HANGZHOU, Feb. 26 (Xinhua) -- Li Dama, 29, left his hometown and has worked in Hangzhou for almost a decade. Li constantly felt alone until he met Wangcai, a stray dog, two years ago.
As a courier, he delivers over 100,000 parcels a year, and Wangcai is an eye-witness.
Every day Wangcai would sit next to Li on his electric tricycle, guarding the vehicle when Li would walk away to deliver the parcels.
Li met Wangcai on a cloudy day in March 2017 not far from his courier station. Looking at the dirty, thin and small thing, Li felt sorry and bought some sausages to feed him.
"He did not dare come near me at first. So I threw the sausages at him from some distance, having no idea that he would follow me everywhere I went after that," Li recalled.
Wangcai was just a puppy at the time. Li could not bring himself to abandon him. He took him in and named him Wangcai (meaning Fortune in Chinese).
He even made him a kennel using a cardboard box in his dorm. In a narrow, small room of about 10 square meters, Li and his three other colleagues squeeze into two bunk beds. The new "roommate" received a warm welcome.
"The next morning when I was about to go to work, Wangcai looked at me eagerly, expecting to go with me. I thought he was afraid of being abandoned again," Li said.
"Come on then," he patted on the tricycle seat. Wangcai jumped on it cheerfully. Li delivers an average of over 400 parcels every day. Sometimes he even does not have time for lunch, but he would always remember to buy some sausages for Wangcai.
The container attached to tricycle does not have a lock, and big packages needed to be transported on top of it, which made it an easy target for thieves.
However, Li never lost a single parcel since Wangcai started tagging along. "Wangcai would become very vigilant and bark if a stranger came near the vehicle."
Li said delivering parcels could be very dull and tiring, especially when alone. "With the company of Wangcai, I was much happier."
Even some residents on his delivery route became emotionally attached to Wangcai. Every time they received their parcels, they naturally asked about the dog.
But Li's landlord does not allow pets. Reluctantly, Li had to take Wangcai to his hometown in the neighboring Anhui Province before the Lunar New Year.
After the festival, Li came back alone. Though he has been back at work for about two weeks, he feels empty whenever he sees the space where Wangcai sat on the tricycle seat or the empty kennel under the bed.
Li said Wangcai was afraid of firecrackers back home, and his six-year-old son would hold the dog in his arms to comfort him.
"Wangcai used to be my family in the city. Now he lives with my son. I miss my son and my dog," he said with tears welling up. Enditem
