Kopi

Kopi is an 8 year old local breed female stray dog. She was born and abandoned by her mum and lived in an extreme bad environment at Eunos industrial park where nobody would even take a second look at her. Every single day was a challenge to her. She would smile and wagged her tail in the canteen hoping that some kind souls would noticed her and reward her with a piece of meat or even bones to ease her hunger.

Sad to say, most of the time the respond that she received was “Shoo! Shoo! Go Away!” however, Kopi was a brave girl, she did not blame the person who “Shoo!” her away but instead, she would still smile and move on to another table in the canteen. When night falls, Kopi would start to worry that she will be attacked by other dogs and would sleep under some big Lorries where she felt safe. Kopi was pregnant twice and after which we brought her for sterilization to end her suffering of being pregnant and also to prevent more poor doggies coming to this world. Anyway, Kopi was not the only one who was suffering, there were many others stray dogs in the industrial park that needs to struggle to survive each and everyday.

My mum loves dogs and cats. Every morning she will go to the market and request some chicken organs left over from the stall owners and most of the time, kind stall owners would give her for free. In the evening, she will cook the chicken organs and mix with rice for some of the dogs living in the industrial park. Kopi was one of the stray dogs my mum was feeding daily for the past 7 to 8 years. To my mum, Kopi is like her own child but because we are living in a HDB flat, we can’t keep her as we are afraid that our neighbors might complain.

On Mother’s Day 10 May ‘09, I happily rented a car planning to take my mum for dinner. We decided to bring food for the stray dogs before we go for our dinner. When we reached Kopi’s place, we were shocked to see that Kopi was having a very deep wound around her neck. She was panting and breathing with difficulties. We suspect that she was abused by some mean people. We decided to call off our dinner and send Kopi to James Tan Veterinary at Whitley road. When Dr Tan saw Kopi, he was shocked to see the bad injury on Kopi’s neck and informed us that Kopi needs to go for a surgery.

Abused by humans

The wound on her neck

Kopi went for the surgery and was hospitalized for 3 weeks. We were so happy that she was recovering well but we requested the vet that we would like to bring Kopi home and take care of her ourselves because I was worried that my savings might not be enough to pay for the medical fees if Kopi carried on to stay in the hospital. So we brought Kopi home and cared for her.

Her neck wound

About 1 week later, we found that Kopi’s neck was infected again so we brought her back to the clinic. But this time, we were very sad when doctor told us that Kopi’s got infection again maybe due to her old age and there’s nothing much he could do, it all depends on Kopi’s immune system to recover and maybe she might not recover anymore. My mum’s eyes were filled with tears when she heard that.


Recovering after being rescued and seeing the vet

Sadly, we brought Kopi home again. But I decided not to give up on Kopi. Through some recommendation, I decided to bring Kopi to another vet Namly for a second opinion. Kopi was given antibiotics and we brought her home again and prayed that this medicine will work on her.

I thank God for answering our prayers. About a week later, Kopi was fully recovered. She’s lively and smiling again! The feeling of seeing her recovering was a miracle and I can’t express the joy for her.

Kopi's wound is drying up!

After some discussion, we decided to give Kopi a home. Kopi is now living happily with us and I hope and pray to God that Kopi will remain healthy for the rest of her life. She’s pretty old now; we will give her all our love so that she can have her last chapter of her life filled with nice memories.

Never have to worry about food nor shelter anymore

But worrying that Kopi might need some medical attention next time and because of my little savings due to my low paid job, I send an email to Noah's Ark requesting for assistance if I am unable to afford Kopi medical fees in the future. And to my surprise, I received an email from Fiona of Noah’s Ark, she assured me that Noah's Ark will be most willing to help if I have problem with Kopi’s medical fees in the future. My heart was filled with gratefulness.

Grandma loves me very much

Thank you Fiona and Noah's Ark, I really appreciate that. I hope that the public will continue to support Noah's Ark by donating if you can, God Bless you all.

Enjoying her golden years gazing out of the apartment

Lastly, I would like to encourage people who wish or planning to own a dog as a pet, you don’t have to spend lots of your money to buy a pedigree dog. Please give our local mongrels a chance to have a home. Owning a dog is not about status, it’s a friend for life, a loyal friend that would stay and listen to you when you are feeling down and wriggled its tail to share your joy when you are feeling happy. Trust me, stray dogs may not be as gorgeous as some pedigree dogss but when comes to loyalty, I can assured you that our local breeds doggies are as loyal as or even more loyal than others.

**Photographs and article contributed by Eric Lim