Of Cats and Dolls: Bububu and Labubu, That Other Name on Everyone’s Lips Nowadays
- Somewhere, Bububu, the mischievous cat, the rickety train is still humming down a hidden track.
One recent morning, I woke with thoughts of a black cat named Bububu—an elegant creature who once wandered the flower-filled porch of a dear friend. Let’s call her Savannah. She was the picture of old-world grace, with long golden hair that shimmered like sunlit straw and dark glasses resting on her small, straight nose. There was a quiet charm to her, a gentle elegance. Her hazel eyes would light up whenever she recounted the tale of how Bububu got her name.
The story began on a narrow crossroad somewhere far from the South Carolina coast. Savannah and her devoted husband, Dave, a gentle soul with slightly rounded shoulders, a balding crown haloed by flyaway gray hair, kind eyes soft as a tide pool at dawn, found the sign first. It read Bububu in weathered paint, nailed crookedly to a leaning post at the edge of a spice village in Africa.
Curious, they asked the villagers what Bububu meant, and the villagers just laughed. It was an onomatopoeia, they explained, the sound the narrow-gauge train makes as it rattles through the hills, carrying bushels of cardamom pods, cinnamon bark, and jute bags of tangled cloves. A train humming an old empire’s perfume through the trees: Bububu, bububu, bububu, bububu.
They liked the name so much they took it home with them before they even had something to give it to. Then came the black tabby: a shelter cat with eyes like damp caribou moss, who slinked into their story the way steam curls into a fresh cup of coffee. Dave, who brewed the best espresso I’ve ever tasted. Thick, dark, bitter, and fragrant, would sit on their porch with Bububu curled at his feet while Savannah told the story again and again, never quite the same way twice.
I always liked the name more than the cat. Not to hurt the black cat’s feelings, but I am allergic to cats. This “cat” always curled up behind a piece of furniture to do me in. I liked how Savannah’s voice would soften when she said it, like an old train crossing invisible tracks between memory and myth.
Today, I’m sitting in a chai shop tucked into the Berkeley hills, the fog a thin shawl over my shoulders. I called Savannah to ask about Bububu. And to hear the name again, because somewhere in my half-sleep it had tangled with Labubu… that other name on everyone’s lips now.
Labubu is not the train, not the cat — but a troll-like doll with fanged teeth, rabbit ears, and a mischievous grin that’s become a craze. A superstition. A billion-dollar empire. Born from the mind of Kasing Lung, the Hong Kong–Belgian artist who spun Nordic folklore into soft vinyl, Labubu is the leader of The Monsters. A tribe of fierce little elves sold blind in mystery boxes.
People line up outside Pop Mart stores in Bangkok, Beijing, and beyond to pull a box from the shelf, hoping for a rare version: a skeleton boyfriend, a spiky-tailed leader, a candy-colored Macaron edition. Clipping them to their bags. Some pay hundreds, even thousands, for their Labubus.
Some treat them like Thai amulets, talismans for luck or protection, arranged on altars beside incense and fruit. They show up at festivals, drifting through sidewalks, political rallies like good-luck charms in fur and plastic. Little plush monsters to ward off whatever real monsters the world keeps breeding.
But no squeaky toy can hush the sound of a spice train slipping through cardamom groves at dawn.
Savannah told me Bububu is gone now. Curled up somewhere in a softer place, along with so many of the people who once worked in the African spice village she talks about. The Cape of Spices is an echo of the ancient kingdoms that came before.
I think of Punt — the ancient land that sent myrrh and frankincense drifting up the Red Sea to Egypt. Of the beden ships that stitched Somali ports to Greek harbors, to Rome, to Parthian Persia, and India. Cinnamon, gum, ivory, glass: treasured treats and breakable cargo carried in sturdy hulls through the salt winds.
Their stories, embedded in the pages of the Periplus of the Erythraean Sea, I fly away to Mosylon, modern Bosaso: the cinnamon emporium, its docks bustling with traders and sailors, their hearts beating in harmony. Spices packed tight as secrets under the chatter of voices.
Somewhere, Bububu, the mischievous cat, the rickety train is still humming down a hidden track. In their seaside cottage on the Isle of Palms, Dave is bending over his espresso machine, the hiss of steam echoing the whistle of the old train. Savannah is there too, sunlight tangled in her hair, her laughter drifting down the porch steps like a blessing.
Somewhere, the beden ships still glide across the waters. Mosylon drifts in salt and shadow, the old trade routes shimmer like train tracks across the sea. And Bububu, Bububu, Bububu hums on carrying cardamom, carrying cinnamon, carrying all of us a little further into that sweet, enduring place where names outlive the ones they hold. People, real pets, and plush monsters alike, and where something warm, soft, whimsical, and childlike always waits to carry us home.
With one foot in Huntsville, Alabama, the other in her birth home, India, and a heart steeped in humanity, Monita Soni writes as a contemplative practice. She has published hundreds of poems, movie reviews, book critiques, and essays, and contributed to combined literary works. Her two books are My Light Reflections and Flow Through My Heart. You can hear her commentaries on Sundial Writers Corner, WLRH 89.3 FM.