If you are Govi and Lap, you should be quite concerned about your future in the property at 61 Kovan Road. Here’s why.
On Monday, something strange landed on Justice Choo’s lap. It is an application to judicially declare whether Govi and Lap are permitted to move into the Kovan house. I guess Govi is a nine-year-old Golden Retriever and Lap is a seven-year-old Labrador.
The Kovan house belonged to the family’s matriarch Mdm Low Gek Huay. She passed away on 22 March 2002. She left that house for her ten children and one grandson. They are free to stay in the Kovan house rent free until it is sold with the consent of all 11 beneficiaries.
But when the plaintiff, the ninth child, 64 yrs old, brought Govi and Lap in, the first defendant, the third child, 77 yrs old, and his wife objected. They considered Govi and Lap ”dangerous and dirty”.
And so, the plaintiff applied to court for a declaration that her pet can stay put.
Hearing the case, Justice Choo wrote: -
“The court is not where one goes to for permission to keep pets...The court is not a dog licensing authority...A person who has a right to move into a house, has the right to decide what she brings along with her...There is, therefore, in my view, no necessity to make a formal judicial declaration since from my reasoning here, it will be obvious to the parties that there is presently no impediment to the plaintiff moving in with her two dogs, Govi and Lap.”
With that, Justice Choo ordered that the parties are to bear their own legal costs.
Lesson? One, and Justice Choo sets the stage here. His comments below are instructive: -
“I am comforted in ruling as I do because I think that the dogs will probably be the most benign occupants in the House. It seems more likely that it is the human siblings who are going to tear each other apart. They had spurned the suggestion to sell the house, each taking her share of the inheritance and living peacefully apart from the other siblings. So now they have to live with each other. True misery is what we create for ourselves.”
Indeed, we are often the author of our own misfortune or misery. And at such time, blood is no thicker than water for the viscosity of hate is not only thick but opaque (if not blind).
Cases like this make you wonder what is the point of having a big house when peace is ever so elusive? Or what is the point of wealth, when hate consumes you?
At first reading, I admit that I was tempted to dismiss it as a petty dispute between siblings. This is not uncommon. But if you read it again, the judgment draws an analogy between animals and human beings. Here is a second read.
“I am comforted in ruling as I do because I think that the dogs will probably be the most benign occupants in the House. It seems more likely that it is the human siblings who are going to tear each other apart.”
The debate is always human-centric. We stand at the top of the food chain. We have overcome all our limitations. We have tamed nature, reconditioned our environment, and drove to extinction species we don’t even know existed.
What’s more, we have applied our brains to unlocked scientific mysteries, invent contraptions that have defied gravity, and build a world of unimaginable affluence and technological wonders. And if simba is the Lion king, we are indeed the king of our world, and possibly beyond.
Yet, the outward accomplishments have changed little of our inward ambitions, that is, the dark side of our humanity. I do not know whether it is futile to talk about this, but strive as we did to lead a life worth emulating, we are still struggling to rise above the animal in us (another human-centric sentiments).
We see this everywhere. Power corrupts even the best of us. Envy robs us of understanding and compassion. Pride drives us to burn bridges. Lust deforms marital passion. Greed robs the soul. And hate contaminates the heart. Even the good we do risks doing it to perpetuate the self we can’t satisfy.
I know my reflection this morning has taken me far from the plight of Govi and Lap. But the connection is undeniable.
We have journeyed a long way from the time our ancestors had first built a tinder nest to start a fire in the wild. But however far we have travelled, with the technological breakthroughs that have left the world both enriched and endangered, what we have nevertheless not left behind is the carnal appetites we are scarce to tame and improve. That abhorrent nature shadowed us like night follows day.
Sibling rivalry is just one of them. Selfish ambitions to dominate the world is the other. Between the two, we are perpetually the victims of our own appetites driven by discontentment, egocentrism and tribalism.
Alas, I do not know what will be the fate of Govi and Lap. They may be the most benign occupants of the house, but there is no guarantee that they will be spared being the collateral casualty of sibling rivalry.
And while the court “is not a dog licensing authority”, neither is it a human behavioural modification authority. As Justice Choo said, “True misery is what we create for ourselves.” And we seem to be quite natural in that department.
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