I was only a witness. We were finished partying like it was 1999, because 2000 had arrived already without a bang or even a wimper - a hangover, certainly, but aside from that, everything was just the same all over again.
We congregated at a little underground cafe on Agricola Street that was actually some artist's house. He used to throw “private” parties at which he sold beer and everyone smoked the ganga and live music thrived for a little while.
This artist had a cat who had kittens. One day, I was sitting on a couch outside the front door, and I saw the momma leave the cafe. The door was still open, though, and one of her brave kittens followed her out onto the sidewalk. Agricola Street is a fairly busy street. The buildings spring up right out of the sidewalk without any grassy yards or gardens - nowhere to hide, in other words, if you're a cat. It was the first time any of the kittens had left the cafe, and this one immediately sought shelter under a car that was parked in front of the cafe. Cars sped by, and if a human were to lie down on the sidewalk to get a better sense of the cat's perspective, she would discover that cars, from that vantage point, possess extraordinary agression and insensitivity.
Momma cat suddenly appeared, having noticed that one of her kittens was outside in the brutal dangerous world. She didn't utter a sound, but she sat upright on the sidewalk facing her kitten, who sat in the same posture. They stared into each other's eyes for several long moments. Then momma pounced away.
The kitten calmly walked back into the cafe. Inside, the other kittens formed a semicircle facing the adventurous one, and they all sat upright making eye-contact for several long moments. Afterwards, they dispersed and started playing again, behaving the way that we expect kittens to behave.
I'm no scientist, and I have no experimental data, but I'm convinced that a form of telepathic communication occurred between those cats. The mother warning her offspring to stay away from the road. They emitted no sounds, and body language too was absent, unless it was too subtle for me to see.
They simply exchanged the pertinent information and continued on with their lives. We could speculate forever about how they did it, but I just prefer to wonder.
