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... your One-Stop about the happenings in Asian cat fancy

That would be the last thing any exhibitor would want to see or hear. Seeing his or her cat being disqualified can somewhat be disgraceful but do you know that there are some pioneer breeders knew their cats will be disqualified but still showing them?

I had taken things slowly now after my last involvement in running a cat show last December. So, I had been practically a regular exhibitor (which I had not been for the longest time that I could remember…..) for the year 2009, still traveling here and there and I could not imagine there were so many hilarious things happened during shows until other fellow exhibitors told me about some ‘amazing’ people.

‘Amazing’ people such as:-

1. A judge could not tolerate with the loudness and continuously utterly clerk that the judge wished that a duct tape was available and immediately the Show Manager stood up and reach behind his pocket for a duct tape!!

2. A show manager shows her cat and announcing to a judge that she need only x points to grand her cat. This was immediately shush by the Ring Clerk and told her, ‘You can’t do that!!’

3. A ring clerk had purposely uttered, ‘That is such an ugly cat!!‘ which was heard by some exhibitors and angered them.

4. An exhibitor was on his feet when the show management did not provide lunch for him while there is a food court just right across the show hall

5. A judge had asked a fellow exhibitor to carry a box upon returning to his home country without telling the poor kid that inside the box contains his tuxedo, a pair of shoes and some other personal stuffs.

6. An exhibitor’s cat was classified as OPEN in the show catalogue but informed all the Ring Clerks that her cat is a CHAMPION without filling the Correction Form. When confronted, the exhibitor said she was informed by the self-proclaimed licensed Master Clerk that there is no need to fill up such form and will inform Headquarters personally.

Ring Clerk Joke
What did a licensed Ring Clerk who is clerking told an unlicensed Ring Clerk who is also clerking?
Answer: ‘Check your mechanics’

What did the same unlicensed Ring Clerk told the same licensed Ring Clerk who made few mistakes?
Answer: ‘Check your mechanics, dyke!!!’

Master Clerk Joke
Master Clerk fee for 1 day show: $40
Master Clerk fee for a weekend show: $60
Master Clerk made mistakes and try to do cover ups but got caught by the Show Secretary: ‘Priceless’

For the 4th year in a row, the Spotlight Award for the last CFA Asia / Latin-America show season 2008-2009 is again won by another Hong Kong exhibitor.

Congrats to Ms. Vera Chan of Autumnleaf Cattery.

With the permanently deregistration of Feline Society of Malaysia, Sarawak Cat Club had given Malaysia cat fanciers a sign of hope in cat showing by organizing more CFA shows but this time in Peninsular itself.

At the end of May, Sarawak Cat Club working together with IOI Mall, Kulai to do a 2-ring CFA show. Not long after that, moving on high gear, Sarawak Cat Club managed to run a 6 ring show (4+2 concept) flawlessly in Kuala Lumpur itself in conjunction with the CFA Asia / Latin-America Award Banquet which manage to attract many foreign exhibitors from Thailand, Hong Kong, Singapore and for the first time, participation from our neighboring country, Indonesia as well.

Kudos to Sarawak Cat Club. You had certainly made Malaysian cat fanciers’ heads held high once again.

Keep it up!!

I was fortunate enough to be able to attend 3 shows that were held since May 17 till end of May and yes it was really tiring and also I were away for every weekend in the month of May. It started in Jakarta where Cat Fanciers Society of Indonesia (CFSI) had organized a 4-ring AB CFA show and the judges were Pam Delabar, Carolyn Lyons, Marge Collier (all 3 from the US) and Rod U’ren, the guest judge from Australia. Then a week after that, the same judges were en route to Kuching, Sarawak where Sarawak Cat Club was also doing a 4-ring AB CFA show. At the last weekend of May, only Pam Delabar and Carolyn Lyons were at the IOI 2nd International Show in Kulai, Johor.

Despite the outbreak of H1N1 or better known as Swine Flu in the US and other parts of the world and also the last minute pull out by a sponsor in Kuching, all the 3 shows went pretty well. The show in Jakarta was held at the same venue as per last time which is POIN Square and there were about 175 cats being entered. The show started about 10am or so but ended up quite late, finishing around 8pm and everyone was indeed tired. Perhaps a lil advice to the show management that it is very important to have the judging schedule properly planned for the smooth sailing of a 4 ring show with 175 entries. The other thing I wished to highlight is that it is about the blatant imposition that was put on the foreign exhibitors’ wallet when they enter a Group 3 country such as Indonesia, the so called customs fee imposed to foreign exhibitors for just exhibiting their cats. Perhaps it is something for CFSI to look into this matter for the betterment of the cat fancy not just in Indonesia but as well as in Asia.

