick, anything she ate or got into… A few hours later, the vet (bless her) called and said that Lailee has a low white blood cell count and they don’t know why but they wanted to keep her another day. God, you know I stayed up all night and half the morning sick with worry, wondering if she was going to die in the night, alone in a strange place…

THANK GOD she did not die then, and after two nights away from home she is BACK with us and Squig is so relieved to be with her mommy again.

[We still aren’t sure what it was but apparently an infection or something…]

I just posted a boatload of pics on flickr recently, I hope a few of you will comment on them!

http://www.flickr.com/photos/leena/

And now for a Squig chronology:

I just read one of the saddest and most depressing articles that I’ve come across in a long time.

An Elephant Crackup? on NYTimes.com

For a number of biologists and ethologists who have spent their careers studying elephant behavior, the attacks have become so abnormal in both number and kind that they can no longer be attributed entirely to the customary factors. … Decades of poaching and culling and habitat loss, they claim, have so disrupted the intricate web of familial and societal relations by which young elephants have traditionally been raised in the wild, and by which established elephant herds are governed, that what we are now witnessing is nothing less than a precipitous collapse of elephant culture.

It has long been apparent that every large, land-based animal on this planet is ultimately fighting a losing battle with humankind. And yet entirely befitting of an animal with such a highly developed sensibility, a deep-rooted sense of family and, yes, such a good long-term memory, the elephant is not going out quietly.

As a result of such social upheaval, calves are now being born to and raised by ever younger and inexperienced mothers. Young orphaned elephants, meanwhile, that have witnessed the death of a parent at the hands of poachers are coming of age in the absence of the support system that defines traditional elephant life. ‘‘The loss of elephant elders and the traumatic experience of witnessing the massacres of their family, impairs normal brain and behavior development in young elephants.’’

‘‘There are over 200 displaced-people’s camps in present-day northern Uganda. Everybody lives now within these camps, and there are no more elders. The elders were systematically eliminated. The first batch of elimination was during Amin’s time, and that set the stage for the later destruction of northern Uganda. We are among the lucky few, because my mom and dad managed to escape. But the families there are just broken. I know many of them. Displaced people are living in our home now. My mother said let them have it.

All these kids who have grown up with their parents killed — no fathers, no mothers, only children looking after them. They don’t go to schools. They have no schools, no hospitals. No infrastructure. They form these roaming, violent, destructive bands. It’s the same thing that happens with the elephants. Just like the male war orphans, they are wild, completely lost.”

It’s sad that even though we (some of us, at least) acknowledge the damage we’re doing to ourselves, our animal friends and the planet, we REFUSE to change our actions. We know we’re stealing land from native creatures to make more buildings, but we will continue to do so. We know that that zoos and “amusement” parks are not healthy for animals, yet we continue to support them. We know what causes pollution, but we continue to produce materials which will litter the earth for years to come. Weapons of all levels of destruction continue to be used for all levels of KILLING (the sole reason for which they are created.)

In fact, we ARE destruction. When will this change?

Since my last (ancient) post, I’ve done one large thing and a bunch of very small ones. The large one was that I took a trip to California to see the Coachella Festival (which ruled supremely). I have plenty of new pictures (and a few treats for my Flickr friends). The West Coast was everything I never expected it to be. I was impressed by the beauty of the landscapes there, different from the fluffy green trees and brown dirt East coast ones. The desert (well, sleeping outside in it) was a VERY new experience. I didn’t see any famous people, although I really tried hard. We drove down all the well-known streets in Los Angeles and many of the beaches nearby. It was unforgettable.

As for more recent “things”:

Today, while reading my AlterNet.org newsletter, I found an article about controversial animal-rights supporter and author Peter Singer called “It’s Not Enough to Be a Vegetarian” Which caused me to think about my own food opinions. As I attempt to be a conscientious consumer, I have considered all the diets that are available for human beings. I try to educate myself about the choices that will have the “least” impact on environment, animals and the world. Singer suggests that everyone be vegan (not eat any animal products or by-products [milk, cheese, etc.]) and that our consumption come from the most sustainable, least-harming places.

Unfortunately, while arguably the “best” option, it is not an option available to all, as many of the commenters and the writer of the article point out. One commenter noted that,

“We should consider ourselves VERY lucky to be able to talk abstractly about the ethics of eating. Most of the population on earth cannot engage in that discussion. They eat whatever they can manage to.”

