It was December when Mama Dog decided to descend from the mountain and deliver her litter on the north side of our tiny wadi. At the time, the south side of the wadi was controlled by my banished cats and the two sides were separated by a paved way that passed through our neighbourhood.
Mama Dog didn’t expect the warm welcome from the residents. She didn’t know that it was our first time to witness such an occurrence in the neighbourhood.
Stray dogs were rare in our area until a few years ago when construction projects started on top of the surrounding mountains. This brought them down in packs, raiding garbage cans and attacking cats as their natural habitat with all its riches that included hares and quails was being demolished.
While nursing her puppies, Mama Dog was given food, water and blankets from our neighbour Khadija and her daughter, whose wall was adjacent to the wadi and offered the nursing dog and her litter shade.
Other neighbours also left water tubs and dry food for her, as every other house owned a breed dog or two. Visitors – especially children – came to see them on daily basis. I was the only one who wasn’t interested in the whole affair, after a few of my cats were either attacked or killed by their kind.
Nevertheless, Sham the helper kept me updated with their news as he passed by them everyday when throwing the garbage. Sham’s updates were to be taken with a pinch of salt as exaggeration was a second nature to him: “Mam! There are 8 puppies in the wadi!” (There were only 5, one disappeared and 4 remained as I learned later from my English neighbour).
“Mam! the English neighbours adopted 3 puppies and the Malaysians took 2. There are only 3 left!” (The English adopted 2 and the Malaysians none. 2 puppies were left). My first contact with the puppies was just before Ramadan when I went to fetch Rocky from the house across the wadi.
One of the puppies was sniffing the garbage can and I felt sorry for him. Dropping Rocky home, I took back some dry food for the hungry puppy. Upon seeing me, he wagged his tail and I noticed that the water tub was filled with green stale water. I went home again and got a new tub and 2 bottles of fresh tap water to fill it with. I realised then what exactly had happened.
The novelty of the puppies had worn off, Mama Dog had left and this puppy was expected to fend for himself after months of being pampered. I went home grumbling to Mom about the unkindness of the dog owners surrounding us.
What difference it would make if each continued giving a handful of dry food to the starving puppy! We decided to include him in the daily feed along with the other Kitzanians.
The following day, I went to feed the puppy and noticed – to my own surprise – that he couldn’t see the food offered to him. He walked aimlessly and kept banging his head into the adjacent wall. His eyes were bright blue, a sudden change from the black ones that met mine yesterday.
Even worst, flies were swarming around him and kept me company till I reached home. I lost sleep and suffered from tension headache the very next day, thinking about what sudden affliction could’ve occurred to him within a day? It was time to get some answers by getting in touch with my friend Mr T, the pet expert. (To be continued…)
