The moment we entered the Istanbul neighborhood we were staying in, I noticed the big, fat cats. These cats were huge and healthy even though they were all strays.
We figured out that the people that live here feed the cats, leaving bowls of food on the sidewalks, in windowsills and sometimes there was even a cat house posted by their door. Near pet shops there was almost always a cat house and tons of food. Sometimes we saw cats waltzing into the pet shops like they owned them!
Also the cats here behaved like the holy Indian cows. They aren’t holy, but they are the rulers of the sidewalk. YOU have to step over them or move out of THEIR way. They will not budge from their spot of the side walk, unless you scare them! And people are affectionate towards the cats. Just the other day I saw a woman kneel down by a trio of cats. She started petting them and the cats responded by rubbing their backs into the woman’s shoes and purring. I also saw a man that same day taking a meat sandwich and showing it to a cat (not in a mocking way). Then, making sure the cat was following him, he went over to a trough and emptied the meaty contents into it.
So as you can see people in Istanbul respect the cats and love them.
Other animals didn’t fair so well when we were in Istanbul. Take the cows for example. We happened to chance upon Istanbul when the Muslim festival of Bayram was about to start. One day when we were walking around the center of the city we passed by a car wash that was full of men butchering cows. I saw a cow hanging off of the ceiling by it’s foot and a man cutting it’s head of with a kitchen knife to let the blood drain. The cow was still moving. We all walked away on the brink of having to barf. What Muslims do in Bayram is buy cows (or sheep) and butcher them. Then they give some meat to the poor and use the rest for a HUMONGOUS feast.
I liked Istanbul very much with all of the cats walking around that were letting us pet, feed, and play with them!
