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July 5th, 2017: Pussy Cat City
♫Oh don't lean on me man,
'cause you can't afford the ticket
I'm back in Pussy Cat City♪
♫Oh don't lean on me man
'Cause you ain't got time to check it
You know my Pussy Cat City♪
♫Is outta sight… ♪she's all right
| The city of Kuching, in the state of Sarawak in Malaysia, is full of cats. There are cats on the sidewalk, at traffic signals, in parks, inside roundabouts and on rooftops. But unlike other cities, most of Kuching’s feline population is in the form of statues and sculptures, installed by the city’s cat-obsessed folks. |
| The state of Sarawak was once part of the Sultanate of Brunei, about 200 years ago, but as a reward for help in putting down a rebellion, it was ceded to the British adventurer James Brooke who ruled it as his personal kingdom. The Brooke Administration was given the status of Protectorate under Rajah Charles Brooke's rule and was placed behind the Indian Rajas and Princes. Brooke ran his kingdom admirably, providing improved sanitation system to the dwellers, and completed several developments including a hospital, a fort, a prison and many other buildings. The Brooke family ruled Sarawak until the Japanese occupation in December 1941. |
| According to a frequently repeated fable, when James Brooke first arrived in Kuching, he asked his local guide the name of the town. The guide thinking that James Brooke was pointing towards a cat, said "Kuching". That the story is fabricated is evident from the fact that ethnic Malays in Sarawak call cat "pusak" instead of the Malay word "kucing". Besides, the name of "Kuching" was already in use for the city by the time Brooke arrived in 1841. |
| A college in Kuching is named I-CATS—the International College of Advanced Technology Sarawak, and the local radio station is Cats FM. Kuching’s most famous cat attraction is the Cat Museum, containing over 4,000 artifacts including paintings and memorials related to cats. Exhibits include a mummified cat from ancient Egypt, a gallery of feline-related advertising, and the five species of wild cats found in Borneo. |
| There is a story that once in the 1950s, people in Borneo were dying of malaria. So the authorities spread a lot of the insecticide DDT, which although helped combat the malaria-carrying mosquitoes but also killed a large number of the island’s cats. The consequence of this was the rat population flourished and they brought in plague. To solve the plague problem, the United Kingdom's Royal Air Force air-dropped 14,000 cats into rural Malaysian Borneo in a mission known as ‘Operation Cat Drop’. Although the cat story is probably another fabrication, the story was published so many times that it’s believed to have played a role in getting DDT banned by the US Senate in 1972. |
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Diaphone Jim Wednesday Jul 5 12:15 PM
Does Sarawak have ugly cats or just crappy sculptors?
Gravdigr Wednesday Jul 5 02:41 PM
Don't get catty.
Gravdigr Wednesday Jul 5 02:41 PM
Also:
♫Oh don't lean on me man,
'cause you can't afford the ticket
I'm back in Pussy Cat City♪
♫Oh don't lean on me man
'Cause you ain't got time to check it
You know my Pussy Cat City♪
♫Is outta sight… ♪she's all right
xoxoxoBruce Wednesday Jul 5 05:55 PM
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Originally Posted by Diaphone Jim
Does Sarawak have ugly cats or just crappy sculptors?
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