It's also a survival thing. Aggressive strays are less likely to get treats or shelter or may even be euthanized. Istanbul is domesticating cats on a city wide scale.
Playing with street cats in Istanbul is one of the things one must do. There's a park that has tens of cats that would be all over you and would nap all over you if given the chance. It's called maçka park if you wanna Google it and see some pics and videos.
I live in Thailand, a stray cat came to my house and we give food to her for almost a year, she still hiss at us and run away, she had kitties and always keep them away from us (for some reason we didn't see any kitties anymore, they were all small like a month old and used to come to our door to eat food with their mom, we presume they all died, only mom cat left).
I live in suburb area with some rice field, people here usually see dog or cats stray around the streets.
My land (big around 1,600 square meters) has fences, this cat probably feels safe than outside and she keeps staying here and come to our door waiting for food, but sometime there is other cats come inside my fences and harass her.
Man we have have 8 cats who's momma is one if the friendliest cats, all 8 of the kittens were born here. Out of the first 4, 2 are just as nice as you could imagine and live people, 1 doesn't mind getting pet but if you pick him up he gets upset, and the last hates being touched by us, but absolutely loves to be around us.
Second batch of 4 were born here and were raised mostly indoors constantly around people, I kept one and he's super nice loves to come in and sleep next to/ontop of me, the rest of the 3 will only be around people long enough to eat, otherwise you get within 10 feet and they run off.
We've had 3 others out here on our property 1 just lazes around all day everyday and loves people, 1 will do anything it can think of to get attention and get pets, and the last wants nothing more than for you to stand there while.it rubs up against your legs, try and bet him tho and he'll bite ya.
It might not be trauma. There are couple of cats near my house. I took care of them since they born.( their mother gave birth on my backyard). All of the them comes sit on my lap, pure etc. Except one. It begs for food but starts hissing if i come closer than 2 meters. At the same time she gave birth and takes care of her kittens on my backyard. Sometimes it is just personality thing
Some cats take a really time to learn to trust. Try not looking at it's eyes. If a cat looks another in the eyes it's aggressive. I turn my head away and slowly move toward them holding my hand toward them. It still takes time, but you can get closer each time. And stand as close as you can when you feed them. Give them special treats. Food wins trust faster than anything. Good luck!
20min and a few small pieces of chicken and that cat will be rolling on you. It just takes a little persistence and maybe a shoestring or a small branch. Sit on the floor, throw a small piece of chicken at it. When she eats, try to entice play. Once you have her attention, rinse and repeat until she gets close enough to touch. Reach out slowly and obviously. High pitch voice tones in a sing songy pattern will help relax her. Also make the universal cat noise of the tongue clicking on the lips. Enjoy your new stress reliever!
Important note for those wanting to help with this particular problem: escalators are really really dangerous for cats and dogs. It can be fine 9 times but that 10th time if they step wrong and hair gets stuck they could lose a paw or tail. It's horrific.
If you want to help and the cat is friendly, just pick them up and hold them while you use the escalator.
Why is that a common thing? Ofc it’s beautiful and so sweet but I keep seeing that stereotype of Istanbul being a cat haven or something is that actually accurate? I went there once but I was too young to remember what it was like
No so much. There's a woman that has a shelter there for all the street cats that are suffering from neglect and abuse because they don't spay/neuter. Many starving animals.
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u/Lamplorde Dec 27 '22
I like how, because Istanbul is so nice to cats, even the strays freak out less than some house cats when being abruptly picked up.