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- Story Listed as: True Life For Adults
- Theme: Inspirational
- Subject: Pets / Animal Friends
- Published: 03/20/2016
Snoopy-the oldest inhabitant of Bharuwala
Born 1970, M, from Dehradun, IndiaSNOOPY - THE OLDEST INHABITANT OF BHARUWALA
I have never been a pet or a dog lover. But I like observing animals, animals that are not confined to the walls of peoples houses. One such stray dog caught my attention for quite some time. Small kids in the colony called him Snoopy and this is his story.
In June 2012, I got posted to Dehradun in a small, old military cantonment of Clement Town. We shifted log, stock and barrel in a typical army fashion from my previous station and were in process of settling our household luggage in the new allotted military quarter in Bharuwala colony in Clement Town. I observed this big tall dog with faded golden fur standing quietly at a distance and looking in direction of our house observing the activity. There was something in him that differentiated him from other stray dogs. He was bigger in size, there was a distinct ease in his gait and though he was too quiet and stable for a stray dog, it gave an impression that he was a much older inhabitant of the place and had a place of importance in the society of four legged. As it started getting dark, he made a soft gaffing sound and moved away in a slow yet steady manner.
Military children like their parents are quick in getting over their immediate past and aligning themselves to their frequently changing present. One week in the new place and my eight years old daughter Nandini and twelve years old son Dhruv had already made inroads in the respective age groups and my wife’s summary report of their objectionable activities of the day put to rest any doubt that we were settled once again.
Manisha, my wife, was all guns when she brought Nandini pulling by her arm and said, “Do you know what this girl was doing today? I found her touching and rubbing herself with a stray dog in the park. A week in this place and she is already on to her usual habits”. “Stray dog... some puppy..” , I asked. “ No, not a puppy.. a full big dog and she along with her friends was hugging and caressing that filthy dog as if it was their own dog”. I looked at my eight years old daughter. She did’nt have tears and that meant that she was not sorry and if my daughter is not sorry that meant in her own opinion she was doing the right thing. “Ok.. what was that”, I asked her. “Dad, it was not a stray dog”. That was enough to get my wife on the scene again and she literally shouted, “Not a stray dog, ok can you please tell me who is the owner of this dog”? Well… my wife’s sharp, shrilling, shrieking yell is enough to generate current in dead wires or to create disturbance in a perfectly aligned dish TV, so my daughter was suddenly taken aback. She quietly retreated to her study table and the matter was temporarily rested.
After the dinner I took her out for a stroll and she narrated the whole story, “The dog Mom was talking about is’nt a street dog. A few years back, an officer’s family lived here in the colony in that corner ground floor house and they had two daughters. They sort of adopted this puppy and kept him as half pet…., half pet …like they took care of him, fed him and kept him in an dog outhouse. They named him Snoopy. The dog was not permitted inside and the parents never took him for walks like other pets are taken. They stayed here for around two years and the dog grew with them. It moved everywhere where the girls went and all children in the colony loved him. Then one day their posting came to another station and they had to leave…., the children cried but their Mommy and Daddy did'nt permit them to take Snoopy. The poor thing was left behind and it kept searching and waiting for them till someone else was allotted the house and that broke his heart. Imagine Daddy, how this dog would have felt on being suddenly abandoned by those whom he considered his family…, but since he knew other kids in the colony and all kids loved him, come evening and Snoopy would be in the park with the kids and the kids adopted him as “Their Dog“. He always was a half pet and therefore did’nt take much time to settle with other street dogs in the colony and adjoining areas. Some kids had their own dogs but Snoopy become every kids dog. Children kept leaving on postings with their parents but new children came and Snoopy kept getting handed over from children to children……, and Dad even you will like him. He is tall and has fine golden fluff and is very nice”.