As for the show in Kuching, the show was held at Stampark Sports Centre at Taman B.D.C and the place was just nice to hold a 4 ring show. Despite a little chaotic situation with the last minute pull out from a local sponsor, a big thanks to the show committee for their quick and swift actions to rectify any shortcomings. Sarawak Cat Club was stomped and trampled, chewed and spit out because of outside interference of another club, but like a trooper, Sarawak Cat Club came out smelling of roses despite all the hindrance, the show was a success. Hats off to the club and show committee of Sarawak Cat Club. There were 107 cats registered for this show an improvement as more pedigree cats were entered this time around compared to their inaugural show.

Finally in Kulai, the show was held at the concourse of IOI Mall which provides very limited enclosure and the risk of cat escaping is pretty high. Just a bit of advice to the organizers of Kulai, try and get a better venue which is more conducive to the well being of the cats as it was done in an open mall and it is hot and with the Carousel going round and round, it just freaked some if not most of the cats being judged. Since this is the 2nd show in Kulai and if it’s going to be a yearly event then a better location for the show would be highly recommended and more space needed to accommodate probably a 4 ring show. Despite having only about 85 cats, the show started an hour late which began around 11am and had to end by 5pm.

Now, how these judges are being picked is beyond me but I do know of a club that had their EXCO pick one judge each and in my opinion, I think this is very fair compared to a single hand picking by a single individual.

Since Indonesia is the first show of the season (2009 – 10) in Asia, certainly a good kick off to the Divisional Winner list for 2009-10 and I wish all of you good luck. I am looking forward to the Annual which will be held in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia this coming July. Hope to see a whole bunch of cat lovers there.

Are you??

It’s end of February and you still haven’t made any resolution. Here are some tips.

The following are most definitely NOT examples of 2009 resolutions for a breeder, an exhibitor, a fancier, a committee member of a club or show, an owner and of course how can we forget, as a judge as well.

Breeders

1. I will breed a cat which had been registered as NOT FOR BREEDING and when the cat gave birth to kittens, I will register the mother as a different cat of the same colour class of the same breed.

2. I will do whatever it takes including smuggling my cat to another country to show my cat in order to be first in the Divisional Winner list. To do this, I will collaborate with another breeder in that country to handle my cat without applying travel documents by ignoring the risk that my cat may be put to sleep if got caught by their local authorities. But hey, what the heck, to win any sort of sacrifice will do.

3. I am the pioneer in Maine Coon breeding and my cats always win in cat competitions so therefore, no one should question my ethics and my conduct and I don’t care whether my public statement contains elements of racist remarks. I am also very good in being defensive.

Show Committee

1. When I am a member of a show committee, I will work as a team. My definition of ‘working as a team‘ is by playing the role of the Treasurer, the Secretary as well as Entry Clerk all at the same time although the Treasurer and Secretary post had been filled. I will ignore my Show Manager or Assistant Show Manager and do things my own way.

2. As Entry Clerk, I will use my own personal bank account to collect entry fees from exhibitors knowing the fact there is a designated account upon agreement by my show committee. My reasoning is that I can collect the fees faster and easier and I do not seek the approval from the Show Manager as well as my committee.

3. I chose to be ignorant by being immature and childish when the Show Manager told me that I had failed to perform my role as Entry Clerk because I had been busying myself calling for meetings whenever I deemed fit on the Show Secretary’s behalf, doing the accounts on the Treasurer’s behalf as well as other club’s matters without the instruction or knowledge of my Show Manager.

4. When there is a big international show, I will take the opportunity and declare myself as the Chairman of the show without the knowledge nor approval from the show committee so that I can steal all the limelight. At the same time, I will be ignorant of any sort of duties as show committee. I will also entertain the judges or VIPs by wining and dining with my wife / husband especially before the shows so that I can secure my cat(s) placement in the finals. I will most certainly forbid and condemn anyone (besides me) from taking the judges out during their stay.

Club Committee

1. I will completely ignore my role as office bearer whether I am the President, Vice President, Secretary, Assistant Secretary, Treasurer or just plain Ordinary Committee Member. I will also ignore the responsibility towards the club members and also to the Registrar of Society. I will only focus on running cat competitions so that my and my friends’ cats will win.

