Thai streets are stained with dogs or peppered with dogs or perhaps graced by dogs. It depends how you are rooted and how canines shared the earth where you grew up. Dogs are tied to strong opinions so today I'll walk with care.
A minute from our house the first ones appear. I am challenged. I always am. I stay calm as they lope through the open gate towards me, bristling with a semi-snarl in their jowls. These two are large enough to intimidate. I don't stare at them. I don't move quickly. I greet them in the same calm voice I use for children. The closer they get the calmer their attitude as the strength of recognition grows and my reaction doesn't. They give my legs a good sniff then mill around me before yawning back towards their gate with a detour to the opposite verge. Their tails have a hint of wag. We know each other well and this is always how it goes. But the sight and sound of me is rarely enough, they really need that sniff.
Accepted by these gate keepers I enter the village. At the next fence angry barking doesn't erupt which surprises me. Through the fence I can see the dog with jaunty ears lying on the ground watching me, a glint of chain around its neck. This dog and I know each other and yet we are total strangers. I became as bored by its endless noise as it was frustrated by its prison. Perhaps its owners put a stop to its gate antics. I once tried to be friendly but that just provoked it more. The craziness of barriers. But release it to an open gate and I suspect the dog would be lost, too confused to actually follow through with its threats.
The problem with pit bulls is that they have to be restrained. They have too much potential if the wrong triggers appear. Our village has one and it looks so sad, so grumpy, so ugly. A stodgey ginger lump of unused muscle. It also challenges me but only to wonder if there is anything positive in its life. I walk on and shudder with empathy at its doleful existence.
A young light brown dog pauses as I approach. It lowers itself and quietly slinks away then reappears after I pass and continues exploring the roadside. I don't recognise it and catch myself wondering where it belongs. Me tied to my western view of dogs tied to our homes.
That's it for our little village so I wander towards town a few hundred dogless metres away.
I walk passed a feeding station in a quiet corner that I had first noticed thanks to all the crows gleaning scraps. Every day a woman leaves too much food here for the street dogs so the birds gather. Today several dogs are lazing around ignoring me and the rest of the world. Then I stop and crouch down to take a photo of them. One dog lifts its head and glares at me. I continue photographing. Its growl brings the same reaction in the next dog, then the next. Very quickly all three are barking and striding towards me. I snap away knowing they just want to intimidate me into not focusing on them so much. I trust that I would have to do much more to provoke a bite. A sharp call from a nearby woman who I hadn't noticed stops the snarls and dissipates the aggression into wagging. I don't mind that my theory wasn't tested. Excitement over, the dogs lie down again and I wander on.
Animals hate being stared at. It intimidates us, it intimidates them. So many incidents occur when people stare through nervousness and dogs react back through their own nervousness. And the dogs are riled further when the people start flapping. You wouldn't stare at a group of potentially aggressive skinheads so best not to stare at dogs however necessary it feels.
I walk passed a gate with a large barking dog behind it. I stop to take a photograph but jump when it slides the gate open. A woman slips out then closes the gate behind. I hadn't seen her.
In different places two other black dogs loiter roadside. Both are very relaxed but seem wary when I focus on them until I manage to convince them that I am harmless.
A temple gateway forever guarded by dogs who have nothing to guard except the opportunity to eat. I once provoked a fit of barking from them by being too quick and direct in my approach. Today I take a longer, slower stroll through the grounds and end up with the most confident ones sniffing my ankles. With no food on offer they drift away. A mixed bunch of shapes, sizes and backgrounds, mainly "donated" to the temple by owners with any old excuse. Abandoned is a better word, of course. But I suspect often abandoned to a better life.
In the main market area I only see four dogs. The first loosely follows a man, getting in his way and surprising women by sniffing the backs of their legs. That looks like a fun game. When the man goes back to his food-stall the dog goes with him but continues to freely drift further afield. Pet, friend or opportunist I don't know. On a table beside this stall is a squat-faced little dog wearing a gold-chain collar lying asleep on a blanket. Pet.
