This is a little story to break out of the reporting stories and also share a story about my cat.
Back home in Kabul, I bought some tikka kebab wrapped in Korean newspaper and brought it home to eat sitting on the outside table. I wanted some hot sauce to go with my kebab and headed into the kitchen only to return to a tortie kitten pinching my juicy meat. The little thief didn’t want to be petted and ran every time I tried. She had a much bigger sister who was grey in colour and would come as well, sneaking for food from the rooftops of an abandoned shop and climbing down a tree into our garden. I named the tortie Kabuli Palaw or just Palaw after the Afghan national dish and the grey cat Kebabi.
Later on a huge red ginger cat as big as a dog came down who possibly was their father. He looked like he had been in hundreds of fights with some of his jaw missing revealing his razor sharp teeth. I called him Siraj after Siraj Haqqani cause I found it difficult to photograph him front on. He always turned his head last moment when the camera or phone come out.
Around the same time of trying to get Palaw to let me pat her, Sophia Maier turned up from Stern TV to my guest house and a Russian journalist Aleksandra Kovalskaia who soon became my wife but saving all that for another story.
They both managed to woo Palaw while I was working and Palaw came around all the time look for food ramming her face against the glass of the door meowing. She wanted food before friendship and she was keen to get food. Soon I started getting cat food which is a rare thing to find in Kabul but I found the last real stash of Whiskers in one of the super markets. Other than, she was always keen for the kebabs and whatever the international journalist coming here and there had as left over.
Aleksandra or also known as Alex, decided she really wanted Palaw and for me, I did too but the complexities of taking the cat home was going to quite difficult for Australia. As winter came, Palaw found comfort climbing into my big puffy military jacket I got from bush bazaar and napped while I graded and wrote descriptions of photos.
Sneakily Palaw learnt to jump on door handles and opening them, letting herself in at the middle of the night, knowing which ones was canned cat food and poking at it or dry food, peeing in bathroom sink and or trying to do it in the toilet. She took it to herself to take dumps in the pot plants and almost done one while Alex was interviewing Suhail Shaheen, the top Taliban spokesman at our home. Most of all, for winter cuddles in bed when I decided to go to sleep early and Alex worked late.
Travelling with a cat isn’t easy and Palaw needs a titre test to prove she doesn’t have rabies which can’t be done in Afghanistan and so it is a long process to get her to Australia and will have to settle with Malaysia.
I had to leave Afghanistan and left Palaw with a vet clinic which didn’t look after her so well and she got ringworm and other internal parasites as I tried to get the money to afford to travel her out of Afghanistan. She is much better and getting back her hair and enjoys chasing a laser around in circles in the apartment we live in now.
I nicknamed Palaw, the Pusslim terror after the twitter handle Islamicat which is cat videos with a cat jihadist commentary (best thing ever on twitter) but mainly cause at sunrise she wants to get fed and jumps on your bed to scream in your ear.
Airlines unfortunately can’t take her, Turkish Airlines and Emirates used to carry pets but they no longer fly to Kabul though recently the UAE won the contract to look after Kabul airport and may start the flights again for Emirates.
The other way was by road to Pakistan and then fly from there to Malaysia. It would be about a 3 hour journey to the border, get through the mass of people wanting to leave and or do business and get a taxi through the legendary Khyber pass into Peshawar and then Islamabad.
Can this be done? I can only hope so. But it going to take money. Already I raised $700 for helping me get Palaw with me by selling digital prints of my adventures and I am happy to sell photos digitally though can do actual prints if you live in Australia. If you are interested in helping me out and donate, I am happy to send you a picture of my cat cruising down the Khyber Pass or any cool photo I have taken.
At the moment I am getting Palaw used to being in her carry backpack and take her in the streets of Kabul and on motorbike rides which she did not like at all the first time around. Little girls coming from school love to look inside the box and say hi to Palaw and give her cat talk which I also get the same amount of enthusiasm from Taliban footsoldiers who never really seen someone carry a cat around the city.
I tell Afghans I am taking Palaw home with me and they laugh hoping I would take them too. Only time can tell if the Pusslim Terror can make it.