2. I will not inform the club’s affiliation body regarding the resignation of my Secretary but instead request to them to change my ex-Secretary correspondence address to my home address. When the ex-Secretary found out, I will become defensive and blame it to the ex-Secretary him or herself for failing to inform the affiliation body about his/her resignation in order to divert the attention from the actual matter which is forgery and misrepresentation.

3. I will correspond either by email or posting in public forums or Yahoo list using my wife’s or husband’s name (in other words hiding behind my wife’s skirt or my husband’s pants) whom is also the President of a club so that no one will know it is me especially if I’d involved myself in political movements and the last thing I would want is my political friends found out and laughed at me for being involved in a cat club.

4. I will create a blog and smear the names of those who had revealed the truths of my misconduct and divert the audience’s attention from the actual matters.

5. As Secretary, I chose to be used by the President, Treasure or even a plain just Ordinary Committee Member or in other words any higher or lower ranking officers than me in my committee. I refused to use my brain and think on my own feet and most of all, voluntarily being used as a scapegoat for e.g. posting statements in the forum and yahoo list.

p/s: Now, there is a difference between Corporal Saiful and this Seksatary’s case. Corporal Saiful ONLY being used as a scapegoat by high ranking officers

Cat Fancier / Owner

1. I will collect all types of Forest cats without taking into consideration of my financial status so that I can brag to the whole world and appear in the magazine or TV that I had owned all types of forest cats. When I could not pay the breeders, I will made (stupid) excuses after (stupid) excuses.

2. I will be as loud as possible so that the whole world will pay attention to what I had to say and putting all my 10 fingers and toes into any matters whether they approved or not of my involvement.

3. I will take my own sweet time and excuses for not neutering my semi-longhair domestic cat although knowing the fact I have some breeding male pedigree Maine Coons running around the house. I may have intention to breed my Maine Coon males to the female domestic cat.

4. I will open up a cat club hoping to have a new start after I had screwed up big time in the dog fancy by failing to keep my promises to hold shows in my region (which had pissed many dog fanciers here). Due to my action, many of these dog fanciers had now switch to become cat breeders, some being regarded as irresponsible breeders.

5. I will impersonate as a third person by registering myself in forums and yahoo list for the purpose of slandering anyone who decided to reveal the truths and all my wrongdoings.

6. I will coordinate with my fellow members to attack any individuals in public forums and yahoo list in order to divert the attention of the readers from seeing our mistakes and misconduct.

Judges

1. I will only choose to reply selected mails whenever and wherever I want although knowing the fact that I had been contracted to be a judge in a show. I do understand it is very imperative to have communications on both side especially when the show date is getting closer but I chose to ignore it.

2. I will only hear 1 side of a story which I can gain political advantage in my career and I may want to perceive that I am protecting my President in anyway no matter how wrong is he / she.

3. When I am the moderator of a public forum or yahoo list, I will choose to moderate all messages and approved them even though knowing the fact that the posts contain elements of character assassination. I will disapprove any messages or posts that had showed my mistake or jeopardizing my reputation although they were the truths.

4. I will expect to be treated like a king (or queen) when I go for overseas judging since I do not have the same treatment in my home country. I will expect to stay in a luxurious hotel, wine and dine without taking into the account the financial burden of the club and the high cost of running an international show.

5. When I perform my judging, I will put cats into the finals depending on the relationship that I have with the exhibitor and how I was being pampered during the duration of my stay for the show.

So, what do you think? How important is ethics nowadays? Being loud to show people that you are right but the fact is you are wrong or trying to mislead people? You see, being loud does not show that you are right or by keeping quiet does not mean that you are wrong. One must have courage to stood up for the truth. The last thing that anyone wants is a handful of schizos destroying the cat fancy (which I had already seen some in a land near near away….). So, my faithful readers, my last message to you before you make your new year resolution is this,

But for those who had done any points mentioned above, well… what can I say but listen to the music that I dedicated specially for you…

Get your own Box.net widget and share anywhere!

Please feel free to drop any suggestions of New Year resolutions that I may had missed….

While I was reading the international news, I came across a piece of news which I found pretty distraught about 2 teenagers abusing some cats and videoed their act and put in YouTube. Fortunately, YouTube had removed the videos. Below is the article,

Teens face two charges of animal cruelty after posting cat abuse on YouTube
http://www.kswo.com/Global/story.asp?S=9859463
Posted: Feb 18, 2009 04:38 AM

Lawton_Two Lawton area teens accused of beating a cat and posting it on YouTube over the weekend will be going through the juvenile justice process in Oklahoma. The 14 and 16-year-old brothers each face two charges of animal cruelty after law enforcement was directed to two videos on Sunday that showed the beating and torture of the grey cat named Dusty, and each video carries separate charges.

