Arguably, Oscar has found it more difficult to fit in here in Hong Kong than Raffles because he’s not good in the heat. Raffles positively laps up the warm climate and we think it’s because of his Singapore roots. Oscar does seem to have made a lot of canine friends here, as well as many Philippina aunties, whereas Raffles, having to stay on his lead all of the time, has been more disdainful with the other dogs.

Last week, though, we discovered a huge wound on Oscar’s rump, which the vet told us was a hotspot, an inflamed area possibly caused by a bite or allergy that had become infected. Antibiotics were prescribed, along with some silver and sulphur cream but we had to prevent Oscar from licking the cream off or worrying the itchy wound until it heals.

We tried at first to buy a soft cone but the pet shop had sold out, and things like that take a while to be delivered here. I had such bad memories of the last time poor Oscar inhabited a C of S that I couldn’t bear to use a hard plastic one on him again. You try sleeping with one of those around your head.

Jonathan, the Canadian pet shop proprietor, suggested we use a dog nappy to protect the wound, but it would have to be a girls’ one, because of the shape. The nappies are a respectable dark navy, and not the pink or baby blue as John had feared – seriously, let incontinenece underwear for dogs be incontinence underwear for dogs – and, intitally this was a solution that worked comfortably. 

The itchiness has now become unbearable for poor Oscar, though, and he’ll try all sorts of tactics to create a moment for a crafty scratch. On evening walks he stops dead, pretending to be old and exhausted so that we walk on and he can scratch the irritating spot. This behaviour reduced me to tears the other night. He’s now actually managed to bypass the nappy with his teeth and the wound is wet and no longer being given a chance to heal.

Now, when I told people that I was coming here, most people asked me immediately whether I’d be bringing Oscar and Raffles with me. I find this such an odd question. Of course I was bringing them! It was my first condition of coming. Dogs are family. You can’t just stick them into a rescue shelter if it’s no longer convenient to have them as part of your life, especially older dogs who, having been ripped away from their homes and families, have a lower chance of finding a loving forever home. Would you do that to your children? (I have, in fact, left mine in the UK, but that’s another story.) Weeping, I reasoned that I have left all of my friends at home s it is and I’ve got no-one here, and I could not bear it if, having disrupted poor Oscar’s life so much, I’d lose him now, too.

So it is time for the C of S. Let’s see if a couple of days’ respite from being licked will be enough healing time for the wound, and for the antibiotics and silver cream to do their stuff, uninterrupted. As for Oscar: he’s not happy.