This is a cat from the Van region of Turkey. I don’t know his/her gender so I’ll refer to the cat as she. She is all white with odd-eye colour which is not unusual. She has been described as a Turkish Van but I don’t think we can say that just because she comes from the Van region of Turkey. She is a freeborn (random bred) cat that happens to live in the east of Turkey, the human population of which is mainly Kurdish (a Kurdish Van someone wrote). The Kurds appear to be a nation of people without a country.
The odd thing about this attractive cat is not the odd-eye colour but the way she picks up her forepaws and curls her toes back at regular intervals as she walks. It is mainly the right foreleg but she also picks up the left as well.
She appears to have no leg injuries and in any case she picks up both her forepaws, which indicates no injury but some sort of habit. It almost looks like the ground is cold or hot and she doesn’t like it. That may be the reason but is a far-fetched idea.
Anyone got any ideas why she has this mannerism?
Caroline thank you for the thoughtful comment and info – I really appreciate it – I don’t feel alone when kind people share such things with me like yourself. I have all kinds of substance abuse problems and like you I voluntarily have taken it upon myself to fix them – I am doing brilliantly – its been years now since I was heavily involved in that kind of thing. Sometimes it comes to the surface and I slip up for a day or two but on the whole its behind me.
I agree entirely with the yoga theory. I took yoga classes every morning for quite some time when I was younger and it did me the world of good. Actually now I need to get back into this kind of hting. I also did Tai Chi which was much harder but also very good for me. Now that I am older and cleaner I should do yoga and physically healthy things because I am in danger of becoming very unhealthy. I must also quit smoking. I’m considering e-cigs but out here you can’t get them with nicotine in them.
I will have to find a way around that because they work very well indeed – I’ve tried them before.
I think what happened with me ‘losing’ Gigi did exactly as you said – it brought up the exact moment and feelings I had when I found Red under that tree and brought him inside – my whole universe just fell apart in 5 short minutes and I couldn’t breathe and was hyperventilating in the same moment. I had the exact same physical reaction – you are right. Thank you.
Thank you for correcting me. I like that. I find the whole area very interesting particularly the cats ;).
Hi Michael!
I just wanted to correct you, this cat is NOT from the Van region. I know many people think about Van when they see white odd-eyed cat…(You can see in Van many colored cats more than white ones! whites are always minority everywhere)
This cat is from Bitez, Bodrum as uploader said in his comment.
The title ”Kurdish Van”was added by uploader a week ago when one Kurdish nationalist convinced him that ”Van is Kurdish”.
Remind you that Van city is in Turkey, Kurdish people are not different from Turks but due to the national identity they created for themselves (with a support of Western countries, terrorist organization PKK) now they consider themselves somewhat ”different”. Turkey is made up of MANY different people, who are united by being citizens of Turkish republic and speaking in Turkish language. Would we divide United States by thousands of pieces just because some people feel ”too different” to belong to the same country? Why would we do this to Turkey?
Sadly everyday this country becomes more and more divided – Kurds vs Turks, religious vs secularists, Sunnis vs Alevis etc. etc.. Even cats are being used to serve some kind of nationalistic agenda…
You should live here in order to understand what’s going on…
As Ruth says you are brave. Well done. Please remind me how you came to have PTSD. If you don’t want to answer that don’t.
You may have heard of Debra Millet who is the caretaker of a famous Savannah cat (F2) called Motzie (world’s second tallest domestic cat). She was in the Vietnam war and suffers some problems because of it. It is very tough for ex-servicemen and women. There is a pile of psychological problems due to being on active service in the military.