R.A. Puram isn’t as vibrantly traditional as West mambalam. The ugliness of development, and class separation is apparent. The presence of a slum next door makes this disturbing reality in our faces. Another thing that is in our faces is the presence of what westerners typically call farm animals: cows, goats, chickens, and lots and lots of stray dogs (actually there are stray dogs everywhere). There were cows in west mambalam, but not any stray ones.

There are a couple of cows in R.A puram who nap next to the apartment buildings, and dine at the dumpster. In our first week there were also a few stray chickens. We have made friends with a dog, who lives on our street, and can’t help but to occasionally feed him. We think he is getting fed by one of the families on the street, because there is definitely one driveway he prefers to sleep in front of. 

The goat in the picture was hanging out in front of the ice-cream stand of a restaurant we went to late at night after a concert. He seemed very much in HIS place. One night we came home, and found the 2 neighborhood cows sleeping in the garbage next to the dumpster. They were sleepily chewing on garbage. The picture looks sad, but at the time it was funny as well as sad. I think these free cows are happier at least than the factory farm cows who never get out side even if their diet may not always be agreeable. They are both bulls. There are milk cows tied up in the slum next door. I was theorizing that the people living next door can’t afford to feed them, so they let these 2 small bulls wander and fend for themselves until they need them to make another calf for milking. That is totally a theory (maybe a really stupid one), so don’t take it as true. Things like this really make me want to learn Tamil. The cow tied to the tree grazing like a giraffe had a third eye painted on, but I couldn’t get him to look at me to show it off.