My daughter has a way to tell things and it sure was a touching story. As we neared our house, my daughter pulled my arm and pointed towards a light pole, “Look Dad, that’s him.. Snoopy”. I looked at him, the same big, tall, golden furred dog with a firm and stable gait who had in his own way welcomed us and kept a watch while we had unloaded our luggage on the first day. Now I looked at him with a different sense of.., I would’nt say attachment but… certainly familiarity. He was not fidgety like other dogs, he maintained his quietness and sure gave that impression of being an older inhabitant of Bharuwala Officers’ Colony.
Nandini called softly, “Snoopy..”. It seemed he made a move and stopped. My daughter walked ahead and touched him on the head and I…, no dog lover…, for some reason did’nt stop her or I simply did’nt feel even once to stop her. He rubbed his head on her open hand, made a soft gaffing sound and calmly moved in the direction where some other dogs were barking. As he approached them, they stopped barking. He lifted his head and looked at them.., a short, calm look of an older being to younger offsprings, and moved towards the center of the colony.
Time passed and I got used to the new appointment, new friends, new habitat and along with it occasional sightings of Snoopy. I could see him strolling on the road during my morning PT (physical training) runs, during my evening walks I found him being fondled by small children in the park, during the day he was seen under the shade of some tree and in the night I always saw him standing under a central lamp post as if surveying the extremities of the colony. There was a peculiar serenity about him. Something like an aged maturity…, like an old wise man’s presence in a village…, an established acceptability. And indeed I observed a few dogs in the area with a typical similarity of that golden fur though none seemed to have inherited the complete genetic structure. Some had the fur, some had the same big size, one was nearly as tall as him but none was fortunate to have the full regalia of the Snoopy brand. The way he moved in all the corners and beyond of the colony in different demarcated territories of dogs with same air of affluence and uncensored acceptance, it seemed that all factions in and around the colony had some sprinklings of Snoopy’s lineage. It seemed to have given him an unconditional acceptance where there was no suspicion of intrusion, no rivalry of male supremacy and no clash of territory. A barking dual between two groups would suddenly fall silent when Snoopy stepped in. Sometimes, I even saw puppies of different color cuddling under his legs in protection or jumping over him when he was resting, while Snoopy looked at them with that soft, kind, satisfied gaze of an old martial seeing his generations grow.
Children are children and they are pure. They love when they want to love and they feel love even if it is not expressed. They don’t love by reason and you can’t reason them out of love. Fierce warnings of “That’s a diseased dog….., you will catch disease from it…, if you touch it then don’t come home and so on..”, could not threaten the kids enough when Snoopy fell ill. I accidentally got involved in activities of an underground banned organization of children that could have been called,’ The Snoopy Revival Group’. On that inconsequential evening, due to some repair work being done on my usual, circular walking route, I took a shortcut through a wooded patch and came out on the extreme eastern corner of the colony. I found my daughter and four of her friends sitting near a culvert and doing something that didn’t appear to be a usual play activity. It didn’t seem to be a snake or something akin as they were not alarmed and moreover they seemed to be engrossed in the process. ‘What are you doing there’? I called out. All of them stood up and my daughter called “Nothing Dad, just playing.., just..playing”. I was engrossed in my walk and so I just carried on, however I faintly remembered that Nandini had her arms crossed behind her back when she spoke. Well, that …. Is a posture which my daughter makes when she is not comfortable answering a query. But I left it at that and continued on my walk.
