PonyTales

I still remember, my mom bought 4 little green tortoise at the pet shop - 2 male and 2 female. The way to identify the male from the female is from the pattern formed at the underside of the tortoise. The pet shop uncle identify it for us. I only have very vague idea how to identify them and could not care so much as they were all so cute.

My mom gave me a big and round glass container, where she used to put money plant in it to rare the tortoises. I put a few big pebbles, colorful marbles and some water into the container for the tortoise. I fed the tortoise with dried shrimps - those tiny ones.

Initially, the tortoises do not seem to get tired crawling around in the container and when they got stuck at the sides, they just kept crawling like wanna dig a hole thru the container…hahaha…

Sometimes, they like to crawl up to the pebbles and just sat there taking air. Their legs would be stretched, and it seems like they were posing for a photo session. Too bad I do not have a camera then, else I could have taken some photos of my tortoises.

I loved to pick one out from the container, place them on my palm and just let them crawl up - feels very ticklish as they crawl. Sometimes, I like to fed them by holding the little prawns with my finger. When they are hungry, they would come and snatch the prawn away. There are times when I got bitten feeding them that way and it feels like putting a cloth peg on the finger. My mom also got bitten before when she helped me to clean the container  If the container is not cleaned regularly, the stench can really kill…hahaha

One fine morning, I found that one of the tortoise was missing. I searched high and low for it but could not locate the tortoise. It has crawled out from the container as I put the big pebble too near to the side of the container. I told everyone in the family about the missing tortoise and they helped me to search, but it was not found.

Several days later, my mom asked me to help her clean her wardrobe. As I was taking the drawer out to clean the bottom, I saw a dark round thing hiding at the inner corner of the drawer compartment. I took a torch light to see what it is as I am afraid, and after a short while, I realised that it is the missing tortoise!! I quickly took it out and showed it to my mom. It was still alive!!! How it got into my mom’s wardrobe and survived for so many days is still a mystery until today!

I remembered that the tortoises was with me for a long time until one of them grew as big as the size of my palm. The other three remain the same size - small.

One day as usual, I was throwing in some dried shrimps to feed the tortoise. I noticed that the big tortoise was laying on the big pebble and did not go into the water to get the shrimps. I tried to move the tortoise, and suddenly, its head just drop out lifelessly. I was shocked and scared at that moment, I dare not touch the tortoise and quickly run to inform my Dad.

The tortoise was dead and we don’t know what was the reason. I felt desperate and told my Dad to bring the tortoise to a vet, but we do not know of any vet and doubt that the vet can treat a tortoise!?

I think my Dad was quite dissapointed that time and as Chinese, we believe that tortoises symbolizes longevity. Since one is dead under our care, he told me it just doesn’t felt right. He said it was better for us to release the rest of the tortoise into the nearby river. Maybe they are meant to be in their natural habitat and could survived longer.

I agreed with my Dad’s suggestion as I am afraid to see another dead tortoise and also seeing my Dad’s dissapointment. We brought the tortoise to a nearby river and released them. As I see them go, I felt a little lost and just hoped that they would survived on their own.

I go on with my usual business as a child, playing around at the neighbourhood. I often play at my close friend’s place, which is actually a shop house. Next to her shop house, there live a family that sell cooking gas container. It was a very close knitted neaighbourhood, and everyone knows each another pretty well. One day, my friend called me and told me that her neighbour just came back with a big basket full of rabbits! She asked me to go over to have a look as they were so so cute. It was the first time I saw so many rabbits and the uncle allowed us to cuddle and play with them. After that, I quickly got home and told my Dad about the latest addition to our neighbourhood - Rabbits!!

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