I wonder, is the reason that they have to eat whatever they can an effect of our eating whatever we want? Many Veggie-proponents have described the environmental, economic and other impacts of the meat-heavy diets in this country; the water, soil and air pollution; the suffering of animals ^(link). But no amount of numbers can change a person’s “choice.” Most people are too far removed from it to be bothered and others simply don’t care.

Singer’s ideas are certainly controversial and in a few ways, hypocritical, but I will likely be reading his book soon. :-)

Another interesting addition to his story is his interaction with Harriet McBryde Johnson, a feisty (and funny) disability rights activist and lawyer, about his belief that we should (or should have the choice to) abort or euthanize disabled or ill babies and humans. Please read: Unspeakable Conversations. A favorite from the article:

He asks what I thought of the students’ questions.

‘’They were fine, about what I expected. I was a little surprised by the question about meat eating.'’

‘’I apologize for that. That was out of left field. But — I think what he wanted to know is how you can have such high respect for human life and so little respect for animal life.'’

‘’People have lately been asking me the converse, how you can have so much respect for animal life and so little respect for human life.'’

‘’And what do you answer?'’

‘’I say I don’t know. It doesn’t make a lot of sense to me.'’

Blogdrive Insanity:

1. What is your favorite veggie?

I kind of like cooked potatoes a lot. And lightly steamed or raw broccoli.

2. Are there any veggies you don’t eat?

A few. I try to try everything a few times before I say I hate it, though. But I do dislike beets and anything similar to them. They taste like dirt!

3. Which veggie do you think has the funniest name?

In English: cauliflower. It’s a flower… that’s “caul-y”! In Urdu, eggplant is called “baingan” which sounds a lot like bangin’ - that’s funny.

4. If you’re a vegetarian, why are you and do you like it? If you’re not a vegetarian, would you ever want to become one?

I am, indeed, a vegetarian! I am so for all the reasons you might imagine a person would be. Disapproval of the industry methods, sadness for the killing sentient beings merely for food, health… I do like being a vegetarian, very much.

I have been hearing about the U.S. military plans to develop neural controllers to implant into sharks’ brains. To exploit their stealth and senses… to spy on enemies and plant delicate devices (mines) in even better places! This is nothing amazing to me, but it is disgusting.

See: Weaponizing the Shark and Other Pentagon Dreams - Shark and Awe

Recently I watched an old Degrassi episode with my husband which sparked a discussion between us about animal testing. The plot of the show was that a girl was planning to write about animal rights in the school newspaper and encourage students to boycott a local cosmetics company. A friend of hers later confronted her, announcing that she will not work for the newspaper any longer, since her father works for the cosmetic company and encouraging the boycott was going to hurt her family. Another friend reminded the first girl that there are two sides to every story — some tests on animals have yielded important discoveries and advances in human healthcare, for instance.

The first girl wondered, “Is it worth it to test our chemicals/products on animals if humans will benefit from the outcome?” My husband thought that if the testing was for good (for health/humanity reasons) then testing might be justified. I, of course, being the radical animal-rights girl, disagreed. I think there is no justification for it. I believe that until we can ask the animals for their permission to test on them, we should not do it. I think that most of the “ends” these people are achieving are not justified by the “means.”

There must be some humans willing to sacrifice themselves (their sight or hearing, their limbs, their sanity, their lives) for the greater good. No?

Happy New Year +one second!

I’ve been gone a while. Not an unheardof thing for this blog, but yeah. Since hubz had a long weekend, we stayed up late, ate donuts, got drunk on caffeine-free diet Coke, went to the city and generally wasted time having fun. Lailee had her first walk in downtown Philly… She’s a country girl, but she did wonderfully. Hubz says he wants to live in the city… That will be interesting.

It’s 2:00 in the morning and we still may go out… Man, I love long weekends. I took some pics recently that I haven’t uploaded and I have to upgrade my Wordpress installation. But later!

I heard about an earthquake relief donations packing operation that was happening on Saturday and decided we should go. As it happens, we didn’t sleep at all on Friday night. Instead, both hubby and I worked on websites and studied. Saturday morning comes and we still haven’t slept, but I want to go help with the donations packing — so we go! Keep Reading …