Some childhood memory has made me forever wary of wolves, dogs, foxes and their ilk. Here, I extend my sincere apologies to all dog lovers, nay animal lovers, Maneka Gandhi,Jane Goodall,Greenpeace, PETA and all such individuals and groups of people who deem it fit to equate humans to our animal/canine brethren.The wild varieties one encounters only inside the safety of the wire mesh enclosures, whereas , the domesticated variety is encountered almost anywhere. From posh drawing rooms, to seedy garages.
The block I live in comprises of four flats. We occupy the ground floor.My family comprises of only humans, no dogs.The two neighbours on the first floor have pet dogs , of the exotic breeds too. There is a huge , shaggy, St.Bernard called Sugar,and a frisky labrador called Alex . The block in front houses a black labrador who goes by the name of Scooby( a misnomer, for if I remember correctly, Scooby was a Great Dane). Then there is a flea-ridden, hairless, stray bitch who has been adopted by my next door neighbour(in a spirit of canine camaraderie), who consumes all the uneaten and inedible portions of tandoori chicken with gusto.Needless to mention, the bitch, thereby , does an immense favour to the punjabi couple and the quantum of garbage ,produced by them.
When we moved in, the garage had been lying empty and unused for quite some time. A friendly neighbour decided to help himself to the empty space and parked his huge ,glistening white sedan there.(His own garage being full of packing boxes, the bane of all army men ).
But the appearance of the roaring metal beast did nothing to deter a determined group of stray dogs from setting up camp there. When we moved in , we requested the neighbour to kindly withdraw your sedan(if you please),and he complied. But the dogs, (being dogs), put up a' dogged' resistance.All 'doggerels" of appeasement fell on deaf flea-bitten ears. There must have been ten odd of parents, siblings, pups put together.They set up a regular howl of protest, barking at our mere presence.Any trip to and fro, the kids school, shopping complex, or the workplace, was fraught with embarrassing cacophonous howls and angry barks, not to mention the potential danger of bites.Canine crowds would growl, blood-curdingly, from beneath parked cars, and chase shoppers overloaded with groceries. Many a time , yours truly has had to make a panting breathless,sorry arrival into the foyer, deprived of footwear and groceries scattered all over the driveway.
Dogs being' dogmatic' in their disapproval of the scheme of things,we took to keeping the garage shutters lowered,at all times, (after having checked the automobile underside for glistening pairs of yellow eyes and warning growls).
Gradually, the dogs dispersed,and peace reigned once more.
Then the pets moved in.
Dog poop reappeared on immaculately trimmed lawns.Because you cannot' tell a dog from its poop', after weeks of patiently cleaning the lawn, we erected a makeshift fence made of green netting .When we arrived, we had found these fences everywhere, and were puzzled. Now , we had the answers .
Some weeks earlier, the stray bitch gave birth to a pair of black and white pups, which surprised everyone in the neighbourhood. Being emaciated, she didn't seem pregnant at all.The upstairs neighbours'(Sugar's keepers) garage was vacated in a moving show of magnanimity and canine solidarity. Anti-flea powders and left over chapatis were showered upon her. The only protest came from a possessive Sugar who was likely to greet her competitor with a half-friendly swipe of hairy paw, whenever the two met.
Now, any postman, milkman or newspaperwallah had to contend with three sets of stranger-danger barks. No wonder, our leaking taps and flickering bulbs remained unattended, despite repeated complaints.Dogs were in , so humans were out. Classic Arab and the camel scenario.
One morning, Alex and Sugar, normally quiet, went berserk.Their loud lion-like barks were interspersed with plaintive squeals of the stray. An intruder dog, as emaciated and hairless as the stray herself, if not more, had crept into the garage and mauled both the pups.
Now we could correctly say that our neighbourhood had" gone to the dogs".What we had just witnessed was a "dog-fight" to the finish, no less.
The block I live in comprises of four flats. We occupy the ground floor.My family comprises of only humans, no dogs.The two neighbours on the first floor have pet dogs , of the exotic breeds too. There is a huge , shaggy, St.Bernard called Sugar,and a frisky labrador called Alex . The block in front houses a black labrador who goes by the name of Scooby( a misnomer, for if I remember correctly, Scooby was a Great Dane). Then there is a flea-ridden, hairless, stray bitch who has been adopted by my next door neighbour(in a spirit of canine camaraderie), who consumes all the uneaten and inedible portions of tandoori chicken with gusto.Needless to mention, the bitch, thereby , does an immense favour to the punjabi couple and the quantum of garbage ,produced by them.
When we moved in, the garage had been lying empty and unused for quite some time. A friendly neighbour decided to help himself to the empty space and parked his huge ,glistening white sedan there.(His own garage being full of packing boxes, the bane of all army men ).
But the appearance of the roaring metal beast did nothing to deter a determined group of stray dogs from setting up camp there. When we moved in , we requested the neighbour to kindly withdraw your sedan(if you please),and he complied. But the dogs, (being dogs), put up a' dogged' resistance.All 'doggerels" of appeasement fell on deaf flea-bitten ears. There must have been ten odd of parents, siblings, pups put together.They set up a regular howl of protest, barking at our mere presence.Any trip to and fro, the kids school, shopping complex, or the workplace, was fraught with embarrassing cacophonous howls and angry barks, not to mention the potential danger of bites.Canine crowds would growl, blood-curdingly, from beneath parked cars, and chase shoppers overloaded with groceries. Many a time , yours truly has had to make a panting breathless,sorry arrival into the foyer, deprived of footwear and groceries scattered all over the driveway.
Dogs being' dogmatic' in their disapproval of the scheme of things,we took to keeping the garage shutters lowered,at all times, (after having checked the automobile underside for glistening pairs of yellow eyes and warning growls).
Gradually, the dogs dispersed,and peace reigned once more.
Then the pets moved in.
Dog poop reappeared on immaculately trimmed lawns.Because you cannot' tell a dog from its poop', after weeks of patiently cleaning the lawn, we erected a makeshift fence made of green netting .When we arrived, we had found these fences everywhere, and were puzzled. Now , we had the answers .
Some weeks earlier, the stray bitch gave birth to a pair of black and white pups, which surprised everyone in the neighbourhood. Being emaciated, she didn't seem pregnant at all.The upstairs neighbours'(Sugar's keepers) garage was vacated in a moving show of magnanimity and canine solidarity. Anti-flea powders and left over chapatis were showered upon her. The only protest came from a possessive Sugar who was likely to greet her competitor with a half-friendly swipe of hairy paw, whenever the two met.
Now, any postman, milkman or newspaperwallah had to contend with three sets of stranger-danger barks. No wonder, our leaking taps and flickering bulbs remained unattended, despite repeated complaints.Dogs were in , so humans were out. Classic Arab and the camel scenario.
One morning, Alex and Sugar, normally quiet, went berserk.Their loud lion-like barks were interspersed with plaintive squeals of the stray. An intruder dog, as emaciated and hairless as the stray herself, if not more, had crept into the garage and mauled both the pups.
Now we could correctly say that our neighbourhood had" gone to the dogs".What we had just witnessed was a "dog-fight" to the finish, no less.
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