miss cayce

Letting the cat out of the bag

I was going to write more about my RWMF 2004 experience, sans drunken debauchery but my dear friend, sativa, has already written a great piece here. I was with her all the time, except for Saturday when I was recovering in my hotel room. I pretty much agree with her assessment of the festival, especially about the musicians. So go read it – love the title!

In that entry, she wrote about my encounter with Old Guy in the hotel corridor. That pretty much killed any interest I had in crashing the after party with the musicians. I do believe lightning strikes twice. This year, I was more leery of the musicians. My encounter with a Cuban musician last year was enough to send me running for the hills. No, I wasn’t the one who was frenched – thank God! But there was hair-twirling, and knee-stroking and long eye-gazing and omigod, if I were to relive this one more time, I think there would be another bout of throwing-up. That might sound harsh but believe me, he was old enough to be my grandfather. For ONCE, could I have some gratifying attention from someone who’s not geriatric? I don’t think that’s too much to ask, really.

Yesterday, I brought Daniel to the Cat Museum and Semenggok Orangutan “Rehabilitation” Center. The former was priceless – but in a horrific kind of way. I started laughing as soon as we stepped into the museum because the first thing I saw was someone’s badly stuffed award-winning pet cat. I don’t know - that’s just so wrong in so many ways. And then I got angry when I saw a stuffed civet because that’s REALLY wrong. It’s not even from the cat family! It’s so scientifically misleading. But then again, this was a museum where they had every possible tacky exhibit on anything remotely connected to the word, cat. I guess to a lot of dumb people, a civet kinda looks like a cat.

There was a cat burglar exhibit with a mannequin dressed in black. There was a catwalk exhibit. Catfish exhibit!!! Tacky cheap cat keychains encased in a thick glass case with the banner, “DO NOT TOUCH”! An exhibit of cat food products! Movie posters with titles that have cat in it! Never mind that the movie Cat Ballou had nothing to do with cats, but is actually short for Catherine Ballou. A mini-library stocked with books that have cats in them, and books written by politicians (gee, I figure that they’re more asses than cats).

After a while, when I was going cross-eyed from staring at the numerous tacky cat figurines, I quietly admitted to Daniel that I used to collect anything cat myself when I was younger. He looked at me with horror, and exclaimed, “So, YOU’RE the one who designed this museum!”

Actually, I think a bunch of ang moh grannies designed this museum. I’m just glad that we didn’t have to pay an entrance fee. The thought of actually paying to see this horror would be unbearable. At least the view from the city council (it’s on top of the hill) was beautiful. It justified the drive up there.

After a Curry House lunch, we drove to Semenggok. We didn’t see the orangutans because it rained heavily. We didn’t even bother to walk up the trail because I KNEW they wouldn’t come out. Orangutans are more similar to humans than we would like to think. If it’s raining cats & dogs (sorry, I can’t help myself), I’d rather stay in my comfy nest than come down and be ogled by tourists. And so we stayed dried on the bridge, and I chatted for a while to one of the staff. He kept staring at Daniel, and finally admitted to me, “He looks really familiar”.

“That’s because he’s a FAMOUS actor”, I mock-whispered, “He’s been in a lot of movies”.

The shocked amazement on his face, and the faces of the other two listeners (including a tourist) was too much to bear. And so, Daniel and I ran out into the pouring rain.

posted by Cayce @ 11:00 AM