It’s like many movies I watched growing up: The Austrian Times reports that a domesticated cat did what many invading armies have failed to do, travel 2,000 miles across Russia all on its own.
Two years ago the owners of Karim, a gray house cat, moved from their home in Uzbekistan to Liska, Russia. They didn’t think Karim would handle such a long-distance move very well, so they made the devastating decision to leave Karim with their neighbors.
But Karim’s owners didn’t just dump him off on the first people they could find to take him. To try to ease their beloved cat’s transition, they gave Karim’s favorite chair and cushion to his new owners, along with his food bowls and other paraphernalia, doing the best they could to help Karim feel like he was still at home.
Only a few days after the move, however, Karim disappeared. His new owners contacted his old family to let them know, and for two years it seemed like that would be the heartbreaking end to the story. But then in late June Karim’s old owner Ravila Hairova made a startling discovery. “I was walking along the road and I saw this cat which seemed to be waiting for me. When I go closer I saw it was Karim – thin, and in very poor condition but it was him,” said Hairova.
Of course stories pop up from time to time of pets trekking across long distances to find their owners. But Karim’s story is still unusual even amongst these. Typically dogs travel the longer distances to find their owners, and cases of pets finding owners after a move usually involve the pets having been lost, not placed in a new home.
To find his family, the then seven-year-old Karim trekked 2,000 miles and across three state borders. He certainly showed the wear of the journey, appearing bedraggled and starving to his family, but now he’s made a full recovery. And they don’t doubt that this is definitely their Karim. “There are certain marks on his body including a scar on his tail when it was caught in the door that show us he is 100 per cent our Karim – and he obviously recognized us as well,” said Ravila Hairova’s husband Lev Kondratyev.
I certainly can’t imagine Cole undertaking such a journey to find me if I left him behind somewhere. I don’t doubt his affection for me, but he gets so unhappy even when briefly taken from home. When we visited a friend’s house for a few hours during the flea bomb, he worked himself into a tiny hole amongst the boxes in that house’s storage closet and wouldn’t move until we fished him out when we were going.
But then, Karim’s family must have thought their cat would react likewise, given that their original plan involved leaving him with friends when they moved. I hope never find myself in a similar situation with Cole. Still I’m so glad to hear of the happy ending for Karim and his family, and it’s good to know that sometimes pet adventure movies might be grounded in reality.
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