Next day I was back on my usual walking route as the same had been repaired. As I turned at the park, I was a little surprised not to see my daughter and her friends… and … not even Snoopy. “SNOOPY”, the thought struck my mind like a flash and my feet took me on the shortcut through the wooded patch till I reached the same spot where I had spotted the girls on the previous day. They were there again at the same spot bent on the culvert busy on something very important and oblivious to the rest of the world. I quietly moved nearer, behind a tree to have a look and what I saw was something like from storybooks. The golden furred object of their selfless attention was lying on the side of the culvert, an old piece of rug was placed on his back, there was an assortment of food consisting of biscuits, bread…chapatti and something else. My daughter was rubbing his head with her hand and another girl was doing the same on his back. There was a big size bottle of coke with water on the side and a small polythene bag with something. Snoopy looked sick. His eyes were half closed. He made a weak muffled sound as he sensed my presence. The girls looked at me with a pleading look of compassion and I gave in. I sat down with these little angels to hear their sweet little narrative which went like this, “Dad, Snoopy got sick… real sick, didn’t come to park for three days”, “Uncle, We searched for him all over on our cycles…., we even searched in the Perry Estate colony also”, “ Uncle, Bagisha’s bhaiya said he is lying dead in this corner, Nandini and Paki found him here,.. his eyes were closed as if he was dead“, “Dad, Paki started crying and touched…, and … he opened his eyes”, “Uncle Arshia poured water in his mouth from her water bottle…, he drank very little”, “ Dad, Paki brought bread from her house soaked it in water and put it in his mouth…, he ate very little“, “Uncle, Acia brought this rug from her store and put it on him to keep it warm..”. Well to cut the story short, these little girls, all between seven to ten years of age had searched out of genuine concern for their stray dog friend and having found him in nearly dead condition had coordinated a complete recovery plan in a bid to revive him. I was speechless and I could no longer stand as spectator. I walked to the house of veterinary doctor of the military farm and narrated the touching story of the girls and their friend Snoopy. Sure enough, he being a vet and more inclined to animals didn’t waste any time to extend medical assistance to this aging inhabitant of Bharuwala colony. Three injections in three days and Snoopy was up and about eating an all out assortment of bread, biscuits, left over meat and milk brought directly from the fridge, and what not. The point to mention here is that this group of little girls had carried out this “Save Snoopy Operation” coordinated to the minutest detail in complete secrecy. I had assisted the group mid-course and supported the confidentiality of the entire operation, thus making myself vulnerable to the well earned wrath of their parents. But in the end, all this was more than the worth when on the next Sunday, I saw Snoopy being given a bath, one girl spraying water by a garden pipe and two of them rubbing him with soap and a rug. Having been cleaned, soaped, showered and fed, Mister Snoopy was back with the kids in the evenings and standing silent guard under the central lamppost in the night.
Winters were over and after a short soothing April came the two months that Doonites (people of Dehradun) abhor the most. May and June are difficult months to endure as the valley becomes extremely humid and sultry before the monsoons. The normal mood of the people rises with the rising temperature and decisions are often aggressive. Amid such influence of hot weather and resultant behavioral heat, happened a few dog bite cases and cantonment authorities went on an overdrive on dog-catching and sterilization. Some people resorted to secretly poisoning the stray dogs to mitigate the threat of Rabies. Kids, as always, heard the information in the environment in superlative and there version was, “ They are killing dogs”. Being military kids they had imbibed the abilities of quick workable decision making in heredity and sure enough, Mr Snoopy had a proper, dark brown, old but leather collar strap around the neck. May-June were school holidays and kids were always around to give personal protection to their golden furred friend and thus Snoopy survived the holocaust.
Clouds started covering the sky from mid june and with the arrival of monsoons, the military population got busy in plantation drive and the effort towards the stray dogs was forgotten. A number of stray dogs went missing but the good old Snoopy was still standing and this time with a proper collar strap.
Time flies and our two years tenure in a nice class B city came to an end. Transfer certificates had been collected from the schools, the household was once again packed in large wooden boxes to move to next station of duty and the scene was a little somber on that wet, humid morning. The luggage truck had been loaded and was ready to move. My wife’s friends, i.e wives of other officers in the colony, were there to say goodbye. Friends of my son and daughter had gathered to bid farewell to their buddies. I completed the formalities of handing over the military house and payment to the truck owner. Just before we got on to the vehicle to leave, I saw the same, big tall figure with wet golden fur standing a little distance away. My kids walked up to him and hugged him. I felt a strange emotional surge inside as I witnessed the oldest habitant of Bharuwala Officers’ Colony licking farewell to two more friends. As the Gypsy vehicle moved off for the airport, amid the waving of small and big hands, I still remember the image of Snoopy who once again had been handed over to yet another generation of kids in Bharuwala.
