The cat fell in the toilet

Now, this might seem like an amusing but relatively harmful anecdote if it happened in America – the cat fell into the toilet, meowed pitifully, then was rescued and returned to the comforts of home. Well, in Uganda this story goes a little differently…

Here, the “toilet” is a 10-foot deep pit latrine. And yes, one of the cats that live on our compound/farm fell in one night. The next day as I was squatting to do my business I heard the pitiful wail of a cat. I assumed the cat was outside the latrine door or maybe behind the building, but I noticed that its wails turned rather indignant when I relieved myself. Surely, I thought, the cat COULDN’T have fallen in the latrine! I got my flashlight and tried to find the cat down below. My Ugandan neighbors noticed me peering inside the latrine and laughed hysterically. It turns out they had already discovered that the cat was indeed inside the latrine and had tried, but failed, to rescue him. All I could discern about their rescue attempt was that they had lowered a rope into the latrine and the cat “refused” to grab on. My thoughts on this: he’s a cat! Do you really expect him to grab on to a rope for the 10-foot ascent!? So I executed a second cat rescue attempt.

My first idea was to lower a bucket into the latrine, but the bucket was too big to fit down the hole. My second idea was to tie a loop in the rope, grab a hold of the cat’s leg, and pull him up, but it turns out that you can’t really distinguish between different cat body parts from 10 feet up. My third idea was to lower a plastic bag into the hole and hope that the cat got inside – so we jimmy rigged a bag into a bowl-shape, used sticks to keep the shape intact, and added some leftover rice to attract the cat’s attention. Well, the cat “refused” to get inside, so my neighbors told me we must “just forgot about him and pray.”

Now, this story wouldn’t be nearly as tragic if the cat had died upon impact or within the first few hours or even days, but instead the cat is slowly perishing in a 10-foot deep toilet that several people still use on a daily basis…what a way to go. A colleague told me she once had a chicken fall into the pit latrine and survive for three months! Only time will tell how long a cat can survive in a pit latrine – hopefully it’s less that three months. RIP mukwano gwange (my friend).