You don’t have to be a vegan to love animals. Love toward an animal is not subjected to what goes in our plates.

After traveling for almost a decade and working with children for even more than a decade, I decided to dedicate my life to them; which by the way, turned out to be the best decision of my life.

Traveling to remotest parts of the Himalayas and interior villages, I found one common thing in almost every household – a pet dog.

From small cafes to local houses, everyone has a pet dog and not necessarily a fancy breed. Mainly they were guard dogs – their job being to protect their owners at all costs. 

The further higher as I proceeded into the mountains, I could see big bhutia dogs guarding herds of sheep, protecting properties and especially ensuring safety to small children. 

Coming to the point –Pets have a very positive impact on kids! Kids raised with animals become more sensible and  have higher moral values as compared  to kids raised with an aversion towards animals.

Pets make kids humane

My nomadic experiences have made me realize the importance of having a pet in our lives. It can be a beautiful thing to watch your child grow up with an animal. You can have any animal (except the wild ones) for a pet and you can watch your child blossom into a compassionate human being. 

Kids who grow up with pets are more confident, empathetic, open minded and can develop skills that may never be taught in school. 

As we humans strive to build healthy relationships in our lives, it is high time to take a step back and focus on working on our relationships with other beautiful beings. 

Today I have the opportunity to share the experiences of my travels and the wonderful sentinel beings that I came across along the way. Traveling from North to South across India, I was forced to wonder, that maybe, we need animals in our lives… much more than they need us. 

For many, having a pet in the cities can be a challenge. Many cannot afford one or do not have the time for one. Or on the other hand, for many it is status symbol, to have husky’s, St. Bernard’s in hot cities like Delhi and Mumbai.  

In such cases we can always choose the alternatives: 

1. Introducing a school pet

Having a school pet is not an uncommon phenomenon. It helps children take responsibility and understand the value of another life. With a school/class pet you can assign children with duties for the week. These activities are not for grades, but rather to teach children the value of what they don’t have.

A school/class pet can be trained by the children. As the term used by educators “problem child” – can also find a way to participate in such activities. Children learn to play with their hands, rather than their phones.

Children facing abuse, trauma or any kind of emotional trouble find it difficult to confide in anyone. Introducing a pet in their lives at the right time, could help them in opening up. 

2. Volunteering/Adopting

In our country in various cultures we worship many animals. On the contrary, we are quick to hurt a monkey stealing our food, a cow that ate vegetables , a dog that gave birth to animals in front of someone’s main gate. If you can remember, few years back a barbaric incident sent shock waves across the nation when a woman killed 8 innocent puppies by crushing them with boulders only because the mother dog gave birth to those puppies in a drain under her gate.

Incidents like this sends a very wrong message to our children who goes on to believe that this is what should be done when something of this sort happens.

Desperate times calls for desperate measures. We worship the cow for many reasons, yet she ends up on the roadside eating plastic. 

It’s time we encourage young ones, to volunteer to help such animals and adopt an animal in need and find it a real home.These acts of kindness brings a positive psychological shift in these innocent minds of our kids.

Teaching children to be vegetarian or vegan, while they hurt roadside animals is as baseless as it can get. 

Monkey see Monkey do

A while ago while exploring Ladakh, I reached a small chai(tea) shop to rest. A small family of four (mum, dad and children) arrived few minutes later . Of course the chai shop had many strays around, waiting for someone to drop a piece of biscuit. Upon seeing the kids, my instant reaction was to play with them.

As I approached them, the child too, timidly walked towards me, the mum however was quick enough to pull the child away, saying “there are too many dogs around and they will bite you.” I looked around to see who this vicious dog was, only to find few puppies tumbling around.

I wanted to judge them, but I held myself. I realized it’s not their fault. It’s the way they were programmed by the society and now they pass the same knowledge to their offspring. Soon the children started to scream and yell, every time  the puppy would pass by them while they ate. I finished my chai, paid for it and left.

Animals are NOT dangerous

We humans are afraid of the unknown. We are afraid of something that is bigger than us. We are taught that small is weak and huge is strong. 

Animals are sentinel beings, who feel, understand and see things beyond the human eye and mind. They can sense danger, natural calamities and even death. 

We use donkeys or mules as porters because we aren’t strong enough to carry our own luggage. We pay thousands of rupees on a safari to see wild animals, but cannot donate one penny to save them from poachers. It is high time we reverse this mindset and teach our kids to interact with animals from an entirely different perspective.

The children are our future… do we want non empathetic leaders of the future? And one of the best way to make them sensible is to let them grow in the company of a four-legged friend.

Many times I had to travel at night through thick jungles in search of food and shelter, and I would be trembling with fear thinking I may never see the light of day. 

Quite often while walking for a few miles, I would usually hear a loud roar and I feel the instant urge to wet my pants. “You cannot out run a leopard” – is what I tell myself. There is absolutely nothing you can do to save yourself. You cannot scream for help, you cannot climb a tree, you cannot make a sound. 

 After dealing with such situations repeatedly, you don’t fear death anymore. I realized, I was much safer in the jungle, rather than in the city, where if I was out late night I would never return home safe. 

However I have met a few good souls too who can be portrayed as ambassadors of animal love. Once during my stay in Uttarakhand, I came across a lovely family who own a sweet cafe – husband, wife, a child and lot of pets. They narrated an incident of a rainy night when there was no electricity in the cafe and the dogs were asleep under the table. The owner was busy preparing a meal when a leopard entered the cafe.

He made a loud roar to announce his arrival and all hell broke lose. The owner with no regard for his own life, successfully saved his two dogs and a customer at the cafe. The dogs were scared and in shock for almost a day, but all ended well. 

These may seem as stories from the Jungle Book, but this is the world we live in. It’s as real as it gets. And yes, these are a part of my life now!