Snoopy-the oldest inhabitant of Bharuwala(dinesh bisht)
SNOOPY - THE OLDEST INHABITANT OF BHARUWALA
I have never been a pet or a dog lover. But I like observing animals, animals that are not confined to the walls of peoples houses. One such stray dog caught my attention for quite some time. Small kids in the colony called him Snoopy and this is his story.
In June 2012, I got posted to Dehradun in a small, old military cantonment of Clement Town. We shifted log, stock and barrel in a typical army fashion from my previous station and were in process of settling our household luggage in the new allotted military quarter in Bharuwala colony in Clement Town. I observed this big tall dog with faded golden fur standing quietly at a distance and looking in direction of our house observing the activity. There was something in him that differentiated him from other stray dogs. He was bigger in size, there was a distinct ease in his gait and though he was too quiet and stable for a stray dog, it gave an impression that he was a much older inhabitant of the place and had a place of importance in the society of four legged. As it started getting dark, he made a soft gaffing sound and moved away in a slow yet steady manner.
Military children like their parents are quick in getting over their immediate past and aligning themselves to their frequently changing present. One week in the new place and my eight years old daughter Nandini and twelve years old son Dhruv had already made inroads in the respective age groups and my wife’s summary report of their objectionable activities of the day put to rest any doubt that we were settled once again.
Manisha, my wife, was all guns when she brought Nandini pulling by her arm and said, “Do you know what this girl was doing today? I found her touching and rubbing herself with a stray dog in the park. A week in this place and she is already on to her usual habits”. “Stray dog... some puppy..” , I asked. “ No, not a puppy.. a full big dog and she along with her friends was hugging and caressing that filthy dog as if it was their own dog”. I looked at my eight years old daughter. She did’nt have tears and that meant that she was not sorry and if my daughter is not sorry that meant in her own opinion she was doing the right thing. “Ok.. what was that”, I asked her. “Dad, it was not a stray dog”. That was enough to get my wife on the scene again and she literally shouted, “Not a stray dog, ok can you please tell me who is the owner of this dog”? Well… my wife’s sharp, shrilling, shrieking yell is enough to generate current in dead wires or to create disturbance in a perfectly aligned dish TV, so my daughter was suddenly taken aback. She quietly retreated to her study table and the matter was temporarily rested.
After the dinner I took her out for a stroll and she narrated the whole story, “The dog Mom was talking about is’nt a street dog. A few years back, an officer’s family lived here in the colony in that corner ground floor house and they had two daughters. They sort of adopted this puppy and kept him as half pet…., half pet …like they took care of him, fed him and kept him in an dog outhouse. They named him Snoopy. The dog was not permitted inside and the parents never took him for walks like other pets are taken. They stayed here for around two years and the dog grew with them. It moved everywhere where the girls went and all children in the colony loved him. Then one day their posting came to another station and they had to leave…., the children cried but their Mommy and Daddy did'nt permit them to take Snoopy. The poor thing was left behind and it kept searching and waiting for them till someone else was allotted the house and that broke his heart. Imagine Daddy, how this dog would have felt on being suddenly abandoned by those whom he considered his family…, but since he knew other kids in the colony and all kids loved him, come evening and Snoopy would be in the park with the kids and the kids adopted him as “Their Dog“. He always was a half pet and therefore did’nt take much time to settle with other street dogs in the colony and adjoining areas. Some kids had their own dogs but Snoopy become every kids dog. Children kept leaving on postings with their parents but new children came and Snoopy kept getting handed over from children to children……, and Dad even you will like him. He is tall and has fine golden fluff and is very nice”.
My daughter has a way to tell things and it sure was a touching story. As we neared our house, my daughter pulled my arm and pointed towards a light pole, “Look Dad, that’s him.. Snoopy”. I looked at him, the same big, tall, golden furred dog with a firm and stable gait who had in his own way welcomed us and kept a watch while we had unloaded our luggage on the first day. Now I looked at him with a different sense of.., I would’nt say attachment but… certainly familiarity. He was not fidgety like other dogs, he maintained his quietness and sure gave that impression of being an older inhabitant of Bharuwala Officers’ Colony.
