“MY GREAT DANE HID HIS FACE BEHIND ME, THINKING THE REST OF HIM COULD NOT BE SEEN”

I remember receiving a call from Tandrali at Friendicoes, saying there was this young pup they’d rescued from a situation of extreme abuse and if we could give him a home— followed by a photo of this adorable, floppy-eared Great Dane, looking extremely scared. One look at him and of course we had to say yes; we went to pick him up from the home he was temporarily being fostered in. Cooper (or Coopsie as he came to be called) came with us in the car, trembling–and was too afraid to even enter the house on day one. In the early days, the strangest sight was when people came home–cooper used to hide his face behind me, assuming the rest of him couldn’t be seen either (given that he was the size of a small pony this was clearly far from the case!). He would emerge much later, once he instinctively realised he was amongst wellwishers. Over time, when he realised he was amongst people who wouldn’t inflict harm, he slowly started coming into his own.

And then came the day we took him to a place with an open space–seeing Cooper run like the wind, bounding about, obviously delighted, his ears flapping majestically–it was one of the most beautiful moments ever. Dogs in shelters (irrespective of their breed) just need to be given that break, that one chance of leading a normal life with people who love them– and you can see magic happen.

(Top to bottom) Rajdeep Sardesai; Shobhaa De; Siddharth Dhanvant Shanghvi; Varun Grover; Vikas Khanna

Devapriya Roy (left inset) and Hemali Sodhi with her dog Cooper (above)