Defining a Life
who looked like the ghost of Snowy , the incarnation of those faded images from my unremembered infancy . Launcelot was not a well cat , so we took him to a vet to find that he was dying . He would walk around the compound on our heels , more dog than cat , and wait on our steps for us , not just for food ; he ’ d even leave a bowl of food to follow us .
The compound was a new one , all concrete and sand , a construction site filled with workmen from Nepal and India who lived in slums hidden on the edge of Doha and earned a pittance . My husband carried cans of coke out to them on sweltering days where even walking to the car made you feel you couldn ’ t breathe and a neighbour told him off for that small act of kindness . We never understood why , beyond the implicit racist hierarchy that ran through Doha like a vein filled with shit . The only common air-conditioned space was a big room often overrun by children who disliked the stray cats and would catch and torture them . We caught two boys abusing Lancelot and screamed at them , only to have their mother appear and shout at us that it was obvious I didn ’ t have children , otherwise I would have known that it was just how children were . Her words stung , but I held my ground . Our pyrrhic victory . The next day Lancelot was gone . Our workmen told dark tales of cats and dogs abandoned in the desert without food or water , miles and miles from the city . Not killed because that would be irreligious , but left there so that God might save them if he so wished .
Gypsy had five kittens and we took them all into our University accommodation villa and tended them till they were old enough to be rehomed with my students from the University . Brutus died , was killed by a car , and in his honour we named one of the kittens who was also a ginger after him . The first time I was ever welcomed into a Qatari house
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