Nandini called softly, “Snoopy..”. It seemed he made a move and stopped. My daughter walked ahead and touched him on the head and I…, no dog lover…, for some reason did’nt stop her or I simply did’nt feel even once to stop her. He rubbed his head on her open hand, made a soft gaffing sound and calmly moved in the direction where some other dogs were barking. As he approached them, they stopped barking. He lifted his head and looked at them.., a short, calm look of an older being to younger offsprings, and moved towards the center of the colony.
Time passed and I got used to the new appointment, new friends, new habitat and along with it occasional sightings of Snoopy. I could see him strolling on the road during my morning PT (physical training) runs, during my evening walks I found him being fondled by small children in the park, during the day he was seen under the shade of some tree and in the night I always saw him standing under a central lamp post as if surveying the extremities of the colony. There was a peculiar serenity about him. Something like an aged maturity…, like an old wise man’s presence in a village…, an established acceptability. And indeed I observed a few dogs in the area with a typical similarity of that golden fur though none seemed to have inherited the complete genetic structure. Some had the fur, some had the same big size, one was nearly as tall as him but none was fortunate to have the full regalia of the Snoopy brand. The way he moved in all the corners and beyond of the colony in different demarcated territories of dogs with same air of affluence and uncensored acceptance, it seemed that all factions in and around the colony had some sprinklings of Snoopy’s lineage. It seemed to have given him an unconditional acceptance where there was no suspicion of intrusion, no rivalry of male supremacy and no clash of territory. A barking dual between two groups would suddenly fall silent when Snoopy stepped in. Sometimes, I even saw puppies of different color cuddling under his legs in protection or jumping over him when he was resting, while Snoopy looked at them with that soft, kind, satisfied gaze of an old martial seeing his generations grow.
Children are children and they are pure. They love when they want to love and they feel love even if it is not expressed. They don’t love by reason and you can’t reason them out of love. Fierce warnings of “That’s a diseased dog….., you will catch disease from it…, if you touch it then don’t come home and so on..”, could not threaten the kids enough when Snoopy fell ill. I accidentally got involved in activities of an underground banned organization of children that could have been called,’ The Snoopy Revival Group’. On that inconsequential evening, due to some repair work being done on my usual, circular walking route, I took a shortcut through a wooded patch and came out on the extreme eastern corner of the colony. I found my daughter and four of her friends sitting near a culvert and doing something that didn’t appear to be a usual play activity. It didn’t seem to be a snake or something akin as they were not alarmed and moreover they seemed to be engrossed in the process. ‘What are you doing there’? I called out. All of them stood up and my daughter called “Nothing Dad, just playing.., just..playing”. I was engrossed in my walk and so I just carried on, however I faintly remembered that Nandini had her arms crossed behind her back when she spoke. Well, that …. Is a posture which my daughter makes when she is not comfortable answering a query. But I left it at that and continued on my walk.
