Once again, we at CatSynth are happy to be participating in the annual Blog Blast 4 Piece. Many blogs, including many of our cat-blogging and Wordless Wednesday friends, post a peace globe like the one above. We always feature something that represents the year for us along with a message of peace.
You can see other globes at the official gallery of peace globes here as well as the official Facebook page.
We wish everyone peace today and every day.
[click image to enlarge]
Once again, it’s time for our traditional end-of-the-year image at CatSynth. The past couple of years have all been good, rich, full, and sometimes complicated. But 2013 has been particularly significant, certainly one that I will long remember. As the title says, it has been a transformational time on multiple dimensions for me, indeed it has touched almost every aspect of my being. There will be more to say on that in the coming days. Music and art have been going very well, too, and one of the main challenges of this coming year will be to build on the successes of this past year but in a more directed way. If that sounds vague, it’s because I haven’t quite figured it out yet.
For Luna, things pretty much are the way the always are. Such is the life of a contented house cat. And we wouldn’t have it any other way.
Thanks to everyone who reads and supports this project, whether here at the blog, on Facebook, or through the many personal friendships that grown from here. You are all what makes this work worthwhile!
One of our favorite holiday traditions here in San Francisco is the window display at Macy’s flagship Union Square store featuring adoptable pets from the San Francisco SPCA.
There were quite a few kittens on display, some in windows that featured a theme of holidays in the city. Some really knew how to ham it up for the visitors, like this cutie:
They always get a good response from the public including numerous adoptions, which is of course what this event is all about. And we at CatSynth love seeing cats finding new homes.
You can find out more about the program at the SF SPCA’s website, including visiting hours and how to donate to help the city’s homeless pets. And if you live here or you’re visiting SF this holiday season, go downtown and see the cats in person!
One of the ways to empathize with a place, and by extension its people, is through the things that touch you strongly. So we at CatSynth present images of cats and traditional music from Syria.
[Photo by Arbo Moosberg on Flickr. (CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)]
The picture above is from Aleppo. Apparently a woman off-frame is feeding them. The next cats are enjoying quite the view of Damascus while having dinner.
[Photo by delayed gratification on Flickr. (CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)]
These young cats in a garden in Damascus seem quite healthy and contented in their verdant surroundings.
[Photo by Jose Luis Canales from Flickr. (CC BY-NC 2.0)]
Back in Aleppo, we meet a cat named Lulu playing outside.
[Photo by Ali Qasmo from Flickr. (CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)]
The photographer of the above image, Ali Qasmo, is from Syria – the others were taken by various visitors. Indeed, he has taken quite a few pictures of local cats, which you can see on his Flickr page.
[Photo by Ali Qasmo from Flickr. (CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)]
Cats do have to cope with the effects of the civil war there, just as humans do. Here we see a cat sitting amongst debris in the city of Homs:
[Photo from Freedom House on Flickr. (CC BY 2.0)]
Syria (like many countries in the region) teems with cats. But it also has a rich tradition of music. String instruments are particularly prominent in traditional music, including the bazuq:
[Photo by xlynx on Flickr. (CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)]
The above photo comes with a story of the chance encounter between the photographer and the musician, which ultimately included a bit of improvisation together. Here is a video of the musician playing solo:
Channeling my inner music-geek for moment, I found myself looking in detail at the arrangement from frets, which are not monotonically decreasing in distance towards the body as they would on modern Western fretted instruments.
This photo of a traditional musician was taken in the town of Palmyra:
[Photo by James Gordon from Flickr. (CC BY-NC 2.0)]
If anyone knows the name of the instrument in the picture, I would be curious to know, as it reminds me a bit of the Indian ektar that I sometimes play.
And we conclude with an image of a cat and kitten together at the Der Mar Musa monastery in western Syria (near Lebanon):
[Photo by Stijn Nieuwendijk from Flickr. (CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)]
Today many of our friends from Cat Blogosphere and elsewhere are celebrating World Cat Day. It was founded in 2002 by the International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW) and other animal rights groups. Of course, it is a bit redundant here at CatSynth where every day is a cat day, but it is good to set aside a date in the greater society to recognize the contributions of cats.
While we haven’t done much per se to mark today other than lifting the graphic displayed above from Ann of Zoolatry, several of our fellow bloggers have fun posts for today.
The Island Cats have some cat proverbs.
Animal Shelter Volunteer has a collage of colorful and adoptable cats.
Georgia, Tillie and the rest of the cats from Halifax have a special card. They also agree with us that “cat day” is a bit redundant.
The Opinionated Pussycat has some basic facts about the date.
Purrchance to Dream has a world graphic with the whole gang (it seems like they’re always growing in number).
We can’t post everyone here, but you can hop over to the Cat Blogosphere for more festive links.
Last Sunday was the big annual Pride celebration in San Francisco, and with the recent court decisions restoring and expanding marriage equality, it was the largest and most celebratory that I had seen in my five years here. It was already quite crowded when I arrived at usual perch along Market Street at 7th.
Marriage equality and the court cases were of course a common theme in signs and displays.
