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Beloved Stray Cat In Turkey Memorialized With Statue
by HeartEternal Staff 12/19/2016
Thanks to social media, even a cat can get its 15-minutes of fame these days; but in Turkey, those 15-minutes have been eternalized for one special pudgy feline. This story is of a cat called Tombili from the Ziverbey neighborhood in Turkey's famous city of Istanbul. Although a stray with no dedicated owner or home, Tombili was very loved and cared for by the people of the neighborhood.
Tombili would spend his days lounging around the city, bringing smiles to passersby. His carefree ways were captured by one such onlooker and shared on Turkey's comic site 9GAG. What happened next was pretty amazing and completely surprising.
The picture happened to get world wide attention as people fell in love with Tombili's unique relaxed attitude and lounging pose with one leg up.
That one picture soon turned into countless memes, some with props such as tea cups and prayer bead necklaces to further attention on social media. There was no stopping to Tombili's rise in fame.
Sadly, Tombili passed away on August 1st of 2016 from an unknown illness. A flyer was soon posted at one of his famous lounging spots saying how much he would be missed.
The note read:
"You will live in our hearts. Mascot of our street, beloved TOMBILI lost his struggle for life after a month and closed his eyes to life on first of August."
As if that wasn't enough, a petition to the city soon followed to memorialized the cat in a more permanent way. After getting over 17,000 signatures a statue was commissioned in honor of Tombili to bring joy to the neighborhood forever. Soon a Facebook page with over 700 likes followed supporting the petition and Tombili's legacy. The city took notice and did the right thing by commissioning a statue.
The statue was soon inaugurated on October 4th, 2016, in the same place where the original picture was taken. That day also happened to be the World Animal Day bringing more attention to the importance of making the world a better place for all animals. To show their respect and appreciation, people have been dropping off several items by the statue, including prayer beeds, tea cups with actual tea in it, and cat food.
Here is a video showing 13 famous animal statues from around the world.
Love for animals is often compared to love of children. In this case, Tombili was truly more than just a stray cat in the community. He spread joy with his pudge relaxed attitude and made the people stop and smell the roses, so to speak. Tombili is now memorialized permanently proving that we do have the ability to love and respect each other for what we are.
Sources: Alarabiya, Anadolu Kedisi, Daily Sabah, Daily Mail, Hurriyet Daily News, Kadikoy Municipality