They Say That All Mammals Can Swim in a Pinch…

Tuesday night we had an interesting occurrence during dinner. Let me set the scene. In Cambodia, we are not too far north of the equator; thus, the sun rises and sets right around 6:00 am and pm, give or take a little. Coming home after a bike ride a little after 6:00, it was already very much dusk. By 7:00, when we had gotten around to eating dinner, it was fully dark. With no moon at the moment, a rain-cloudy sky, and no streetlights, it was pitch black. But, no worries, the electricity was working, so we and our meal were tucked away in the kitchen under the flourescent bulb, . Outside, we could hear the light rain falling, some frogs croaking away, an occasional car or moto passing by, and the cat that has been meowing away most nights lately. This is what we heard next:
Cat: “Meeoowww! Meeooww!”
Us conversing: “ Man, what is that cat’s deal?”
Cat: “Meeooww!” (pause…)
On the roof: (thump…scratch, scratch, slide, slide, scratch-scratch-scratch!!....SPLASH!)
Us: “Did the cat just fall in the water tank??”
From the water tank: “MEEOOWWWWW!!” (swim, swim)
Us: “Guess we need to go get the cat out of the water tank.”

And so, we grabbed a flash light and my battery-powered lantern and headed out into the night. Municipal running water is unheard of in rural Cambodia; people draw water from wells or holding ponds or catch rain water in giant pots. Occasionally, people have various types of water tanks or cisterns. Our house has a large, open tank built like an extra room on the backside of the house. About eight feet tall, it collects rain water and holds it for our use.
So, we tramped through the wet grass and mud, around to the back of the house. I climbed up the ladder that allows access to the water tank (which, despite the precarious looking angle—see the picture—was actually quite steady). I peered over the edge, and—yep, there it was, a cat treading water. Unfortunately, the water level in the tank was a good four feet below the top of the tank--too low for me to just reach in and grab the cat, meaning that we needed to move on to plan B. Fresh out of any lifeguard/man-overboard equipment, my roommate had the idea that we could stick something wooden into the water for the cat to grab onto.

Fast forward a little bit—my electric lantern decided to shut off, the cat keeps swimming and crying for help, my roommate uses her little flashlight to find a big muddy plank among the discarded items in the grass, and a few minutes later: I find myself perched on the ladder, in the pitch black, in the rain, with plank in hand and a sodden feline clinging to the other end. Once the cat got on board, I expected it to run right up the new ramp we had just provided it with, but the cat had other ideas. So, thanks to leverage, I got to heft the cat up to the side of the tank. Tired from all the swimming and like most Cambodian cats, scared of people (even ones who just pulled it out of a tank of water), it crouched there for awhile. We headed back inside, duty done, and the cat cleared out sometime after, hopefully no worse for the wear. Poor thing! So our, our tank has been cat-free since then.
Bottom picture: The tank and the plank