Culture shocked (again)

Most of you will know by now that I managed to get a job in Cairo, so I'm not going back to the UK to work. I'm really happy about this for many reasons, one of which is that I will now be able to get a dog. Those of you who know me well know that if I have one weakness, it's dogs. Cairo has a charity called the Egyptian Society for Mercy to Animals (ESMA). I looked at their 'dogs for adoption' internet page and noticed an older female German shepherd, named Baraka, which I found out later means blessing. Oh the irony. I contacted the shelter and asked if I could come and see her, so yesterday, off Mohamed and I went to see this dog, and it turned out to be a bit of an adventure.

I thought you didn't like cats?

It turns out ESMA has two shelters, one for cats and one for dogs, and we went to the cat one. It was confusing at first, because there were dogs there too. We eventually worked out we were in the wrong place, and I rang my contact at the dog shelter. She had just left, but said she would come to the cat shelter to see us. In the meantime, the staff offered us a tour. I have nothing but complete and utter admiration for the people that work there, and ESMA do outstanding work in the face of extreme challenges, but, quite honestly, it was awful. There was a dog there with paralysed back legs, although he seemed really happy and was able to move with surprising speed. There was another dog with a missing leg. One little white dog couldn't be petted because her previous owners had stubbed cigarettes out on her back. One older dog had scars round his neck. I decided not to think too much about the reasons. There were several baladi dogs who seemed to be healthy, and were really friendly. I was very taken with one in particular. Baladi means local and is the word Egyptians use for street dogs. And then there were about 200 cats. I have never seen so many cats in one place. Mohamed, who professes to hate cats, got pretty friendly with some of them. The three-legged dog was obviously a good friend of the cats too, as you can see from the photo. Anyway, it was pretty grim, all these homeless cats.

Lots of cats and a happy 3-legged dog

Little did I know that worse was to come.

Two of the people from the dog shelter arrived, and offered to take us to the shelter, somewhat incongruously in a red Hyundai coupe. We sat in the back, and Mohamed was a little too tall to be in the back of a sports car on Cairo's potholed roads! We arrived at the shelter just as their staff were having their dinner, but despite this they happily agreed to show us some dogs. While they were doing this, we were invited to look around. Many dogs milled around in large compounds. They have 500 dogs here, I think we must have seen about 100 of them. There was another baladi dog with paralysed back legs. He was a cheeky little fellow, and having paralysed back legs seemed to be no impediment to him living a happy life. One of the shelter people told us that they feed the dogs to stave off hunger but the food isn't particularly nutritious because they simply can't afford it. I'm not surprised with 500 dogs and 200 cats. Then they brought out Baraka. Apparently, she was probably abandoned in the desert by locals who wanted a pure breed but got fed up with her when she got too old. Quite honestly she was in a shocking condition. She was thin and her back feet looked bad, but worse than that was her mental health. She was clearly depressed and not at all happy in the shelter, and trembled the whole time we were there. Apparently German shepherds don't do well in shelters, and she was being bullied by other dogs as well. We also saw a middle aged baladi dog called Blackie who was really cute and another German shepherd called Kim, who was in much better condition.

The two shelter people offered us a lift back into the centre of Cairo, and we gratefully accepted - god knows how long it might have taken to get a cab or an uber from there. During the journey I spoke on the phone to Mona Khalil, Head of ESMA, who knows Baraka, and I asked her if she thought that Baraka would improve if she was given a home. She said definitely yes, as she had got gradually worse the longer she had been there. She also said "all the dogs deserve a home, but Baraka needs a home". It's an interesting and important distinction.

Throughout the visits to the cat shelter and then the dog shelter, I could feel my stomach clench and my hands tremble at the horror and injustice. I knew it was a risk going, because I really don't cope with these things well. Since that visit 24 hours ago I haven't been able to get the smells and sounds and sights out of my head. Although things are slowly changing, I can't pretend that Egyptians have the same attitude to animal welfare that we do in the UK. There was a horrific incident earlier this year where a dog was tortured and killed, and the culprits got 3 years in prison, but there is still a long way to go. Mona, mentioned above, features in this article which talks about Egyptians' attitudes animals. ESMA does incredible work but it's an up-Everest battle to be honest. I don't understand this because in Islam, the Qu'ran tells Muslims to treat animals with compassion and not to abuse them. So why do these things happen?

Well I am going to do one miniscule thing to help one of these animals. I'm going to give Baraka a home. As soon as I saw her terrified eyes I knew what was going to happen. I do have previous for adopting old dogs, but this really is going to be a challenge. She's an old lady who deserves to spend the rest of her life in comfort with someone who loves her and that someone is going to be me.