My beloved Chihuahua

Our Beloved Dog, ICE.
This picture was taken before Xing Yi went to UK for his final year studies in Manchester.

Animal lover

Many times people will ask me why there are so many dogs in my house. Since young I have always been an animal lover. It started by my being a farm boy rearing pigs in my father 's orchard.This is the main reason why I love all these animals. Once there was a bitch in our house that was sent to the farm due to various reasons . One fine day , my dad told me that she had given birth to many puppies. I followed my dad to the orchard and immediately went to see her brood of puppies ;they were below a tree trunk. Upon arrival, I took one of her puppies in my hand and started to stroke it. My dad shouted to me to let go of it as he was very worried that the bitch would bite me .However,he was very surprised that she did not and instead started to wag her tail and even licked the puppy that was in my hand. I started to have confidence that she would not bite me . This is the reason why I love puppies.

Let's get back to the reason why there are so many dogs in my compound. Well, most of the dogs that were given by my friends and relatives were those searching for a new home for them. One of the main reasons was that they could not bring them to their new apartments as no animals were allowed. The second reason was that they could not take care of them due to one reason or other. At one stage we have as much as 5 dogs.
To date, I still have 2 dogs in my house. First ,is an Alsatian and Labrador breed dog given to us by a couple breaking up ; second is a Dachshund that was given by my relative from Petaling Jaya and finally the last dog was a Chihuahua.

ICE ,our beloved Chihuahua



This dog was given to me by a friend. One fine day , I received a call from a friend. He told me that he was given a puppy and it looked like ET and wanted to give it away. Well, he could not describe it that well so I immediately went over his house and upon arrival he showed it to me. The puppy started to wag its tail once in my hand. He asked me to take him home. Everybody in my house was very happy for they had not seen such a small puppy for we have been rearing bigger sized dogs and not one that was so small.

The next day while in my office , I received a call from my son telling me that there was something wrong with the puppy. Curious about it, I left my office straight at 5.30pm sharp and upon arrival , my youngest son asked me to observe it. The puppy kept loosing his sense of direction and banked into the wall. My son told me that the puppy could be blind!. After our dinner, I took him to see the animal vet. Upon examination, she confirmed that the puppy was blind. She asked me whether I would like to put the animal to sleep which I did not agree. I was shocked and immediately asked the vet for instructions of how to handle a blind dog. She told me that nature had its way and the puppy could move around in my house once it got used to the surrounding. Her last words to me were ,"do not worry for my puppy would be okay.'"

Everybody fell in love with ICE, a name given by my son, Xing Yi. As the vet had confirmed ,he started moving around the house at ease with its surroundings.. I started to train him by sound and eventually managed to guide him to his food by tapping his bowl on the floor every time when we wanted to feed him outside in the compound. Most importantly the main door must be opened before we tapped his dog bowl. Once he heard the tapping sound, he would dash out from the kitchen to where the sound was coming from. With slight errors and some fumbling about, he made it.
His smartness does not stop there. One fine day, we left him outside for we wanted him to ease himself after his lunch as we had to go to the supermarket for our weekly shopping. Upon returning, we could not find him in the car porch and started to search everywhere for him. Finally, we found him at the back of the house. We were all very curious as to how he managed to find his way there so we took him outside and was very surprised that he could travell along the side and upon reaching the back ,tunneled himself through the drain until he reached the kitchen which was at the back. It was clever of him but he started to get soiled and smelly for going through the drain.
A few weeks later he started to go through the grill as the gap was just nice for him to squeeze through. Time went by very fast and he was already going up the stairs to the 1st floor where we were all sleeping.There was only one thing that he could not do and that was going down the staircase. We had to take him down every morning. Once, he rolled down the steps and was very frightened when we picked him up. But that never stopped him and he was back again sleeping upstairs most of the nights.

Many times ,we could not find him for his meal and had to search for him upstairs for he did not bark at all except run around in circles acknowledging his name. We could not know whether he was around for he did not bark. Time passed by so fast and at times he could even sleep in my wife's arm in the living room. There was only a sound that could make him bark, the sound of spraying a mosquito which my eldest son, Pei Yi, found out on one of the nights. My eldest son would play with him most of the nights and even let him sleep on his bed sometimes scaring my youngest son by letting him into his room .Such were the fun and love that we all shared having this blind dog in our house.

The final day came as a surprise for us when he started to get sick and on that day I had left for the airport for a Shanghai , company trip ( 18/10/2010).My son called me when I was at the airport informing me that ICE had passed away in the garden. So sad was my youngest son that I had to explain to him that all living things would leave this earth sooner or later. We just needed to pray that ICE would rest in peace.

These few nights, I still miss him for he would normally move around my legs when I was at my computer work station posting a blog or watching a movie.
This article was posted to remind us of our beloved blind dog, ICE .