+ Son | Our Hamsters

Puffy Hamster, Class of 5/9 Saint Hilda's Primary School

Well, not exactly ours.

My son's class had started a Recreation Corner where they dedicate one corner of the classroom for creative thinking activities. Arts, hobbies and pets too. The class decided to adopt two hamsters from the neighbourhood pet store.

So the whole class chipped-in a dollar each while the teacher topped-up the difference.

Viola! Two hamsters with a 1.5 x 1 x 1 ft cage complete with all the hamster-loving wheel and other gadgets fixed into the Hamster Villa.

Our Little Guests

Now everyone will have a turn at caring for the hamsters a few nights and weekends too.

Our son got the first turn and on Friday, 6 January, he brought the two hamsters home for the weekend.

Interesting creatures, these lovable cuties.

I came back home from work and instantly got one hand holding a hamster. My first time at touching a one. My son was playing with the other.

That little creature, so fragile, just stayed still in the palm of my hand and fell asleep. Intrigued, I held it for more than 30 minutes while watching TV, have not even took changed from my working clothes yet.

We just fall in love with these little animals.

All 3 of us spent the whole weekend focused on our guests. Our world revolved around them that weekend. We got to know their temperaments really fast with that kind of attention.

The Naming Of...

The smaller one was always moving about. Kept itself busy turning the wheel as if it was preparing for a marathon and always bathing itself in the sand pit.

It was Danish's favourite.

The other, a slightly larger one, was always in the little yellow house, napping! Once in a while it would go out and stuff food in its mouth and headed back home.

That was basically what each was doing the whole weekend. With that, my wife bestowed upon them each a name.

The sporty one was named Sandy while the sleepy one, Puffy.

The Warning Label

Have no idea how to tell its gender, so everybody had to take the pet shop owner's word for it that both are females.

It came with a warning though :

• Do not feed them with anything that contains salt;
• Return one in exchange for another if the two cannot live in peace with each other;
• Blow at them to stop them from fighting.

With those reminders recited by Danish, we were ready to take care our little guests for the weekend.

The Unthinkable Happened!

My son was so occupied with these little creatures that he hardly touched his Xbox the whole weekend.

His buddies around the world must have wondered what happened to their "clan" leader.

He played with them, re-arranged the gadgets in the cage several times. Kept watching him most of the time and feeding them. Yes, he blew at them several times too.

He had gotten attached to our two guests, but he needed to return them to the school for his classmate's turn to care for a few days.

Just as Danish turned-in for the night on Sunday, the two started fighting. Heard shrieks several times and stopped the two from fighting, but then it became intense.

Could not really figure out which one is attacking the other, but after a long, patient watch, it finally turned out that Puffy was the attacker. It kept chasing after Sandy and attacked her.

Did not expect such small creatures can inflict wounds that badly. I stopped the fighting and took Sandy out.

The First Aider

Sandy had wounds and was bleeding from her tail and left hind leg. She was shaking in fear and licking her wounds.

I had to stop the bleeding by applying a light compression on the wounds with a damped tissue.

Little spots of red blood on the tissue. So unfortunate.

Since we had nothing to separate the two, I had to put Sandy back in. I decided to sleep at the living room, near the cage for the night hoping to stop more attacks if it happened.

Nothing happened... or was I fast a sleep?

Err... anyway, I checked Sandy again in the morning for fresh wounds before Danish returned it to his class, with a reminder to let his teacher know that these two were fighting and the exchange be done quickly.

The Bad News

A few days had passed and it was Friday again.

Danish, for whatever reason was entrusted to take care of it through the weekend again. He was more excited to be selected again then proud and could not wait to take them back.

Before noon, a fight broke out again in Hamster Villa. The whole class was distracted with the loud shrieks and Sandy was hurt much more seriously.

She was bloody with cuts on various parts of her body. She was not doing well at all.

Before the bell rang, she died!

Everyone in the class was somber. Danish in particular cried when he told the happenings leading to Sandy's "demise" to my wife when he reached home with Puffy.

"Puffy, The Hampire Killer" I named her. Then again, she is still cute.

I was quite disappointed that nothing was done to prevent the death of Sandy, despite telling the teacher what had happened. A prompt exchange at the pet store would have saved her life.

She would have endured repeated attacks and sufferef quite a lot.

Now I Remember...

I think I am growing old too fast. My memory ditched me!

I finally remembered that we do have a plastic hamster cage that we bought for Danish's red-eared sliders before!

We could have separated the two! We would have been more willing to donated the plastic cage to his school! There would be double the joy since two pupils could take care one each.

Why did I not remember that? Why only now? I could have saved a life! However minute. My wife and I felt bad every time we thought of Sandy.

Now we have Puffy at home, and what a cute little creature she is... despite being a "murder". Call it unconditional love if you will. You just cannot fault her, not when she's that cute! Its mother nature.

We love you Sandy. May you rest in peace.