I Gatti – part 2 Posted by Serena on Oct 18, 2010 in Uncategorized
Here, as promised, is the translation of my little tale about our new gatti:
| Venerdì scorso, mentre andavamo giù a Pontremoli a lavorare, abbiamo visto seduti su un muro nel parcheggio del paese una gatta sconosciuta, col suo gattino. Nel nostro paese c’è un sacco di gatti mezzo selvatici, e questi due appollaiati lì sul muro non somigliavano per niente a loro. Abbiamo chiesto a un paio di persone: "Sai mica di chi sono questi gatti?" "Boh? Non lo so" è stata la risposta. |
| Last Friday, as we were going down to Pontremoli to work, we saw an unknown cat with her kitten sitting on a wall in the car park. In our village there are loads of half wild cats, and these two perched on the wall didn’t resemble them at all. We asked a couple of people: "Do you know by any chance whose cats these are?" "Boh? I don’t know" was the answer. |
| Lunedì, quando siamo tornati dal lavoro al B&B, erano ancora lì nel parcheggio, attorno ai bidoni dell’immondizia, sempre più magri, la mamma che camminava su tre zampe, con una zampa che le ciondolava dietro. Era ovvio che erano stati abbandonati. "Adesso basta!" ci siamo detti, e così sui due piedi li abbiamo presi e portati a casa. |
| On Monday, when we returned from work at the B&B, they were still there in the car park, hanging out around the rubbish bins, thinner than ever, the mother walking on three legs, with one leg dangling behind her. It was obvious that they had been abandoned. "Right, that’s enough!" we said to ourselves, and there and then we picked them up and took them home. |
| Erano tutti e due tranquilli finché non abbiamo riempito una ciotola con del latte. Poi, mamma mia!, ci si sono buttati adosso come due disperati. Ancora adesso, dopo tre giorni, anche se continuiamo a nutrirli, sono sempre affamati. Chissà per quanto tempo non avevano mangiato per bene? |
| They were both calm until we filled a bowl with milk. Then, mamma mia!, they threw themselves on it like a couple of desperados. Even now, after three days, although we continue to feed them, they are always hungry. Who knows how long it was since they ate a good meal? |
| Comunque si vede che sono gatti ‘educati’, gatti insomma d’appartamento, che non sono abituati alla dura vita di questo paese. Infatti, sono molto timidi, e quando li portiamo in giardino non si allontanano per più di tre metri dalla casa. |
| However, you can see that they are ‘well behaved’ cats, apartment cats, that is, who are not used to the hard life of this village. In fact they are very timid, and when we take them out into the garden they don’t move more than three meters away from the house. |
| Com’è bello, però, vedere la mamma con il suo piccolo (non siamo ancora sicuri al cento per cento se si tratta di un maschio o di una femmina, ha sì e no tre mesi)! Si vede che sono contentissimi di aver trovato un posto comodo, caldo e ben fornito di cibo! E devo dire che anche noi siamo contenti, almeno per adesso. Chissà come andrà a finire questa storia? |
| It’s beautiful though, to see the mother cat with her little one (we’re still not one hundred per cent sure if it’s a male or female, it’s only about three months old)! You can see that they are really pleased to have found a comfortable, warm place, that is well supplied with food! And I have to say that we are pleased as well, at least for now. Who knows how this story will end? |
Well, lots of water has past under the bridge since I wrote the above, but in a nutshell: The cats, which we have named Mimì (the mother) e Cocò (the little one), have taken possession of the house. Mimì has recovered the use of her leg, which is good for her but not for us, because now she can climb the ladder to our soppalco (mezzanine floor) where we sleep.
Most importantly, they seem to like our company, e noi gli vogliamo tanto bene, anche se a volte ne combinano di tutti i colori! (and we really love them, even if they sometimes get up to all sorts of mischief!) I’m sure that if they could use a keyboard they would write a blog about the new humans that they have adopted!
Now don’t worry, I won’t become a cat bore, although I could probably write cat blogs for the next month with the amount of entertainment they bring to our house! Perhaps a little update una volta ogni tanto.
Let’s finish off with a bit of cat vocabulary, or rather gattabolario!
| micio / micia | equivalent to ‘kitty’, the generic colloquial name for an unknown cat |
| micino | as above, but for a kitten |
| il pelo | the fur |
| i baffi | the whiskers |
| gli artigli | the claws |
| la zampa / le zampe | the paw / paws (we also use the same word for an animal’s legs) |
| il muso | the (animals) face |
| miagolare / miao | to mew / miaow |
| fare le fusa | to purr |
| accarezzare il gatto | to stroke the cat |
| dare da mangiare al gatto | to feed the cat |
| cibo per gatti | cat food |
| svezzare / svezzato | to wean / weaned |
| la lettiera | the litter tray |
| il veterinario | the vet |
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Comments:
Jerica T:
Seeing this on my blog reader made me cry…I lost my cat almost a week ago. He’s in isolation at the shelter to see if he has rabies. I don’t know if I’ll get him back if he doesn’t. (T-T)
Serena:
@Jerica T Salve Jerica T, sorry to hear about your cat. I hope you get him back again.
Saluti da Serena
William Auge:
Salve Serena, questo e’ un gatto spaventoso!
a presto, William
andreas:
Salve, Serena
Ti ringrazio del blog, che è informativo e divertente allo stesso tempo.
Andreas