Dogs in danger in Bangkok

 

The announcements tell heart-breaking stories, about dogs who disappeared from gardens or patios, or after wandering the soi at night, they never returned in the morning.

 

Where did they go? Where are they now?

 

On my soi, I’ve never worried about the dogs. The soi is a dead end, most of the neighbours know each other, and everyone knows which dog belongs in which home.

 

A few weeks ago, an ordinary Thai dog appeared on our soi. I’d never seen him before, but he was friendly and gentle and made friends immediately with my poodle Wan-Wan. In my mind I named him “Chuckie”. He had a leather collar around his neck, and I looked around to find out who owned him.

 

Then one of the neighbours told me that no one owned the dog. Everyone was feeding him, and finally someone had put the collar on him.

 

“We just want people to think he has an owner,” she explained. “We don’t want anyone to steal him and eat him.”

 

On our soi, who would steal a dog?

 

Then one evening, I hear my neighbour Khun J out on the soi. She’s a small person, but she has a powerful yell.

 

When I look outside, I see her screaming at a workman who’s been helping to renovate a house down the soi. I also see her dog Mee, a part-chow, just wandering around the soi by herself.

 

Normally J takes Mee for a walk in the evening. She tries to control Mee with a leash, but Mee is a muscular dog who does what she wants, and J just follows along.

 

This evening, after the usual walk, J sends Mee inside her patio, then turns to sweep up what Mee left behind.

 

She doesn’t close the gate properly, however, and clever Mee simply returns to the soi, this time without a leash.

 

Then the workman appears. 

 

He’s not very popular. Every night after work, he gets drunk. No one knows what he’s saying, though, because he’s not Thai.

 

What surprises me is that Mee, so aggressive in her own home, is friendly and charming on the soi. She goes up to the workman to say hello.

 

The drunken man has other plans. 

 

He’s prepared a rope and is now trying to catch Mee.

 

The sight of the rope sends J into a rage. “What are you doing?” she yells. “That’s my dog! Stay away from my dog.”

 

The man, not knowing Thai, doesn’t understand what she’s saying. He stands there in confusion, trying to smile.

 

Finally a friend of his who knows both languages tries to explain. “He didn’t mean anything,” this friend tells J. “He just wants to eat the dog.”

 

Call it a clash of cultures, a different sort of interpretation of the word “ownership” and “dog”.

 

J screams again, and Mee, for the first time in her life, obeys the command to go inside her home.

 

The drunken man no longer works in the soi, and J makes sure that Mee doesn't escape, but I still worry. I haven’t seen Chuckie for a week now.