But there was also lots of perennial displays and entertainment. There are beauty queens, for example.
And the obligatory bare-chested men.
The above float does signify one of the big complaints about the event, that it has become very commercial and “corporate”. How should one react to a festive float like this one below, which has a positive message, but it also sponsored by one of the much-despised big banks?
In corporate displays, perhaps none was larger than Facebook, with hundreds of employees marching in colorful t-shirts, and Mark Zuckerberg doing a goofy dance on a bus (sorry, I did not get any good pictures of that). On the positive side, many community organizations were also represented, including the San Francisco SPCA:
The Contemporary Jewish Museum also had a contingent centered around their current Allen Ginsberg exhibition.
There was music, including a rolling live performance from Hedwig and the Angry Itch.
Many ethnic-based groups march in the parade. This year I managed to catch Trikone, a representing LGBT South-Asian Americans (i.e., individuals whose heritage comes from the Indian subcontinent).
Individuals from many countries were also more prominent.
This is a long all-day event. The parade always goes much longer than planned, and then there is the big festival in front of city hall. Certainly there were plenty of complaints to be heard about the crowds and slowness of things. But overall it was a very positive day.
Every year on or around Earth Day, we at CatSynth dedicate a Weekend Cat Blogging posts to the endangered wild cats around the world.
Through the work of the International Society for Endangered Cats and their active Facebook page, we continue to be surprised by the diversity and beauty of the small wildcats, even while observing their similarities to our domestic companions. The bridge between the domestic and the wild is part of what makes these cats so endearing.
We start this year with the Scottish wildcat. A population of European wildcats was found in Scotland in 2012. They are critically endangered, numbering less than 100 according to the Scottish Wildcat Association.
[By Peter Trimming (Scottish wildcatsUploaded by Mariomassone) [CC-BY-2.0], via Wikimedia Commons]
Without immediate help, this subspecies – the last cat native to Britian – could go extinct this year! You can follow efforts to save the Scottish wildcat via the Scottish Wildcat Association and Highland Tiger.
The Asiatic Golden Cat lives in the tropical forests of southeast Asia. They are a bit bigger and more muscularly built than domestic cats.
[By Karen Stout (originally posted to Flickr as Asian Golden cat) [CC-BY-SA-2.0], via Wikimedia Commons]
They are considered “Near Threatened” or “Vulnerable” on the IUCN scale, largely because of deforestation and hunting. Sadly, there is a thriving illegal trade in their fur, bones and meat, and they are also considered a threat to livestock, which makes them vulnerable to being killed in reprisals.
The Caracal is quite distinctive in its appearance, with its large ear tufts. They are found widely throughout Africa and the Middle East.
[By Kristian Thy from Copenhagen, Denmark (Caracal kitten) [CC-BY-2.0], via Wikimedia Commons]
Although not considered endangered, they are often persecuted for threatening livestock. Especially in southern Africa, caracal killings by farmers and ranchers has become all too common.
A perennial favorite of ours, the Black-footed Cat is among the smallest of wildcat species. ISEC is continuing their Black-footed Cat Project in South Africa in order to better understand this species.
[By Zbyszko (Own work) [CC-BY-SA-3.0 or GFDL], via Wikimedia Commons]
Another group we follow, the The Felidae Conservation Fund, sponsors projects here in the Bay Area and around the world, including an effort to study Arabian Leopard.
[By עמוס חכמון (Own work) [GFDL, CC-BY-SA-3.0 or FAL], via Wikimedia Commons[]
The Arabian Leopard, which is found in various parts of the Arabian peninsula, is the smallest leopard subspecies and is considered critically endangered.
And of course, we have our own wildcats close to home. Bobcats can be found here in the Bay Area and throughout California.
[By Don DeBold from San Jose, CA, USA (Calero Creek Trail Bobcat) [CC-BY-SA-2.0], via Wikimedia Commons]
The main threats to these cats are loss of habitat and fragmentation, especially in our larger more urbanized areas. Bobcats are also hunted for fur and sport (it is still legal in California).
Please visit the sites mentioned in this article to find out more about wildcats and wildcat conservation, and to support their efforts.
I wrote this poem on the night the Iraq war began, ten years ago.
On the night of war…
March 19, 2003
A light rain has fallen
A trio of snails marches up the main path towards my front door
Upon the thinnest of thin sheets of wet
Like the one who came into my garage a week ago
To say “hi neighbor, what is all this stuff in your garage?”
A week ago, before I turned thirty, before we entered this latest war
I was unaware there was such an abundance of large snails
Before this night which is a second day
Rising after collapsing from exhaustion of the stress, agony, exhilaration, guilt
Of being alive and flourishing at this strange time
© 2003 Amar Chaudhary
To mark this occasion, we thought we would share some superb owls.
[By Peter Trimming from Croydon, England (‘Tutoke’Uploaded by snowmanradio) [CC-BY-2.0], via Wikimedia Commons]
[By GalliasM (Own work) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons[]
And we even found an “Owl Synth Pic” 🙂
[From Mike Peakcock2005 from flickr.]
And finally, check out this review of a performance by Tiny Owl.
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