Through the glass door of an air-conditioned shop a man is playing with a bundle of hair on his lap. I think it's a dog. I was expecting to see more toy dogs carried around by shoppers and stowed in motorcycle baskets with their feet never allowed to touch the ground. I appreciate the pleasure, comfort and love felt by the owners but I am glad to see my adopted town has not adopted this particular habit yet.
Then I see the high-light of the walk. An old black dog ambling along a line of parked cars. It sniffs a few and pees on another. With a hint of grey on its chin, it seems to know where it's going so I follow. Against the flow it takes a long diagonal line across a one-way street forcing cars and motorbikes to steer around it. It has done this before and knows it's perfectly safe. The market may be hectic but it still has a moral code. Walking behind I am actually more of a problem for the traffic.
It turns off the street and slips down an alleyway lined with market stalls ignoring everybody and everything. It is old but far more graceful then me at gliding between the shoppers. At one stall a bucket collecting water from the ice-covered fish above provides it with a drink. Then it stops and looks up at a stall-holder. She tosses two small pieces of meat onto the ground beside it and I feel warm inside. The dog reacts by looking at them then up at her. House-pets gobble their food at the first chance, street dogs strangely take their time. Only a small meal but it takes him several minutes to eat it.
I chat to another stall-holder while waiting. She knows the dog but not its name. It wanders the market every day and she suggests I should adopt it. To me the suggestion is telling. To tear an elderly dog away from a familar routine of freedom where it is comfortable with friends, strangers and traffic. How the fuck could I improve this dog's life? It does not need saving!
Our little journey together lasts about two hundred metres. It then slips under a stall and doesn't re-appear. The stall-holder is busy and looks a little gruff so I don't ask her anything. I make some assumptions about their relationship trying not to use the labels of owner and pet, then leave. Even when I had moved in front and pointed my eyes and camera directly at him, this dog had given me less than a glance. A dog who doesn't care about being stared at! A crowded market full of strangers trained this dog perfectly.
On my way home I see two toy dogs. A pair of little Chihuahuas smelling the street and each other. I am happy to see them with company of their own kind and some freedom to wander and choice of what to sniff. They stay close to a motorcycle repair shop whose owner smiles at me with a hint of pride but I worry for them as they drop from the curb far too close to the traffic which is much faster here than around the market.
Passing a 7-11 convenience store there is a dog standing by the door. They often do this. These shops and the waste they produce are a good source of snacks for dogs. And they get a lovely cool blast of air-conditioning every time the door opens.
Nearby a dog that hardly reacts to me is curled up by the road at a busy junction. It looks forlorn. I always worry when seeing such a lethargic animal as it makes me think it has been recently dumped and has given up hope. Not being bred on the street makes the lifestyle hard.
Three more dogs exploring beyond an open gateway bark and approach me as I walk passed. Actually, one of them has a severe cough and just stands there hacking at me. I let the other two explore my legs then wander away.
Almost home and the dogs at the first/last house are too lazy in the increased heat to check me out but let me know they are still on duty with a brief howly bark.
One final dog to consider. In the field right beside our garden the farmer leaves a young dog to guard his cattle. Still with the nervousness of youth it is actually the most attractive of all the dogs I have seen today. But he barks. Protecting valuable cows by barking at anything that is not a cow. He is more familiarised and socialised to cows than people so at us he barks. Persistently. If he is level with the kitchen when we wash dishes he will bark at us. So annoying. If I try to be friendly he backs away, barking. If I shout angrily he remembers. My hopeful side thinks he is slowly getting used to our presence. But it may be the other way around. His cuteness buys my leniency and that is probably how dogs originally entered our lives.
On Thai streets this real mixed bag of dogs are here to stay and my point, if I have one, is that their homes do not have to be our homes.
Next time I might do this at night. That will be interesting.
