Yesterday, as I rode my moped along a narrow curvy road in Candolim Goa, from the corner of my eye I saw someone lifting up a big white cat and placing it by the side of the road. I turned back to check if it was dead and saw that the cat was a big boku (a male cat in Konkani) and was in fact alive and taking short breaths, each breath ending with a short meow-like call.
The cat's eyes were golden with narrow black vertical slit pupils and looked intense. On a side note, I recently found out that predators such as cats have vertical slit pupils and prey species such as deer have horizontal slit pupils. As I looked at his eyes, I could not have fathomed what could be going on in that active feline brain of his but I was sure he was in pain. I was convinced that the cat would die because he had an injury on its leg with some bleeding and probably had an impact injury on the head too. I thought that I would wait for a minute or two to see it die; I could not get myself to leave before that. I lifted up the cat and put him in shade since the tarmac was hot and the May-sun was intense at noon.
I asked the guy who had picked up the cat if he had any water to give the cat, upon which he left on his bike to get a bottle of water. I sat by this big boku comforting him during his last moments of life. Water was brought and I tried to get the cat to lick some water but it was in shock and showed no response. I cleaned its wound and face a bit and it spun me a sudden look but did not follow it up with a sound or action. In a few minutes, a couple came by on a scooter who knew the people whose cat he was. He stepped off his bike and touched the cat, upon which it sprang up!
It certainly looked like one of its seven lives had come to life and while it limped a little on the leg that was wounded, it moved very fast and shook off its last few minutes of trauma! I was sitting there on the ground by the side of the road with a bottle of water and was suddenly looking silly. I slowly got up, started my moped and off I left, smiling that the boku was still alive. I am unsure if it went on somewhere else and collapsed or got completely alright. Maybe I can look for it the next time I go there.
I realised I should ride my moped slow when there is no emergency. Although on this occasion I was slow enough, there are other times when I am moving swiftly to be somewhere on time. This incident, I am hoping, will remind me to ride slow and enjoy the ride, take in the view. I also realised one more—perhaps more important—thing. Whenever an animal is fallen by the side of the road, I must check whether it is alive or dead; it may be alive and immobile and desperately need someone's help.
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