Where does the name Bongi come from?

Bongi is a girl and the vet believes she will be six in August.  We got her in October 2020 when the vet estimated her to be approximately two years old.  Her story has a sad beginning, but at least it has a happy ending.  Her name comes from the Zulu language – in full it is Sibongile (Bongi for short) and it means ‘we are blessed / we are thankful’ – really appropriate when you read her full story.

Why and how did you rescue Bongi?

We have a dear friend called Sarah who in 2020 lived in Abu Dhabi and was very much involved in local cat rescues while living there.  Sadly, there is little animal welfare out there and a number of the ex-pat community do what they can to look after cat colonies – cats who have been abandoned or dumped by their owners, which then breed and things get out of hand.  They try to run a TNR (trap, neuter and return) programme while feeding the cats, looking out for those who are sick or need treatment, often paying for this out of their own pockets or from small scale fundraisers they run amongst the ex-pat community.  It’s always a struggle.  Sadly, the weather conditions are harsh if you’re a cat trying to survive on the street. Hence Sarah always has a flat full of cats or kittens while she tries to find homes or foster care for some of the most needy.

This is how Bongi came to her.  She noticed her as a small cat in the colony one day and the other cats were bullying her and she wasn’t coping very well.  Also, even though not more than a kitten herself, she was pregnant.  Despite their best efforts to trap her, she always eluded them until one day Sarah noticed she wasn’t there at feeding time.  It turns out that Bongi had gone off to have her kittens in the basement of a building. Bongi and her kittens had become separated and upon hearing this Sarah took Bongi and her one remaining kitten into the bathroom of her flat and gave her the space to rear the surviving kitten.  When the kitten was old enough, she managed to find a home for it and Bongi was neutered (hence missing the tip of one ear) and returned to the colony.  However, Bongi didn’t want to go back and kept sneaking back to Sarah’s door.  Of course she took her in and started an appeal to find her a home. To cut a long story short we saw her online and felt a connection.  Very quickly her vaccinations, passport and flight was arranged and she arrived to us one wet, dark October night.

Where there any challenges or funny things happen when getting Bongi back to the UK?

Surprisingly, getting her back to the UK went very smoothly.  The only funny thing was Bongi’s first introduction to our local vet when we took her to be registered.  When we signed her up, the vet just wanted to give her the once over and we asked if he could trim her nails as we noticed they were quite long.  He duly took her to the consulting room in her carry case, but a  few minutes later you would have thought they had a lion in there – I never knew such a tiny cat could make so much noise?  Shortly afterwards, she was returned (with only one nail trimmed!) as he said he’d never known such a strong-willed cat!  When we take her to the vet now, we have to give her medication to make her sleepy, otherwise they worry she’ll eat them alive!  That said, she is the most loving cat with my partner and myself.  She still has her quirks – although I am permitted to pet and give belly rubs, she has still never sat on my knee of an evening.  That is reserved for my other half alone – he is the chosen one.  She will follow him everywhere.  As an Arabian Mau, they are an intelligent breed and she has learnt the sound of ‘hello’ which she says when she sees you.  She loves to talk and chatter.  She is also very big on manners as when she gets out of her litterbox, she wipes her feet on the mat (actually lifting the mat off the floor to make a clicking noise) before fully exiting the box.  She’s hysterical!

How is Bongi now?

Bongi is thriving.  She is a fussy eater in that she will only eat Royal Canin kibble and Encore fish in gravy.  She won’t look at meat or chicken or any other kind of food.  She likes to eat her fish very early in the morning (she’s waiting on me as I get up at 4.45am) and she snacks on kibble during the day.  At 5pm, she then asks for the remainder of the fish pouch opened that morning. In winter she likes a hot water bottle or a heated blanket and in the summer she loves a cooling mat.  Due to her feral start in life, Bongi is an indoor cat and it doesn’t seem to bother her.  For the first couple of years if we had visitors she would disappear upstairs, but as time has progressed, she will now come and say hello.

Why did you decide to subscribe to MY Cat Grass?

Bongi has everything a cat needs – from scratching blocks, to toys, to baskets all over the house – but we always felt bad that we don’t feel we can let her outside.  In our area there are a lot of foxes and we’re not far from a busy road, so we worried that instinct might just kick in if we took her out.  We did consider a cat harness, but after the no-no at the vets, we were too chicken to push our luck in putting her into it!  She really is a strong-minded cat!  The answer then seemed to be bringing the outside in, so we started to grow grass for her and she loved it.  The problem was that no two batches ever germinated the same and we soon noticed that the base of the grass (in vermiculite) was crawling with little flies and absolutely stank when it was time to change the grass.  On some occasions she was so desperate to get at the new grass that she would ambush it before it was barely up.  We just couldn’t get the cycle of growing right. Last Christmas I decided to treat her to a ready grown square from your company and when it arrived, she honestly chirped and trilled with excitement – she just went mad for it.  For a cat who doesn’t like being picked up, she will demand that you come and pat her while she rubs her face through the grass and it gives her so much pleasure.  We love the fact that the grass just about lasts from one month to the next and it is just brought her so much joy.

Are you pleased you rescued Bongi? – silly question we know but there may be readers wondering if getting a rescue cat might be right for them too!

As no doubt you have figured by now, she has become our world and as a result, is spoiled rotten.  We’ve been through the teenage years where she could be quite willful (once upon a time we did have a lovely cream axminster wool carpet on our stairs) but it has given us so much happiness to see her flourish and live a happy life – she has certainly enriched ours.