Next day I was back on my usual walking route as the same had been repaired. As I turned at the park, I was a little surprised not to see my daughter and her friends… and … not even Snoopy. “SNOOPY”, the thought struck my mind like a flash and my feet took me on the shortcut through the wooded patch till I reached the same spot where I had spotted the girls on the previous day. They were there again at the same spot bent on the culvert busy on something very important and oblivious to the rest of the world. I quietly moved nearer, behind a tree to have a look and what I saw was something like from storybooks. The golden furred object of their selfless attention was lying on the side of the culvert, an old piece of rug was placed on his back, there was an assortment of food consisting of biscuits, bread…chapatti and something else. My daughter was rubbing his head with her hand and another girl was doing the same on his back. There was a big size bottle of coke with water on the side and a small polythene bag with something. Snoopy looked sick. His eyes were half closed. He made a weak muffled sound as he sensed my presence. The girls looked at me with a pleading look of compassion and I gave in. I sat down with these little angels to hear their sweet little narrative which went like this, “Dad, Snoopy got sick… real sick, didn’t come to park for three days”, “Uncle, We searched for him all over on our cycles…., we even searched in the Perry Estate colony also”, “ Uncle, Bagisha’s bhaiya said he is lying dead in this corner, Nandini and Paki found him here,.. his eyes were closed as if he was dead“, “Dad, Paki started crying and touched…, and … he opened his eyes”, “Uncle Arshia poured water in his mouth from her water bottle…, he drank very little”, “ Dad, Paki brought bread from her house soaked it in water and put it in his mouth…, he ate very little“, “Uncle, Acia brought this rug from her store and put it on him to keep it warm..”. Well to cut the story short, these little girls, all between seven to ten years of age had searched out of genuine concern for their stray dog friend and having found him in nearly dead condition had coordinated a complete recovery plan in a bid to revive him. I was speechless and I could no longer stand as spectator. I walked to the house of veterinary doctor of the military farm and narrated the touching story of the girls and their friend Snoopy. Sure enough, he being a vet and more inclined to animals didn’t waste any time to extend medical assistance to this aging inhabitant of Bharuwala colony. Three injections in three days and Snoopy was up and about eating an all out assortment of bread, biscuits, left over meat and milk brought directly from the fridge, and what not. The point to mention here is that this group of little girls had carried out this “Save Snoopy Operation” coordinated to the minutest detail in complete secrecy. I had assisted the group mid-course and supported the confidentiality of the entire operation, thus making myself vulnerable to the well earned wrath of their parents. But in the end, all this was more than the worth when on the next Sunday, I saw Snoopy being given a bath, one girl spraying water by a garden pipe and two of them rubbing him with soap and a rug. Having been cleaned, soaped, showered and fed, Mister Snoopy was back with the kids in the evenings and standing silent guard under the central lamppost in the night.
Winters were over and after a short soothing April came the two months that Doonites (people of Dehradun) abhor the most. May and June are difficult months to endure as the valley becomes extremely humid and sultry before the monsoons. The normal mood of the people rises with the rising temperature and decisions are often aggressive. Amid such influence of hot weather and resultant behavioral heat, happened a few dog bite cases and cantonment authorities went on an overdrive on dog-catching and sterilization. Some people resorted to secretly poisoning the stray dogs to mitigate the threat of Rabies. Kids, as always, heard the information in the environment in superlative and there version was, “ They are killing dogs”. Being military kids they had imbibed the abilities of quick workable decision making in heredity and sure enough, Mr Snoopy had a proper, dark brown, old but leather collar strap around the neck. May-June were school holidays and kids were always around to give personal protection to their golden furred friend and thus Snoopy survived the holocaust.
Clouds started covering the sky from mid june and with the arrival of monsoons, the military population got busy in plantation drive and the effort towards the stray dogs was forgotten. A number of stray dogs went missing but the good old Snoopy was still standing and this time with a proper collar strap.
Time flies and our two years tenure in a nice class B city came to an end. Transfer certificates had been collected from the schools, the household was once again packed in large wooden boxes to move to next station of duty and the scene was a little somber on that wet, humid morning. The luggage truck had been loaded and was ready to move. My wife’s friends, i.e wives of other officers in the colony, were there to say goodbye. Friends of my son and daughter had gathered to bid farewell to their buddies. I completed the formalities of handing over the military house and payment to the truck owner. Just before we got on to the vehicle to leave, I saw the same, big tall figure with wet golden fur standing a little distance away. My kids walked up to him and hugged him. I felt a strange emotional surge inside as I witnessed the oldest habitant of Bharuwala Officers’ Colony licking farewell to two more friends. As the Gypsy vehicle moved off for the airport, amid the waving of small and big hands, I still remember the image of Snoopy who once again had been handed over to yet another generation of kids in Bharuwala.
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