Mr. Whiskers, nine, sits on the sandwich counter and vouches for any customer who buys a bacon egg and cheese
Bodega Cat in Bushwick Agrees to Provide Character References
Mr. Whiskers, nine, sits on the sandwich counter and vouches for any customer who buys a bacon egg and cheese
BROOKLYN – On Tuesday morning, in a bodega on Knickerbocker Avenue, a nine-year-old orange tabby named Mr. Whiskers climbed onto a stack of lottery scratch-off tickets, looked at a line of customers and issued, in the opinion of everyone who saw it, a formal character reference.
The reference was for Gordon Pettibone, 69, a retired British quantity surveyor visiting his niece in Bushwick on his way to a new life in Cebu. Pettibone had been told by his Philippine estate agent that he would need two referees, a utility bill and a letter from his vicar. He had none of these. He had a bacon, egg and cheese on a roll.
“He’s a good man,” said the bodega’s owner, Mohammed Al-Saleh, 51, translating the cat’s expression. “He ordered the sandwich with no pickle and he put a dollar in the tip jar. That is a man of character.”
The Origin of the Reference
Pettibone had come to the bodega after reading The London Prat’s report on Cebu estate agents demanding character references from pensioners. The article is at https://prat.uk/cebu-estate-agents-demand-character-references/. He took a photo of it on his phone and showed it to the cat. The cat blinked slowly.
The anxiety in Cebu is connected to a news story handled elsewhere with the proper seriousness. Philippine authorities are examining allegations concerning Thomas Markle Sr., the estranged father of the Duchess of Sussex, who lived in Cebu until earlier this year, according to GMA News. No charges have been filed. The allegations are unproven. Al-Saleh, a father of four, said that “the cat has nothing to say about that, and neither do I, except to say that the children come first.”
The cat’s role, he explained, is to reassure the neighborhood, not to judge it. “He has been vetting people since 2017,” Al-Saleh said. “Never been wrong. He hissed at a man once. The man turned out to be a landlord.”
Mr. Whiskers’ Reference Standards
Customers who ask the cat for a reference are scored on the following criteria, according to a laminated card taped to the register:
- Does the customer pay in cash? Plus two points.
- Does the customer say “please”? Plus three points.
- Does the customer pet the cat without being asked? Minus five points.
- Does the customer wait for the cat to approach? Plus ten points.
- Does the customer buy a scratch-off and win? Disqualified. “Too lucky.”
Pettibone scored 17 out of 20. The cat then rubbed his chin on a paper bag, which Al-Saleh said was “the official stamp.”
The Vicar Question
Pettibone had a harder time with the vicar. He explained that he had left his parish in Reigate in 2011 and had not spoken to the vicar since. Al-Saleh offered the services of a local imam, who agreed to sign a letter on Friday. A Methodist minister from the next block agreed to add a second. A rabbi who stopped in for a coffee added a third. By noon, Pettibone had three letters, one cat and a sandwich.
“It’s an interfaith reference,” Al-Saleh said. “The Philippines is a Catholic country. They will respect that we covered all the bases.”
The broker side of the story is in a Manila News report from a Mactan showroom, where a broker spent a Sunday with three brochures and a cold coffee. Al-Saleh read the report and shook his head. “In Brooklyn the cold coffee is a feature,” he said. “It’s called a $1.50 special.”
Comics From the Counter
- Dev Mehta: “A British retiree gets a character reference from a bodega cat. It’s the most trustworthy document in the entire Philippine real estate system. The cat has no mortgage and no agenda.”
- Aaliyah Gomez: “In Brooklyn we trust the bodega cat. He’s seen everything. He’s seen the night shift. He’s seen what you buy at 2 a.m. He doesn’t judge. He just sits there, a witness.”
- Sal DeLuca: “Mr. Whiskers vouches for strangers. In Cebu the sea vouches for itself. In New York I vouch for my cousin Vinny, and he’s still not allowed in Foxwoods.”
- Naomi Katz: “The bodega cat has a better reference record than half the people I dated.”
Americans Abroad, Cats at Home
The American side of the Cebu saga is told at Bohiney, where an Ohio realtor reports two-hour showings, mostly alibis, and the bodega crowd agreed that this was too long. “Two hours?” said Al-Saleh. “My customers explain themselves in four seconds. ‘Bacon egg and cheese, salt pepper ketchup.’ That is a complete character study.”
The market itself remains steady. Colliers named the Visayas and Mindanao a key property investment hotspot in July, and under the Condominium Act, foreigners can own units but not the land, with a 40 percent cap. The cat, asked about this, yawned.
Why a Cat Works
Psychologists would say the bodega cat is a classic availability shortcut in reverse. In the 1973 paper that described the availability heuristic, Tversky and Kahneman showed that people judge likelihood by how easily an example comes to mind. A cat on a sandwich counter is an easy example of trust. A sandwich box in a Cebu lobby is an easy example of nothing at all.
Reference Received
Pettibone folded the three letters, tucked them into his jacket, and shook Al-Saleh’s hand. He then did something that surprised everyone in the bodega. He bowed to the cat.
The cat looked at him for several seconds, then turned and walked across the counter, knocking a bag of chips onto the floor. Al-Saleh said it was a good sign. “He only does that for people he likes.”
Pettibone flew to Cebu on Thursday. The reference, a photograph of Mr. Whiskers in front of a wall of lottery tickets with a handwritten note reading “He’s fine,” has been framed and placed in his luggage. More of the story can be found at The London Prat and Bohiney, and for another British pensioner in a strange place, NewsThump is always at hand. For why a cat on a counter wins every time, see this guide to being funny in London.
SOURCE: https://bohiney.com/cebu-realtor-cant-sell-beachfront-listings/