Lampo

I was yet to attend the high school, around that time my first cousin who's many years older than me [about 15 years] gave me a book. He got that as a merit prize when he was in school, it was by Naryan Sanyal - Na-Manusher Kahini [ The stories about non-human ] , now by non-human he meant about the stories of animals. The book was consisted of several stories like that and most of them were based on true incidents. There I came across the story of 'Lampo', the travelling dog. It was the first story of the book and the last story on that book I remember was about a Amazonian Frog whose Frog-y fairy tale went horribly wrong! Now, Lampo was definitely a real thing. He existed in the south of Italy and the author found his story being reported on Reader's Digest. Later, much later I came across of the actual book based on Lampo in Amazon, sadly the book is obsolete and chances are it will never make it again to the shelves of new book houses, unless one has a chance to find it on a second hand book store. I wish i could be that fortunate one. But at least I still have the Bengali translated book with myself. I found an excerpt to the story -

Lampo, the traveling dog

One day an ordinary dog appeared in the ticket office at Campiglia, a busy railroad station on Italy's main line. A ticket agent named Elvio greeted the strange dog in a friendly way, so the dog decided to stay. From that day on, the dog became Elvio's shadow and was named Lampo.

Lampo kept Elvio company inside the ticket office. When the weather was warm, he would enjoy himself in the sun on the train platform. When it was time for Elvio to return home on the train at night, Lampo ran after the train for a long way and then sadly gave up and went back to the station.

One night as Elvio was riding home on the train , he noticed that Lampo was lying at his feet. Afraid that the conductor would see the dog on the train and shout at him, Elvio pushed Lampo under a seat. Luckily, the conductor did not notice the dog. Lampo came home with Elvio and met his family. Then, after a short visit, Lampo boarded the last train and went back to the station. 

Lampo quickly learned all of the train schedules. He would ride home from work with Elvio every night and then ride back to the station alone. Every morning, Lampo arrived at Elvio's house in time to walk his young daughter, Mivna, to school. The faithful dog would then take another train to Campiglia to spend time with his master, then travel again to accompany Mivna home from school at 11:30.

Soon, Lampo began to take the trains all over Italy. Lampo became famous among the men who worked on the railroad, as his journeys became more frequent, complicated, and mysterious. No one could explain why he traveled or how he always found the right train back to Campiglia. People decided that Lampo was a unique dog. Some of the railroad officials were against Lampo's illegal travels. They were afraid he would bite a passenger or cause some other problems. Finally, the stationmaster threatened to call the dogcatcher if Elvio didn't get rid of the dog. 

Elvio decided to put Lampo on a train going as far away as possible. Months went by and Lampo did not come back. Mivna missed him very much and prayed for his return. Finally one day, a sad, very thin, tired Lampo returned to Elvio's office. Everyone, even the stationmaster, was sorry about what had happened. From then on, Lampo was allowed to ride the trains whenever he wanted. After seven years, Lampo grew old, and he began to need Elvio's help to board the train. One day Lampo was seen lying dead on the tracks. A year later, a life-sized statue of Lampo was set up at Campiglia station.

P.S. Lampo means -  flash of light in Italian.