I took to Ulia when I first saw her. She was only three weeks old then, yet she was brave enough to hiss at me trying to protect her kitten sisters. I immediately decided to bring her home and make her part of my feline community.

Ulia and her brother 2000	Ulia 2003

Note from colleague Barbara: When Vlad adopted Ulia, he already had three cats at home so Ulia is cat number four. Ulia was born at our warehouse in 2000, along with two little brothers and one sister. Mum "Musya" hid them from us, and when we finally found the kittens, they were pretty sick. One of Ulia's little brother didn't make it, and we buried him in a special little spot outside our warehouse. 

The gray baby boy in the picture above was adopted by Russian friend of mine, and sister number two ("Kitty") was adopted by Sarah and Denis. Mother "Musya" was adopted by Amanda McMahon and her family (UK Embassy Moscow) and has since emigrated to the United States. Ulia looks almost exactly like her father "Papusik", who lived at our warehouse for almost two years.

Dad "Papusik"	Mum "Musya"

At the same time our first warehouse kittens were born, our driver brought in another baby kitten he had found. "Belle" was adopted by Tiziana Vigliocco-Cockrell (also from the US Embassy in Moscow) and is now happily living in Washington DC.

After Musya and the kittens were gone from our warehouse, Papusik soon brought in a new girlfriend, who was also called Musya at first but later renamed Mamusya because she, too, had kittens. This was in 2001, and there were five kittens this time. A sixth rescued kitten that needed a surrogate mother was also added to the bunch, and all of them were adopted and have gone on to good new homes.