I was away in California over the past week and came upon these sea lions.
What was however even more interesting to me was the fact that these sealions started migrating to the area, and that at first they were viewed as a nuisance. People wanted them gone because they were noisy. Several people around me also commented on the smell.
What was really interesting though was that they decided to try and accommodate the sea lions instead of driving them away and now they are a huge tourist attraction. There were tons of tourists taking photos and just basically watching the sea lions.
Food for thought for people who think our community cats are pests?
Friday, September 11, 2009
Pier 39 with sealions
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31 comments:
This is really cool! I mean cool in that they took the higher road and accommodated them, and that it paid off for them! I'd love to see this for myself! Unfortunately, I think cats are a bit too commonplace to serve as a tourist attraction, unless there are just a huge amount of them, and then that would be too much of a burden on the environment.
The cats of the Greek islands are part of the region's character. You step off the cruise ship/boat and there are cats to greet you. Tourists can buy packets of cat food for a small fee to feed the cats. Greek islands are not the same without cats draping all over the island sun-kissed buildings.
In Italy, there are cats everywhere. There are many cats along Rialto Bridge, in the ruins of Rome and especially in Venice. They are managed by cat care-givers and are in reasonably good condition. These cats are featured in calenders and books.
Cats are a tourist attraction. Maybe others can add to the list?
I agree - I thought it was fantastic that they took such an innovative approach.
The Singapore River cats were pretty cool too - there is a stone statue but no cats which is just odd. There used to be a colony there and when I went down, there were always tourists taking photos of them. As you know, our local cats do look different from cats in other countries - for example, American cats look pretty different.
anonymous - an excellent point. Cats are so much a part of Greece and Rome.
My older cat looks the same as my mom's cats in NYC, except for coloring. Only difference is the tail. That's what really sets it apart is the bent tails here.
That's what I meant ;) I've had people ask me if Singaporeans cut off the tails to make the cats special.
http://www.messybeast.com/bobtail-cats.html
There are various tales associated with the Asian bobtailed cats. The Siamese tail kink, for example, was supposedly due to a princess threading her rings on the cats' tails for safekeeping and the loyal cats kinked their tails to keep the rings in place. Siamese were also believed to be royal palace cats. Likewise Madura cats may only be owned by people of high status. A Malaysia belief is that if a kittens tail is cut off and buried under the doorstep, the cat will not stray from home. Another is that monks cut the tails off of cats so that the cats do not go to heaven. A cat with a stumpy tail is not perfect and imperfect creatures cannot go to heaven. I examined a tabby cat brought back from Japan whose owner claimed that its tail had been cut off by monks during kittenhood. I found evidence of knots and kinks in the remnant of tail which told me it was a natural bobtail. Also, the tail ended quite normally in a black tip. This was a perfectly normal genetic bobtail, though the owner preferred to think she had rescued an abused cat.
To Singapore Community Cat:
If they (the monks) are monks, then they wouldn't believe in heaven, isn't it? I thought what monks and nuns believe is reincarnation before attaining enlightenment?
And weird thing about perfect people going to heaven....which means that everyone can't go to heaven cos everyone is imperfect..
But anyway, I think the myths are quite cool
Those are interesting myths about bobtails! Bent or not I think my cats would lose any ring put on their tail in moments.
And I agree that no one is perfect. Also, that idea really screws over people who are accidentally injured.
disabled people would not be able to go to heaven then. Unfair, such criteria.
Anyway, I never knew our bobtails are so unique, I thought it was quite common (maybe in Asia)
The only thing is to relocate all cats to one area, like Singapore River, and you'll get a whole bunch of tourists taking photos and if the cats are near the Merlion, good then.
CAts would be contributing to economic growth and then no TC will complain about cats being nuisance! HAHA
wei ling - yes they are pretty unique. Cats with bob tails aren't seen out of Asia.
I don't think they all need to be relocated - they do add to the neighbourhoods they're in. Think of the cat cafes in Japan and Hong Kong which are such a hit too!
We stayed at a sea-side resort (high-end, not the home-stay where a cat is not unexpected) in Australia. If you have tuna, the resident feline may follow you back to your room ;) It is a surprisingly nice touch.
There's an interesting analysis of the mindset of HDB planning in this interview: http://reclaimland.sg/rl/?p=416
One telling excerpt:
"Q: Why has it been so difficult for local community to grow in the HDB environment?
A: There is no belief that people would actually voluntarily organise themselves to take care of their own environment. We have very little faith in people and the everyday life. There are ton of workers taking care all of that so residents have no responsibility to anything, there is no sort of mechanism to generate community unless you become member of the Residents’ Committee and community centre. Whenever community is generated, it’s an occasional thing, mooncake festival and this kind of thing, it’s very event-oriented rather than everyday notion of community."
Budak - that was really an enlightening look into HDB's mind.
I have been wondering why the town councils have not been receptive or even antagonistic towards cat caregivers.
