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He’s black (well, almost) and he walks around naked in the White House! But before you jump to conclusions, let me assure you he’s not who you think... His name is Bo and he’s the official pet of the American president. And why is it important for you to get acquainted with him?

Well, for starters, do we know the name of prime minister Dr Manmohan Singh’s pet? No! In fact, we don’t even know whether he has a pet – except for his pet peeve which is LK Advani. But the whole world knows about Bo, his breed and what he has for lunch.

Bo is a Portuguese water dog. It’s a rare breed originally from the coast of Portugal where Bo’s ancestors were the best friends of fishermen and helped them herd fish into the nets and also retrieve broken nets. But the water dogs migrated to other parts of the world following a violent feud with the fishermen after two water dogs were caught smuggling out a mouthful of fish to be sold in the black market and the rest of the breed formed a trade union to demand monthly wages, bonus, medical, LTA and stock options.

Coming back to Bo, his initial enthusiasm on being named after Barack Obama’s initials was dampened when he learnt that the president’s daughters had named him after a cat owned by their cousin. For a dog that’s the ultimate insult. Interestingly, former US president George Bush had a pet cat named India! This had led to protests in Kerala where people burnt effigies of Bush and some even named their dogs after him. In fact, Kerala was reportedly all set to go to war with the US until it realised that it was not a country by itself and the rest of India didn’t really mind a namesake cat in the White House.

Last week, Michelle Obama revealed that Bo likes to chew people’s feet. This led to an embarrassing situation in the Oval Office when Vladimir Putin tried to get up after a meeting with Barack Obama and discovered that he had no feet! Water dogs also like tomatoes and now Mrs Obama can’t find their ketchup bottle. Bo is the prime suspect.
President Truman had once said, “If you want a friend in Washington, get a dog.” But in these days of recession where pets are expensive, those who want a friend should get onto Facebook!