Street cats

Cats flood the streets of Amman. A sight I never really contemplated as a possibility before I arrived. The "street cats" or "dumpster cats" (depending on who you ask) are wild looking, dirty and often found near, around or in a large garbage dumpster and/or can. Everywhere you go your find cats. Sometimes just roaming the streets but mostly in groups gathered around/in the dumpster bins.

Cats aren't taken care of here, but are tolerated. People don't keep cats in their houses or seem to feed them, but like to have them around because they keep the vermin ratio down. Also, from what a few people have explained to me is that the Prophet liked cats. So, while no one takes care of them and the poor little guys are off to fend for themselves day in and day out. They are tolerated but not taken care of, therefore no neutering happens and the cats continue the endless cycle of making more street cats.

Every time I see one or nine, I want to take them home, wash them, feed them and find them homes. I'm thinking this may need to be my side job here...or backup career. It's so sad to see. I always feed them if I have any food on me. A few weeks ago there was a dirty white cat stuck on the roof below my balcony where my roommate and I were eating our dinner. I saw the cat so I threw some turkey we had down for the kitty and then my obviously more intelligent roommate mentioned that now I've trained it to go to this roof to get turkey.

The kitty actually ended up getting stuck up there and not knowing how to get back down so I ended up throwing an entire package worth of turkey at the little dirty thing to give a trail in order to find the way down. It worked thankfully. Had to go to the store the next day because all of the turkey was gone, but the kitty was fed and hasn't been back. So all ended well I guess.

Its crazy. It's like the street cats are almost equivalent to squirrels in America. We feed them every once in awhile, we try to avoid hitting them with our cars, we don't pay much attention to them, and we typically leave them alone to do their thing. Street cats vs. Squirrels.

Another differentiating cultural adventure in Amman...