A true doggy story:

Help make it a happy one

Dear readers,

I plead with every one of you to help and adopt a pup. I have decided to adopt a female pup myself. It’s very hard for me to do this given the circumstances of my own life but I still am. There are seven of them more, three males and four females excluding the one I am taking. Even though I know I need to keep the puppies with their mother for a few more weeks, we might not be able to do this because they are out on the street and it’s a struggle with those who will try to remove the pups again. This time if they are removed, I’m sure they will be taken very far or even killed just to spite me. Please call 0772-261278 regarding the puppies.

I write this with a heavy heart. I'm an animal lover, I love them very dearly and the love I feel for them is just as strong as the love I feel for a human being, believe me when I say this, even as I write now my eyes fill with tears when I think of the plight of these animals. Many are the stories I can narrate but this is not about me, it's about a doggy family I am struggling to help and I appeal to all of you to please help adopt a pup each, there are eight of them. I know this story is long but please have the patience and read.

I live in a rented house in Colombo, and about two weeks ago my neighbour, also a dog lover called me one evening and informed me that a stray dog had littered just outside my gate. I went out and realized that the mother had hidden them in a huge drain in front of my house.

The drain is sealed with concrete slabs on the top and the only openings to it are on either side, and that's how the mother managed to creep in. I tried to look in to see the pups but it was too dark and I never got to see them that day. I was also told that the mother was being chased with stones by my landlady and that she also poured kerosene around the area.

The next day I started feeding the mother because she was too weak and hadn't enough milk for all her pups. Feeding was very hard as my landlady is a very difficult person and I have had problems with her when I started caring for a neighbour's dog (passed away) on a previous occasion.

Anyway to continue, I had to be very careful and feed this mother without the knowledge of my landlady because if she found out, she would most likely take it on the animals - something I couldn't risk.

Every morning before I left for work I would feed Mama dog a big bowl of milk and when I come back, a good bowl of rice and curry. It was sad because even to show compassion I had to do it on the sly. She didn't even have water to drink and I could only give her water when I fed her because if I left the bowl out, the feeding would be discovered. I would have gladly taken her into my premises and cared for her but I couldn't do so because I have a dog myself and he is 13 and very ill. He is a heart patient and I also didn't have enough space.

Mama dog began to connect with me and on the last day I fed her, she came up to me to be petted and I did. I don't think she had ever been touched by a human before and she looked deep into my eyes and I could see how grateful she was. It made me happy but my heart ached because I wanted a permanent solution. TJ

To be continued