She talks to dogs

SHE claims that a dog told her about what her friend's maid was up to. And it seems her friend believed her.

Ms Lynda Goh, 39, is a public relations practitioner by day and an "animal whisperer" by night.

She claims to be able to communicate with animals. One example she gave was the dog of this friend, who had "suddenly become aggressive" and kept growling at visitors.

Protecter

Through her "communication" with the dog, Ms Goh claimed to have found out that the family's maid had been bringing strangers into the house and that the dog was trying to protect the owner and the house.

She added: "We checked with the neighbours and they confirmed that they saw the maid letting strangers in."

The maid was sacked, but Ms Goh did not give us any further details or a way to contact her friend, so her claims could not be verified.

She is an animal lover with a soft spot for old, rescued dogs. Besides helping friends by "communicating" with their pets, she has started Zeus Communications, an animal welfare organisation made up of volunteers.

She told The New Paper on Sunday that communicating with animals is not about body language.

"It's more like telepathy, bringing pet owners back to nature where we use our hearts and minds to communicate... It is based on instincts, feelings and emotions."

Ms Goh claimed to have picked up this ability last year when she attended workshops by animal communicator Rosina Arquati in Hong Kong.

She said she has wanted to care for animals since she was seven. She would save her pocket money to take strays to veterinarians to be neutered.

She heard about Ms Arquati from friends in the Society for Prevention of Cruelty to Animals in Kuala Lumpur and signed up for the courses.

According to Ms Goh, animal communication is a "much bigger thing" in Hong Kong than in Singapore.

Ms Arquati, a 59-year-old Englishwoman, is the owner of Animal Talk Limited, and has worked in this line for 17 years. She holds workshops in Singapore too (in collaboration with Zeus Communications) as well as in Malaysia and the UK.

Ms Goh said: "For me, it's more for my volunteer work where I work with abandoned pets, lost pets, stray animals, or counsel pet owners if they are planning to give up their pets due to 'bad' behaviour...

"It's not always 'bad' behaviour but owners sometimes don't make that extra effort to understand."

She said she has also helped some who have contacted her through Zeus Communications. Although her training involved communicating with "all kinds of animals", she said most of her work is with dogs and cats.

Ms Goh was also part of the Wish-Upon- A-Bone campaign, an initiative by Wishbone Pet Foods which makes cat and dog food.

The inaugural campaign, which started in May and closed on July 6, aimed to grant wishes that owners had for their pets.

Ms Tan Yu Jia, 21, who owns a jack russell terrier named Jojo, had made a wish to get help for her dog.

Her father had found Jojo abandoned a year ago.

Source: http://www.asiaone.com/News/The%2BNew%2BPaper/Story/A1Story20100726-228951.html