Count on 7News for updates on the cats as soon as they are available.

Below is the news aired on 7News. Please view it with discretion

A club with at least 20 years in history of existence had been PERMANENTLY deregistered…

Those responsible may or will have to face the wrath of the law

Phew… talking about busy, busy and busy. Anyway, sorry for the late postage of this historic event. I managed to found some articles on the last Cat-City International Cat Show 2008 which was held in Kuching on 20th December last year. There were so many dailies in various languages that had covered this much awaited show organized by Sarawak Cat Club.

Above: Adilah Roose from Kuala Lumpur showing her Norwegian Forest cat to the VIP

Above: Representative from Royal Canin presenting a momento to our VIPs

Above: Judge Bob Zenda playing with a cat

Above: Adilah Roose from Kuala Lumpur and Vera Chan from Hong Kong, both posing with their winning cats with Judge Bob Zenda

Above: An exhibitor from Thailand, Mr. Rachaphol playing with his Sphynx.

Above: Judge Wain Harding has full attention from the spectators

Above: Judge Bob Zenda is playing with a Korat

Above: A silver American Shorthair held by exhibitor from Hong Kong, Kit

Less than a week, I flew to Kuching as Sarawak Cat Club is having their very first CFA International show held on 20th December 2008 at Kuching Civic Centre. Congratulations to Dr. Huey Lee, President of Sarawak Cat Club and her team for their effort of affiliating one of the pioneer cat club in Malaysia with an international cat association, The Cat Fanciers’ Association (CFA).

Sarawak Cat Club and the show committee of Cat Friends of Asia-II Show had been working together to make both shows a success. Cat-City International Show 2008 had caused many people excited till some cat fanciers (so to speak) started poking their fingers into it with thousand and one questions even before the Show Manager had announced it.

Kudos to Dr. Huey Lee and her team for able to convince Sarawak Department of Veterinary Services to obtain quarantine waiver for cats coming from Peninsular Malaysia, Sabah and other Asian countries after one man had failed in his attempt. This shows the determination that Dr. Huey Lee has for the betterment of the cat fancy in Sarawak.

Just to enlighten some of my readers and to avoid any misunderstanding, Malaysia consists of 14 states which includes the state of Sarawak and Sabah. The reason I highlighted here is that many foreign exhibitors had been confused that Sabah and Sarawak is actually another independent country (named Borneo).

Sarawak Cat Club’s inaugural show had opened the eyes of local exhibitors, educating them about pedigree cats; being some of them had never seen breeds like Korat, American Shorthair, Sphynx, Abyssinian and Javanese. We have a few CFA Ambassadors during this show and many thanks to Puan Zamina Zainal Ariffin and Adilah Roose from Malaysia, Rachaphol from Thailand and Vera Chan from Hong Kong for educating local exhibitors and the public about CFA. Thanks to Phebe Low, Ambassador Program Regional Coordinator for Asia/Latin-America for the Ambassador banners and leaflets. Thanks to Mr. Bob Zenda for conducting the CFA Clerking School in Kuching as well.

In this show, I play my role as the Entry Clerk where I received entry forms from all exhibitors and process their entries, Chief Ring Clerk for Judge Cheryl Pollock as well as exhibitor who shows 2 cats.

Above: The 4 distinguished judges, ring clerks and show committee

Above: Stormy, my blue European Burmese and Molly, my black Maine Coon resting in their cage.

Above: Stormy got 9th Best Premiership Cat in Jan Roger’s ring

Above: Molly got 10th Best Premiership Cat and Best Longhair Premier in Jan Roger’s ring

Above: Memorable picture taken with Wain Harding and Brad after the show

Above: Me and Cheryl Pollock

Above: Me and Bob Zenda

Above: Me and Jan Rogers

I would like to take this opportunity to thank Dr. Huey Lee for giving me the trust and confidence negotiating with Royal Canin for their support in this historic show; Head of Veterinarian, Dr. Chin, Senior Veterinarian, Dr. Chia for their undivided support in Sarawak Cat Club’s inaugural show; Samudra Court staffs for their great hospitality and not forgetting all exhibitors for the success of this show.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to all….

For more info about Cat-City International Cat Show 2008, please visit Sarawak Cat Club website