Cat litter Glaze

The Forno or Kiln is finished. Meaning, now Minahasa Lagoon has its own mini pottery city. It took us much longer to build it and get it up and running as originally anticipated, but the result is stunning; Guests already enjoy trying their talent on the wheel, and within one week  get to take back home their ceramic vase or whatever they chosen to create.

Now heavily into research for natural ways of producing a glaze for a second firing of the ceramic items, I found out that Cat Litter is actually fabricated from very delicate fine clay material. The chemical binders it contains help apparently when added with a slip (the coating liquid in which the ceramic is dipped for better contact with the glaze) Cat Litter actually glazes in a light beige tone and can be colored with all sorts of household products; Toothpaste, Pot Cleaner, Pummis Stone (Rottenstone) and more…

Now being in Manado on the edge of the Jungle, already having kidnapped three pottery boys from a remote village in the mountains and dragged them to the Sea front – is a huge change in their venues. When trying to explain my incredible discovery (they never glazed or produced a second burning on their ceramic…) I cam across a very odd cultural barrier. Explain to someone who eats cats and dogs (sorry you sensitive peeps out there,  but there are cultures slightly different than America or City peeps) – and having a product that is designed to train a cat to poop into a box while living twenty stories high above the city – is an impossible task! They were soooo amused about the cat litter. At first they refused to join my hands in the bucket trying to dissolve the litter, thinking it was cat shit it self. I did not make any sense by explaining we (city peeps…)  paid equal to three days of an Indonesian salary for a five kilo bag of cat litter, advertising a snow white Persian cat happily sitting in a litter box. I actually felt rather silly! Keep in mind, the fact that we purchase clay to make the pottery in the States/the other Worlds – is amusing in it self; heck, there is more stuff in the ground than humans could ever spin into pots and vases…

In the end, the first burning was successful but the cat litter-glaze did not work. Now we are on to a secound firing; using Baby powder and Alka-Seltzer with Rolaids. The Calcium indeed colored the pottery light blue, the glaze stayed on! (there is 10% cat litter in it)

Shall I write down the recipes? My God, I once was a chef…

I’m completely occupied these next two weeks with studying everything my little head needs to learn about PADI diving to participate with the Dive Instructor exam. In the mean while Q is jetting around the world as ever; maybe even ending up in my neck of the woods for a visit?  I do crave some sort of “normality’s”. The fact I have no curtains in my home for four weeks is utterly bothersome. But heck, it all just takes a while and in the end it gets done. Bring me the whip!

Check out the new website for www.MinahasaLagoon.com and come visit us.

Greetings from afar,

Raphael