A Very Sad Dog

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Today i met the saddest dog I've ever met. He was inflicted with the worst case of mange I have ever seen, so much so, he only had a little amount of fur in small patches all over his body. The skin where there was no hair was black and wrinkly and his scrawny tail looked like that of a dirty black rat. His skin looked like old, thick leather and was scabby and very sore looking. He walked very slowly with his head hanging down and his eyes half closed. He was extremely thin, rib cages showing and weak. His feet were pink and spotted, possibly what the rest of his skin should have looked like. He was very down.

Later on, Kelly and I sat in the guest house's restaurant and while we were waiting for our food, saw the dog walking very slowly along the sea shore in our general direction. I had been thinking about his being so thin so ordered a portion of plain rice that the waiter put in a plastic bag so we could take it to the sorry sight. Walking down the rocks onto the beach, after having filled an empty paint pot up with water from the waterbutt used to flush the toilets, we spotted him lying down in the shade behind a rock near the sea. As we walked over, he didn't seem to care about us being near. He didn't look up and he didn't leave when we got there. Gently comforting him, we opened the bag of rice and put it in front of him. He sniffed it a bit and didn't seem to want any. We wondered whether he'd ever been in this position before - a big portion of rice in front of him, without scavenging and all for him. A couple of other dogs quickly realised what was going on and came trotting over, so I made sure they came no closer in case it put the sad dog off eating his dinner. The stopped in their tracks and obediently stayed away, lying down in the sunshine instead. He started eating tentatively and ate what he could whilst still lying down. His stomach was probably so small that he couldn't eat the whole lot, however, he did really well and only left a couple of mouthfuls which I tried to give to the other dogs who only turned their noses up at it.

Kelly put the water pot to his mouth so he could drink easily from it and he did drink. The paint pot had about a litre of water in it and he drank around two thirds of it. He was so thirsty and I've never known a dog to need a drink so much. He stayed lying down with his head hanging down like he was totally ashamed of himself. It was so sad to think it possible for a dog to have such low self esteem and as I stroked what was left of the fur on his head, looking at his lonely eyes, I cried.

There was no animal rescue here and it was obvious. The dogs in Vagator and Anjuna are very well looked after when compared with the situation here. Any dog spotted having any sort of health issue is taken in to the centre and treated. In Gokarna there is no one to do that.
How could the street dog problem be let to get as bad as this? Why had the life of this dog become so depressing?
People don't care. The culture here is so very different from the one we know in England and it's shocking. I've only travelled a few hundred miles within India so far so I've seen nothing in comparison to what else is there. I know I will see worse and I'm not looking forward to it.

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