Woof !

I sold a Canon 600D to a customer who owns a pet grooming establishment today. As we were talking, I told  the customer about the loss of a customer's dog (which I kind of elaborated yesterday). True to my intuitions, it was very hard to find a lost dog, especially if its a purebred. He gave the following reasons:

1. If the dog was found in another person's house, the person would've tried to return it to its owner.

2. Purebreds, especially house kept ones are not very good in their sense of direction, having being kept in their owner's house for all their lives. Once they escape, they almost immediately loose their bearings, and wander further and further away from home.

3. There is a market for purebreds as pets to unsuspecting buyers, or more sinisterly as breeding stock (Fortunately the Chinese folk in Malaysia don't find dog meat very appealing). The latter occurrence would be more likely if the dog was female as it could give birth to several generations of pups which are worth a lot in the market.

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The first dog that I could remember having in my life was a long haired, dark brown mongrel named 'Duffy'. Duffy and her sister were given to my late grandpa as pups. After I was born, my mom took her to our home and she has remained with her ever since. She was a nice dog with a nice temperament, but she was always ready to bark when strangers approached our home. I still remember the day when Duffy passed away. My mom told me when dogs were going to die, they would do so away from the sight of their owners. She wanted to get out of the house, and so we opened the gate for her. After going out for a while, she strangely came back and lay in front of our gate. And there she lay for about half an hour, until she finally passed away. We packed her in a large box, and carried her to the bush at the end of the road. Boy was she heavy. We dug a hole with a 'cangkul', and put her in the ground before we covered her up. 

We had another black dog named 'Dickter'. Somehow, all the misbehaving dogs in our house had 2 traits - they were black, and could contort themselves so well that they could squeeze between two iron bars. We didn't need to let Dickter out. He let himself out, and always made it home punctually for dinner. After gobbling the food, he would let himself out again.

Unlike Duffy who passed away peacefully, Dickter had a tragic death. He was out one day a few meters from our house when a car knocked him down. The owner then swiftly drove away. My parents and I ran out quickly to survey the extent of the damage. Alas, it was too late. We dragged him back into our home promptly. After a short while (about 20 minutes I think), the driver of our car was asking around the neighbourhood (including our own house!) about the whereabouts of our late pooch. Mom told him we haven't seen him around, and them he left. I remember mom telling me later that he might have come back to take our dog and cook him for dinner! Oh well.. considering that we Chinese eat anything with its back towards the sun, I guess it was true. We buried him afterwards at the same spot.

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BTW, the mutt in the image above is named 'Pug' for obvious reasons. She has a soft bark (and you have to be really close to hear her), and she's afraid of heights. I look forward to take photos of her puppies soon.

Cheers.