By Alike Lira

Some time ago at a show I was asked if I would write a piece about my male Avalon, my cream point boy. Actually, it is still a question whether he is cream point, because his father is a cream tabby point and his mother is a seal tortie point. Since Avalon doesn’t have any children yet, we will have to wait and see. So in the meantime, he is a cream point. But we digress. Initially it was not our intention to keep a male. It was not necessary, because there were two females in the litter, one of which was a red point, and that was just the color I wanted. But alas, it was not to be. Due to wrong supplementary feeding (the mother had little or no milk) the kittens got constipation, and that beautiful kitten died at the age of three weeks. The other kitten was a little less beautiful, so the choice was quickly made: I would keep the male. Then I could enjoy going to the show with him. Besides, I still have a few females from his line, so I could have them mated to him. He looked quite nice in the beginning, so I was very satisfied with him. But I never thought he would do so well. At most shows he became Best in Show or at least Best in Variety. One time he even won Best of Best and Best Over All. And that is something fantastic because you don’t expect that. They even wrote about it in the Leids Dagblad: “Of all the cats in Wassenaar, the Siamese cream point Ekila’s Avalon of Sven became the ultimate winner. NRKV president Mrs. C. Brandt: “This cat met the standard in everything. He has brilliant dark blue eyes, long legs and a long wedge-shaped head with big wide ears, just the way a Siamese should look.'” By the way, Avalon is on the cover of the NRKV magazine all year. I live in The Hague and have a veterinarian in Leiden. He called me in the evening with congratulations and promised to keep the piece separate. You understand that, without being conceited, I became increasingly proud of Avalon. The best part, and of course the most important, is that he has a great character. He is incredibly attached to me. If someone else picks him up to look at him, he always looks at me to see what I think about that. Strangely, he has always done that since he was six weeks old, when a friend came to look at the kittens and lifted them up one by one to see which one she liked best. At the time, there was no question of whether I would keep him or the remaining kitten; after all, they were still so small, and six weeks is a tricky age to determine type. He also always walks with me in the house, beside me, watching my footsteps with his tail proudly erect in the air. Oh well, of course I also bond with all my cats, but you will understand that Avalon is my favorite. He is so sweet. He is now 11 months old and in the new show season he should get his titles. So if all goes well, I am sure you will see him at a show sometime.