Caturday: stressful development at the temple with missing stray cats.

After arriving back at the city, I rushed to feed stray cats at the temple as they would have become quite skinny during my absence. The car park was unusually quiet; only four cats came out to eat their food. Each cat took time in appearing from their hidings. I tried to call for other cats but there was no response. This somehow didn’t make me feel comfortable. The crazy woman might not have gone to the south as she told me last week and could have doubled back to attack some cats. After fifteen minutes, I shifted to the riverside to feed those black cats and four kittens.

The two kittens didn’t come out to greet me as usual. They would normally be running along my steps in excitement as they knew they would get some wet food. Only the big cats came out of the construction site. My heart was heavy and anxious; these kittens were very friendly and approachable after I had befriended them. The adult cats were more streetwise and had good sense of people’s intentions. Even the fierce ones allowed me to carry them around without resistance; they knew my intention of getting them out of their confrontations and saving their faces. Once a younger male cat stared at the older male cat; the older cat felt offended and needed to show his muscles! These cats behaved a bit like aggressive youngsters trying to be macho!

I had a bad feeling that more cats had been abducted and executed during last week. I continued to walk to other spots to feed more cats and count the number of cats. In front of the Buddhist school, my favourite Samsi spotted me and run towards me while giving me her special meowing sounds of greetings. Luckily, some novices to whom I had asked to keep an eye on Samsi and the crazy woman had been feeding Samsi. These novices knew I had to rescue Samsi from being abducted by this wretched executioner of cats. They saw the cat being taken away but they didn’t think she was going to be left by the roadside. The cat was about to be thrown into the middle of the busy road. I took her from the abductor just in time. Later I found a thick elastic band around her neck making it difficult for the cat to breathe and swallow food.

I was sad and mad at the same time but I knew that force or violence wouldn’t solve this problem. Samsi was very glad to see me as she trusted me. The young black cats came to ask for their dinner. Five cats were still alive and well. But they seemed to be more jumpy than usual. Perhaps they witnessed the moment when small cats and kittens were taken away with strings around their necks. Luckily, these cats weren’t poisoned like other cats. Two weeks ago, I noticed plastic bags full of rice and white liquid at the bottom. These were half eaten; so once the cats collapsed the crazy woman took them to be drowned by the river. Very bad karma indeed.

I wish I had witnessed this horrific criminal act so that I would have some evidence to get her arrested by police. But she often committed her crime during darkness when there weren’t many people around. She stalked the temple at night and would arrive in the evening. I continued on my way to the inner court yard looking for the small orange cat. One noisy tabby cat was missing; he would always meow very loudly to attract attention. The only way for a stranger to get near him was only by food poisoning. This was one nervous and very jumpy cat. It took me ages to gain his trust and to get close to him.

The orange cat seemed to get pregnant again after her kitten were stolen almost eight weeks ago. That kitten was very friendly and helpless so the crazy woman could get him very easily. For certain, two mother cats and eight kittens were killed by either food poisoning or drowning. Two black kittens, one tabby cat and at least five cats in the car park had disappeared. The skinny monk told me yesterday that over twenty cats had been killed by this psychotic criminal.

She seemed to have two personalities like Hyde and Jeckle. A novice saw her drowning cats on strings by the river and asked her why she had to kill cats in the temple. She told the novice that she felt sorry for these sick looking cats, some were blind in one eye. She would like to help them end their sufferings. The novice was dumbfounded and told this story to the skinny monk. My experience with her was quite alright as she was very polite and talkative. I asked her to give me back my Samsi and told her not to take Samsi outside the temple. She told me she just wanted Samsi to see the world outside the temple so that she wouldn’t be frightened of cars and learn how to cross the road.

My conversation with her was quite surreal as she appeared to be fully conscious, alert and in control of the situation. She told me she got a university diploma and used to work as a local news reporter in the south. She was very cunning and tried to borrow my mobile phone to make a call to her husband in the south so he could wire her some money for a ticket home. I knew she was going to get some money from me. I couldn’t believe how smooth and sweet she was towards me; she thought she had a very good plan and knew to handle all situations. I could feel her mind spinning away and tried to politely persuade or psychologically manipulate me to follow her request.

I had to be abrupt and asked to leave as it’s getting late. She appeared to be very humble and nicely spoken. The skinny monk was flabbergasted by my story as he had a few shouting matches and received a few threat from the crazy woman. She had threatened to throw acid at the monk and novices. One novice’s palms were burnt as he helped a poisoned cat, she pored acid on the fur of that cat too. I only knew the truth that the dead cat was one of the five white kittens I fed every week. His name was Panda, as he had black patches around his eyes. I was very hurt, angry and sad at the same time. I still didn’t have the time to grieved over four of my favourite cats and kittens. I thought two other big cats, Spotty and Little Tiger, were the first batch of cats being perished.

A tall monk came back from the car park with food bowl. The skinny monk told me that this monk couldn’t find his cat for several days. He looked very lost and sad, what would he do with all the cat food he bought for his cat. The skinny monk thought more cats had perished during my absence. He had to patrol the yard and car park at night with his new torch. Sometimes he couldn’t go to bed until after 2am. He even had a pair of binoculars to watch this crazy woman. He found out that she had a notebook making a list of all the cats that were executed and those still left to be taken to drown by the river. She even listed the two remaining kittens under the skinny monk’s protection.

