Must Love Dogs: Preeti, Unfiltered!

Blunt, big-hearted and endlessly busy, Preeti Sharma’s life is marked by grit, reinvention and dogs – lots of dogs. Elizabeth Kerr reports

Do not ask Preeti Sharma what she thinks of anything because you’re likely to get her unvarnished opinion. There’s a colourful, slightly profane way to describe how much energy the Discovery Bay multi-hyphenate has for nonsense, so unless you can take the brutal truth, don’t ask for her thoughts. Which is not to say that if you do get into a rambling conversation with the 51-year-old Delhi native you’ll get anything less than a welcoming and at times shockingly naked exchange about, in no particular order: choices, self-determination, dogs and food.

Preeti’s an easy woman to ramble with too, particularly given her straightforwardness and tendency to phrases like, “Oh, all that gunk on samosa chaat is the best part!” Only a woman who’s truly lived would see the beauty of gunk.

On this afternoon Preeti is sitting at a Starbucks in IFC, dressed for work in casual striped pants and sneakers. She’s drinking coffee, entirely unconcerned with the impact of caffeine; she can’t recall the last time she had an early night anyway. But she looks far from fatigued. Work right now consists of caring for her 15 dogs, three of whom are fosters; put ting the finishing touches to her welfare trust that donates to Philippine feeding programmes, and Hong Kong and Indian elder care NGOs and pet rescues; running DB’s My Pet Shop in the Nor th Plaza (find it on Facebook: mypetshopdb); teaching Indian cooking and catering through Preats Kitchen (find it on Instagram: preats.kitchen) and, somehow, teaching IB-level mathematics privately – around the world. She has an online class this evening with a student in the UK.

“That’s my life. Last year, I think I fostered about 39 or 40 dogs, all of them adopted out,” Preeti states proudly. “I’ve applied for Section 88 as we’re changing the shop into a welfare trust, and 10% from our earnings will go to that. I want to pay the bills but I also want to make sure that this pet shop does more for animal and human welfare.” She pauses for a split second. “I’m also blessed with my four helpers. They all love dogs.”

Preeti’s road from essentially Delhi street kid to Hong Kong professional philanthropist started when she first came to Hong Kong for a job in 1993. She was 18 and rolled the dice thinking she could do better for herself, and started working as a waiter before getting a chance to go behind the scenes in the city’s kitchens. A natural cook, she took advantage of the opportunity and years later, 2024 to be exact, opened her own kitchen. “I’ve started taking limited orders for Indian food. All the proceeds go towards my dogs.”

Things took a turn when she got married quite young and had her son. The son was great; the rest of it not so much. “Three days in I knew my marriage was never going to work, but because I was rooted to my culture, I thought I’d try and make it work,” Preeti states matter-of-factly before launching into the kind of private details most people try and keep buried. The couple argued over a second child, and things got so bad Preeti contemplated taking her life. Now she recalls the moment that pulled her back from the brink.

“The kids hugged me tightly one day and though I’d stepped off the track I thought, ’I can’t take their lives from them.’ They trusted me. I used to be a people pleaser but that day, for the first time I said, ‘I don’t give a…’ I’m not the same person as I was before.” She sunk eight years into a fight for a divorce and custody of her children; the kids took her maiden name and no one has ever looked back.

The Sharmas have a nickname for the man who is no longer part of their lives, but Preeti gives credit where it’s due. “He did give me my kids. And how many people get to have a relationship with their own self? How many actually know themselves? I spent a lot of time reinventing myself; I had to go back to the trestle to see what was missing in my childhood. My kids were not going to miss anything.”

Part of Preeti reestablishing a so-called normal life for the family involved relocating to DB and taking a teaching position, just in time for the children to start demanding pets. Though she grew up with four dogs and a cat in Delhi, Preeti was under the impression pets cost a fortune in Hong Kong. Discovering they didn’t, she decided to indulge her kids and adopt a puppy: Shadow, who has become the “alpha and the king of the house, and speaks Hindi”.

Then came the two-million-dollar Indigo. Another rescue in 2020, Indigo turned out to have a mysterious health issue that became so persistent Preeti wound up spending the equivalent of a down payment on a flat for her care. Her vet advised stopping, and most people simply thought she was crazy to spend that much money on an animal (tell that to pet owners). She had her kids’ support on her decisions, and DB dog lovers came through when she was down to her last pennies. After animal adoption advocate Catherine Lumsden (of Catherine’s Puppies) posted the story on socials, Preeti had thousands of dollars in donations.

“Indigo’s the love of my life. Those [vet] bills remind me how she brought me close to animals and their lives and feelings. I think it was a lesson I learnt about compassion. I call her my Buddha,” Preeti says. “I’ve struggled all my life. I grew up poor and begging on the streets. You can always get more money.” Whenever the chance arises to repay some of the kindness, Preeti takes it, calling it the best kind of karma.

Now, three decades on, she’s an unapologetic single mother of a 26-year-old son on the way to a career as a pilot, and a 24-year-old daughter heading into a Master of Education programme. She’s a small business owner, after purchasing My Pet Shop from its previous proprietor, who thought she was the logical choice to take over as a longtime customer. She’s an active philanthropist and a major pillar of the DB community 12 years in, with an email signature that says: ‘Preeti, Garv, Sonal… Shadow, Bailey, Indigo, Whiskey, Zac, Ivy, Chloe, Mocha, Simba, Nala, Biscuit & Preet.’ Only three of those listed are bipedal.

Preeti works to live, and to give back to those in need, not because it’s a tax write-off; just because it’s right. On top of that her openness about her life is another service, a way to destigmatise many of the challenges she’s faced. Preeti’s not Superwoman: she has her lonely moments and probably works too much, but she has no regrets. Plus she has her dogs, and someone new is always coming through her kitchen door.

“In everything there’s a yin yang. You need both. You’re lucky if you never see the downsides of life,” she finishes. “Come to my kitchen and we’ll cook together. We’ll make samosa chaat with all the gunk.” Deal.