Chifundo

I am not a pet person. And I am definitely not a cat person. But somehow I have found myself the owner of a 4 week old, tiny, white kitten. This is how it happened. One day last week I woke up to find that, overnight, a rat had eaten half of one of my bananas an chewed through my phone charger. (Stupid rat. It caused a lot of problems and I couldn't charge my phone for a couple of days.) I went to the head teacher of my school to ask for advice. Specifically, where I could buy rat poison or traps. Instead, I was told that one of the other teachers had kittens he was giving away and I should take one. I hadn't really wanted pets here, mostly because I didn't want to worry about them if I left my house for the weekend or on a trip, but I told him I'd think about it. Apparently he took that as "yes! I'd love a kitten" because two days later a guy shows up at my house with a cat in a burlap sack. Being that I've never had a cat before, and have previously made a point to avoid them (I can actually count the number of times I've even touched a cat) I was a little worried about what to do with it. I texted one of my friends, who also has cats in Malawi, and got a lot of advice from her. So, now I have a pet. She's actually really cute, and it's kind of nice to have some company around my house. I wanted a traditional Malawian name so I asked my friend to pick out a name for her. He decided on 'Chifundo' which means 'mercy'. I think 'Wamisala' would fit her better, it means 'crazy', but I guess I'll stick with Chifundo.