Thursday, April 22, 2010

My National Geographic Childhood part 2

An apt. of 400 square feet housed more than 10 people. More than these 10 people, many various pets were also housed, including some wild animals like snake and pangolin (穿山甲)...

1. Wang Mao often stayed behind the fish tank. Don't get it wrong. He just wanted something cool (from the glass). He never played with the gold fishes. After seeing those gold fishes, I recalled we once had some rare species like piranha and big fishes like sea bass of 3-4 feet long and garoupa. Yes, I remember I needed to buy beef to feed those piranhas. 2. ok, something more gentle. This lovely yellow sparrow flew in by itself and sang very nice!

3. Mimi again. See we treated pets like friends. Never put a chain on their feet. We just let them run around in the apt. Mimi stood on the stairs of my double decker bed. 4. This cat is my most favourite cat called Junior. He never bothered for food as he knew I was very punctual in making lunch/dinner for him. He never hurted the other pets. He even put this parrot Mr. Sor Lo in his nap in the winter time and slept. It's a real Disney movie! 3 days after Mr. Sau Lo was scared to fly away, Junior disappeared. That was the saddest day in my life! BTW, Junior appeared on one TV ad. of Kleenex when he was a baby. Junior went to toilet like human being. What an incredible cat! As for Mr. Sau Lo, he could sing the song Tycoon (大亨) by Paula Tsui and all the time repeated 何必呢. Mr. Sau Lo often stood on my father's shoulder asking for petting.

5. Madam Hamster Ms. piggy. She raised a family of 50 kids. One night, they used their sharp teeth to break the cage. There it came a show of Midnight Express! We needed to carefully hunt for each "fugitive" back to their home with more iron bars. 6. Cat in the mirror. See how Wang Mao could strike a pose - VOGUE... Vogue.... with the Queen on the dance floor.

5 comments:

Stella said...

Wow, what a big family with Wang Mao & Junior, some fish, Owl Mimi, singer Sau Lo, Miss Piggy and her 50 babies, plus the snake and pangolin..... Really a multi-cultural family in harmony.
Your father was like "Man Shuen Quan" with "3000 eating guests". He must be very warm, kind hearted, loving, caring and very human with a big generous heart. Now I understand why you are who you are.
"Tiger father has no dog son."

Anonymous said...

piranha? you mean the fish eat meat? where do you buy it?

in the sea said...

There were at least 3 pangolins, more than 12 cats, 3 dogs, 4-5 snakes, 4-5 ducks, 10 chickens, 2 quails, 5 rabbits, many various mice, snails, many various fishes, birds, crows, turtles... Some I even forgot. My father is actually much into wild life. He brought us to the hillside or beaches. Told us many things about the nature.

Anonymous, yes, it's that fish. I guess my father got it from somewhere in Guang Zhou area. He used to go on the boat and visited many rural places in Southern China.

Stella said...

This is really like a wild animal park in HK. Or Noah's Ark.
If your father is in LA, maybe he shall have a farm or ranch or zoo.

in the sea said...

He had better work in a zoo or a park. I don't think the neighbour would let pet some wild animals or forbidden animals.