The monk was very desperate and helpless. He was full of frustration and anger but he wouldn’t use violence to solve this problem. It seemed the abbot knew about this crazy woman and cats being killed. All the CCTVs in the temple recorded all happenings. But he refused to take any action. His close aid also reported me to the abbott for feeding temple cats and making a mess of the place. The aid wanted the abbott to sanction me from entering the temple. But the skinny monk warned him to be careful as I could have come from a good family. The aid had reported me as a poorly dressed person looking dirty and lowly as I sat around with cats on the ground. I thought this monk (assistant or aid to the abbott) needed a brain transplant. I was beyond angry but rather humoured and feeling pity for this arrogant monk.

I knew he didn’t like me since last year. He took two pompom dogs to run around the yard. They were usually kept and fed in the monks’ quarter in the upper floor of the building. There weren’t supposed to be let loose among the temple cats. So, I said a few sentences which he couldn’t argue with. So he had to retrieve the noisy little dogs, which tried to chase all the cats in the yard, and brought them upstairs. Then, I could start to call all the cats back to have their dinner. From that day, those little noisy or jumpy dogs weren’t taken down to the yard again. He then wanted a revenge and tried to get rid of temple cats. The abbott also hated cats and desired them to be ridden. That’s why they got along so well.

The skinny monk only disclosed the whole truth to me about this crazy woman yesterday. The previous abbott had ordered the security guards and all monks not to allow this woman to enter the temple. He knew this crazy woman’s history so he didn’t want her to cause any troubles in the temple. But the previous abbott was promoted to a bigger temple last year. The new abbott knew about this order but he still didn’t take any action. This led several people to speculate that there was a hidden agenda to enable this woman to get rid of all the cats in the temple. The abbott wanted these cats to be taken away somewhere so this woman would be of great service. I thought this was too much like a fiction. The worst scenario would be giving her money to help her buying poison and acid including strings. This woman was a vagabond who slept on benches in the temple at night. She was probably badly treated by other vagabonds in the past, and she was probably raped by others. What a wretched soul!

She told one novice the reason she chose the kittens and cats as her victims. She said she needed something to take on her inner angers. She couldn’t take it out on other people as they would fight back. But these cats and kittens could never fight back! This made the skinny monk almost blew off his top. I had to calm him down and suggested that he ought to pray for her. I felt that he probably killed her in the past life; they were all soldiers fighting at night by the river between Laos and Siam. It was a bloody and gruesome battle field. There was no mercy for the aggressors, all were killed and trapped in a deep trench full of sharp bamboo poles drenched with oil. The captured soldiers were burnt in the drench. This battle at the border took place during the reign of King Rama III.

This temple was closely connected to King Rama III and his top army commander. So, some monks were probably soldiers of the King while other monks were previously the angry or vengeful aggressors killed in the battle field. I told the skinny monk he did kill many soldiers in that bloody battle. He had to pray to appease these souls’ vengeful curse (with blood before their deaths) to end the journey of seeking for a vengeance.

I met the skinny monk yesterday, he looked very different with strangely cool demeanor. He was very calm and he told me that he did follow my suggestion with good result. The guardian angels in the temple seemed to be pleased and he could see the crazy woman in his meditation. In fact, I had been very upset and depressed that I couldn’t save those kittens’ lives. I had a weird feeling the last time I fed him and wondered how long he would live. My subconscious often gave me some warning but never once could I do anything to change the course of karmic law. So, I had been praying for a suitable solution to this bad situation. The abbott and his aid seemed to be gleeful of the actions of the crazy woman. The skinny monk warned me to think carefully before taking any action as there might be negative repercussions for him and these cats.

I wanted to go to see the abbott to ask for help in saving the cats. But the skinny monk told me this powerful monk didn’t like this confrontation and bad consequences would fall on these cats. Thai people wouldn’t like to lose face so I couldn’t do anything directly affecting that, except I wanted an open war with him. My head was hurting trying to think what I could do to stop this murdering spree of cats. The monk couldn’t go to the police without the abbott’s permission. But the abbott just ignored the problems and wouldn’t order the security guards to bar this woman from entering the temple.

I went to feed these temple cats every other day just to give moral support to the skinny monk and to confront the crazy woman. But she didn’t turn up yesterday. The car park was very quiet with only four cats instead of about ten cats or more as in the past. The skinny monk was more at ease and he told me that a policeman had come to take notes about what’s happening. His prayers seemed to work like magic. He happened to talk to a novice’s mother about these cats and crazy woman threatening to throw acid at monks and novices. The novice’ s mother was shocked and fear for the safety of her son. She happened to know a high ranking police in the area very well.

So, she talked to her police friend who sent his officer to talk to the skinny monk. The police was puzzled why the abbott refused to take any action once the crazy woman verbally threatened monks and novices. This has stirred up some panic among the bad karmic monks. The abbott might have the report from his aid that’s probably why the crazy woman didn’t turn up the following day. This saga of vengeance from past lives should have ended as soon as possible. I hoped and prayed for divine intervention for a few days now. This would save me lots of headache and several phone calls to people of authority to ask for help with this problem. Hopefully, bad karma would bite back at these wretched souls who bent on taking the lives of helpless cats and kittens. It’s a matter of time when the fruits will become ripened.

Wishing you peace, good health and prosperity.

Stay strong and cheerful.