Zee is a daily presence around the Karori Mall, but, as Lee-Anne Duncan discovered, just because she’s not always at home, she does have a home.

As soon as the Salvation Army Family Store opens, Zee is in the door. With a flick of her tail, she’s chosen a chair and settled down, ready to receive attention and treats. 

“She’s been coming here every day for about two years,” says Serena Perin, the store’s manager. “We tried to discourage her but nothing worked. She’s here pretty much until we shoo her outside at 5pm.”

With the work day done, does Zee embark on the short walk home to Friend Street? Nope. Up she pops to the Welly Collective.

“I had to close for a toilet stop one day at 5:15,” says Hiro Ogata, who was minding the store the day The Local visited. “When I came back, she was at the door waiting.”

Now the Welly Collective store has just closed, Zee will have to find another spot for her post-5pm rests, and for her Sundays when the Salvation Army store is shut. That could be anywhere, really, and Serena lists the other spots Zee frequents – the supermarkets, the liquor store, curled on the cooling bonnet of a parked car, or up in the supermarket’s roof, where the pigeon population is no doubt delighted to have a cat among them.

She may even be found at the Pickle Jar, where I meet Zee’s official owner, Duncan Robin. Duncan tells me Zee is one of three cats – siblings – he and his partner had from kittens, that she is 12 years old, and that she used to be very much a home cat.

'“Until Covid, if we walked to the mall Zee and the other cats would follow for a while, meowing like they were warning us not to go,” he says. “But with less traffic around during Covid, Zee got used to following us further away from home, including to the mall.”

Clearly she liked it, and Zee started spending her days there. “To get her home, we’d have to go down and bring her back. But she’d leave again, so we’ve done this less and less,” Duncan says.

“She comes home, maybe, once a month? It’s not often. She did stroll back in a couple of weeks ago, stayed for a bit and then was off again.” The family would like her home, he says, but Zee is clearly comfy where she is.

“I do keep an eye on her, and she often pops up on the I Love Karori Facebook page! We do make an effort to see her, and it’s great to see her so loved by the Karori community,” Duncan says.

So, Zee the mall cat is not unloved, and she’s not homeless. She’s also not for sale, even though she hangs out in a shop.

“People do want to buy her, but she’s priceless,” says Serena.