Flashback from 2000: I am in a library in Rolling Meadows, Illinois. I am there to return some books that I had borrowed. Sitting on the library counter oblivious to all the activity around her is a huge, white cat with brown marks over her eyes that end up in an inverted V on her forehead. This is the biggest cat I have ever seen in my life! However, having grown up with dogs, cats, birds, you name it… I am compelled to pet this giant of a cat. “May I?” I ask the lady at the counter, my hand hovering over the cat’s head. “Sure, sweetheart” she answers with a smile. And thus, I was introduced to the Ragdoll cat breed. I fell in love with her (I’ve forgotten her name now), and resolve to get one for myself. I am hooked!

The next few days, I am on the internet researching about the breed, and am falling more and more in love with this particular breed. I bought the “Guide to Owning a Ragdoll Cat” on Amazon, then began looking for a breeder. Alas, my dream of owning one was not to be realized when we had to return to the Philippines. I was crushed. Upon returning here, I made inquiries and learned that no one knew about the breed even in Manila, and you had to get one from the States. I thought this would be an impossible dream…

Fast Forward to 2012: I happen to think back on the time when I chanced upon this beautiful cat called the Ragdoll 12 years ago. On a whim, I find myself on http://www.sulit.com.ph typing “ragdoll cat”. Lo, and behold, to my delight, there are ragdolls already in the Philippines! Yey! I ask my husband and the kids if they would like to have a new pet (we already had a puspin – short for Pusang Pinoy – we call Rex), to which my husband said “no” and the kids said “yes!” Finally, after convincing my husband we would like the cat as a collective Christmas present, he relented.

To make the story short, on November 24, we finally picked up our new 3 1/2-month old ragdoll cat who we named Rocky. He immediately became the darling of the family – especially my husband. My daughter commented to me once, “Well, look at the one who didn’t want another cat!” when she would see how much my husband would cradle and play with Rocky. RD adores him to death and loves to have him sleep with him in bed or on his lap. He just loves his new playmate!

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