Is it the deeply ingrained "cat nuisance" conditioning that negates their attitude and hence treat cat caregivers as "lesser" compared to residents who volunteer for other things if at all?
I wonder what is the training curriculum of a town council officer? I believe it should includes fair and just approaches to residents who step forward to volunteer such as over cat issues, and of course to learn how to manage cat feedback, other than just culling!
Interestingly, I think the attitude isn't that different here in the US. I wonder why that attitude seems prevalent.
This is how SG works.
Many of our children are brought up like this - cared for at home by maids, disciplined in schools by teachers and of course moulded in NS by the army ;) Many parents are weekend-minders who are the givers of the good things. There are always people to do the job whether it be house-keeping, child-minding, cooking or caring for one's aged parents.
Hey, I am partially guilty too!!
So if they don't do your own dirty laundry, would you volunteer to do community work (unless involvement promotes personal advantage)? No time lah-too busy. Can you blame anyone growing up in this culture?
That's an interesting comment Anonymous - but I wonder whether in a way it is a vicious cycle. If someone is always there to pick up as you said, then why would anyone volunteer to do anything? so if HDB keeps providing 'services' then no one will ever take responsibility. Let's put it this way, if no one comes to pick up your trash, you might ignore it a few days or even weeks, but you WILL eventually have to do something about it.
You are right, it is a vicious cycle. TCs do not provide care for community cats (understatment), care-givers pick up the slack - that is an example of community involvement.
TCs care for their performance rating & cheap foreign helpers are hired for cleaning. Residents have no incentive to be engaged.
If you do everything for me, do i want to get my fingers dirty? No way, I go to the nail parlour.
About an hour south of San Francisco is an affluent beach resort/university town, a beautiful place called Santa Cruz with beautiful cliffside houses. It's also mecca for local surfers.
During my work assignment I was put up in the local beachfront hotel. To its left is a wharf and at the end of it sea lions haul out under (if I remember aright, the planks under the wharf were reinforced and added for their convenience) and slack the days away apparently. From their tuft to my window is about 200 to 250 or so metres.
My first morning there was greeted by the sealions calling. Imagine, no alarm clock needed. Thereafter, just before dawn every day, I would wake up because of them. Not that I minded, watching the pacific ocean light up is quite another experience.
I was only there for a while. Imagine the residents and other guests who go through the same. And yet, the sealions are tolerated. In fact, they are a mini attraction too.
and just further down of Santa Cruz is the world class Monterrey Bay Aquarium:
http://www.montereybayaquarium.org/efc/cam_menu.asp
ej - that is an AMAZING aquarium - and I'm not a big fish person even. I was really impressed.
Calsifer - what a nice way to wake up :)
Another telling article from the same source: http://reclaimland.sg/rl/?p=16
Excerpts:
"Two years ago, the 44-year-old bought his ground-floor unit so that he could do gardening right outside his front gate. “It was an empty patch with only grass and two trees, not very well-maintained,” he says, “so I decided to take ownership and build a garden.”...
The town council paid him a visit once to find out what he was doing. They warned him that it had every right to remove the plants if anyone complained, but since then, Chua has been left him alone.
But gardens like his are rare in Singapore. “There is no belief that people would actually voluntarily organise themselves to take care of their own environment,” says Professor Chua Beng Huat, a sociologist from the National University of Singapore. Instead, town councils hire workers to clean and landscape the housing estate, leaving residents with little responsibility or participation, he adds...
...This obsession with maintenance and beauty is what worries Prof Ooi. “Singaporeans are all socialised into very well-organised environments, and these include gardens,” she says. “They have to look neat so we’re not very used to a little bit of chaos. But chaos is quite nice sometimes.”
Dawn, EJ,
Monterey Bay Aquarium is the awesome! Bonus was a mother seal and her cute as buttons baby swimming right outside it when I visited.
Budak,
That's depressing, but so typical. Between Chaos and Order, surely there is a balance that can be struck.
Budak - I echo calsifer in saying that's really worrying. Plus chaos really is kind of nice sometimes - I'd take a slightly messy garden over a manicured one anyday.
Calsifer - it totally was. I was agog and learnt so much!
After all, chaos & order are not opposites: what's generally regarded as chaos can actually be quite "orderly" in the sense of there being a well-developed system. I think what the government generally wants is a kind of centrally-planned visual order.
Budak: thanks for telling me about Reclaimland.sg. I like the name of the website. So much of the space (horizontal & vertical) in Singapore is controlled by the government & large corporations. (This is probably true in most other countries.) It's great to see the common people finding ways to re-claim some of it.
The attitude of the town council reflect our gahmen's isn't?
Non sincere calls for participation by the citizens or phobia of losing control?
yskat - but that does take the spontaneity out of it doesn't it? :)
Hi Dawn, what I was trying to say is: I don't see the need to be obsessive about visual order (as the govt departments often do) because there's order within chaos--one just need to learn how to see it :) For me, a nice tropical "garden" is one that's allowed to take on a life of its own.
Ah - yes indeed. I am not big on manicured gardens at all either!
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