The Triumph of Love

Being friendly is not always an advantage, especially when it comes to stray cats. Trusting little creatures, defenseless and vulnerable, are far too easily targeted in today’s big outdoor world, made of steel and concrete. It’s been proven countless times that stray kitties

with big hearts and loving attitudes are the first to be tortured or killed – they would approach anyone, carefree, without any hesitation or reservation, just to find out the hard way that not all people are trustworthy. Many of these affectionate and friendly strays are

literally doomed to a horrible fate as they’re never aware of any possible danger and their lack of suspicion strongly contributes to frequently bad outcomes in their encounters with humans.

Bengi is one of these

trusting and friendly ones, a fuzzy little package of pure love and joy. It’s almost impossible to take a good photo of him, as he’s tirelessly kneading and reaching out with his paws whenever he hears a human voice or sees someone approaching. Although his trust was horribly betrayed three years ago and his misjudgment could have had terrible consequences, he is still affectionate and loving as if nothing, not even the utmost cruelty and sheer viciousness, could ever shatter his

confidence.

The first time I heard of him, Bengi was a beautiful and extremely sweet tabby and white tom who had been living in a joint backyard in my hometown, together with many other cats. They had a caretaker who had been

providing them with regular meals. They were healthy, vaccinated and neutered, but they were all considered to be a neighborhood menace, even though it’s not easy to fathom what they could’ve done so horribly wrong to deserve what happened to

 them.

Some of the neighbors decided to get rid of the furry nuisances at the beginning of summer three years ago and hired a couple of men to resolve the problem. Those heartless sub humans were spotted while

rounding up all of the cats in the yard and putting them into bags and hauling them away, probably to some secluded place where they would have killed them all. Bengi was one of the first who walked nonchalantly into the trap, naïvely believing that all

people were kind and caring, and only pure luck saved him that day. As it was clear that none of the kitties could stay there, their caretaker reached out for help and all 17 cats, scared and confused, became shelter tenants.

It didn’t take them

very long to adapt to shelter life and it seems that their heart-wrenching experience didn’t leave any scars. I doubted they would ever forget what they had been through, but all of them moved on promptly upon their arrival, with no resentment and no

bitterness, ready to give and receive love. With clear eyes and full hearts, they are living proof that even when everything goes wrong, something right might still emerge. The battle between good and evil is as old as the world itself and seems to be never ending, but

every little victory paves the way for the big leap towards a better life. And even if miracles are far too rare and far between, they do happen sometimes.