Flats and Cats

I've been accompanying my sister and her fiance view flats over the past few weekends. It is quite an interesting exercise, looking at how people do up and maintain the flats. At one end, there are the house-proud where everything is so immaculately kept and at the other end, the karang-gunis where the paper is peeling off the walls and where junk is piling up on every available surface. Then there are simple, spartan homes and then there are those which are done up resort style even in a humble 3-room HDB flat. But flat prices are going up by the week. Valuations have risen over the past 2 months and yet people are still asking for up to 20% more than valuation. It is a bit worrying, knowing you are chasing a rising market. But there is no point paying more than one feels comfortable with - unless we find the perfect flat, we'll just keep our bids appropriately low.


One unexpected benefit from flat viewing is that we are meeting all sorts of lovely cats! This white cat with black and orange markings was in the Old Airport temporary hawker centre, where we went after a viewing. The other customers were watching with some amusement as my sister and I took his photo. One hawker came up to us smiling and asked us to help take the cat's photo so she could replace her hubby with the cat on her phone wallpaper. My sister took the photo but we couldn't figure out the wallpaper bit as the phone language was Mandarin - so much for all those years of learning Chinese.


We also met a group of four cats at the foot of one block, aptly below a sign saying "Pets' Funland". Now one suspects that was the name of the childcare centre just behind the sign. But the cats seem to have adopted the place as their own, in any case. All the cats had been neutered - the sign of the clipped ear. Alas, no photo as I had not had the opportunity to down load the picture from my camera phone before it got lost.


Nearer home, there have been more kitten sightings. Sigh. Definitely, we need to capture the new Mother Cat (or MC for short) which has been wandering around the place and discovered the happy cat haven a.k.a our front driveway. She's just delivered a litter! Well, time to make the arrangements for her sterilisation - a little on the late side but better late than never.