maanantai 30. kesäkuuta 2014

THE LAND OF HAUNTING DOGS

Greek strays are dependent on charity. However, sometimes the cure is worse than the disease. 

Published in Voima 6/2014


                                                     Photo: Toto whose flight was cancelled

Crete is a paradise at the first sight. Snow covered mountains, turquoise-shaded sea. There are beaches and olive groves. Lime trees and rock roses are in bloom already in April.


But for dogs Crete is a bad place to be born as for the rest of Greece. One example: a peasant cut his dogs’ throat. The reason was he thought the dog was homosexual because he jumped on another male dogs’ back.

In Iraklion I meet a man called Angelos. He tells me that often Greek treat dogs like toys. “They get a puppy because it is so sweet. But in couple of months they notice there is too much trouble in taking care of it and just abandon it on the street”. 

Dogs are not neutered and because they go free, there are born more puppies than there are homes for them. Also adult dogs are abandoned, hanged or poisoned. The mass-poisoning are called “cleaning”. They usually take place before or after the tourist-season.

 Animal protectors’ Sisyphean labor is to try and save as many dogs as possible, to bring those to dog shelters and find a new home abroad for them. I visited two Cretan shelters, both run by Englishmen.

Linda Lucas’s shelter is located in Kaina near Vamos. One can see the White Mountains in there. According to Linda there are approx. 250 dogs in the shelter. Linda receives continually new inmates. 

On the way to the shelter we stop and pick up a starving boxer-mix  who trembles from fatigue. The next day they call from a school at Vamos telling there is five abandoned one-month old puppies. Linda  agrees to  fetch them too.

After a couple of days one adult dog and several puppies has been left outside the shelter.
Due the lack of all conveniences  except the agricultural water on water pipes, it is really hard to get voluntary workers.

On this occasion Linda has time to feed the dogs not until at night. She pushes heavy cart on the stony pavements in torch-light. 

Linda lives in a caravan with several dogs. Two dog-invalids are sitting on the caravan floor leaning back against each other. They are looking at me ever so kindly.

 A pitbull-mix was shot with both pistol and a shotgun. The vet operated a bull from his spine. The puppy has got good changes to be cured; he is already slightly moving his hind legs.

The elder small dog was hit by a car. He had been lying on the road-side for days before Linda rescued him. He will not be able to walk again but Linda is hoping to get a wheel-chair sponsored for him.

“It is not hard to get donations. People are willing to help and adopt handicapped dogs. The problem is that I do not have time to update the information about dogs in internet”, Linda says.

There are quarantine cages for puppies in Linda’s unfinished house.  The floors of cages are covered with secretions. Linda has not got time to clean the cages frequently.

The absorbent pads are too expensive. Puppies have to lie on the cardboard sheets which are soaked in urine. They must be shivering in coldness of the nights. The water bowls are filled with excrement.
They know the situation in the association which is contributing the shelter. However, Linda is however too stressed out to take accept orders or even guidance from them. 

I ask by email an opinion of a member of Gatuhundar –association. The person who responses writes that she burst in to tears when seeing the puppies. Nonetheless the voluntary animal lawyer Anastasia Bobolaki understands Linda:
”Linda has a big heart and she cannot deny or leave alone all the puppies and ill dogs that are thrown outside (or even inside) her shelter. And Linda takes them all.”

Bobolaki continues that the Municipalities, which are responsible according to the law, for the welfare of the stray animals in their majorities are not only doing nothing but hinder some time the effort of the Animal Welfare Associations and volunteers.

Foreign vets have offered to visit and sterilize dogs and cats for free.  Cretan vets are however opposing this because they are afraid to loose clients.

Besides these two dog shelters there are several other shelters in Crete. Two of them are kept by Cretans. The people I meet claim dogs are starving in there. 

On Greece Exposed –webpage there is a sad piece of news concerning one municipal shelter. In Volos which is situated in mainland dogs were left for 11 days without water or food. One of the dogs had died and the others had been gnawing the body. This happened after the the expiry of the contract between the municipal and KY.N.SE.P. ‘Argo’.

Angel Hope near Agia Pelagia is very different to Linda’s shelter. The English Dawn Cork and Steve Ockwell live in a modern house of which the rent is paid by sponsors.

Angel Hope is situated on a mountain slope and there is a breath taking view to a village by the sea. However, the dogs are not interested of the view. They only long to socialize with people.

I take a corgi sized Toto for a walk. He had already been reserved in Finland but the couple who booked him could not afford his travel after all.

A good-mannered hunting dog Zack has got a severe cataract. He is not totally blind as tiny Champ is. Champ was found as six weeks old with a deep wound in his head and a string round his neck.

This resulted in a brain-damage and that is why Champ does not see a thing with his beautiful eyes. Champ is allowed to live in a house with the couples own dogs as is Zack also.

There is about fifty dogs in the shelter but nearly sixty is about to be transferred from Chania shelter which is going to be shut down. I am not allowed to see that shelter which is taken care by Steve’s ex-wife Samantha. However, Dawn tells that the shelter is “terrible”.

Steve has got two weeks to build the fences for the new dogs. It seems rather an impossible task because the only car in the shelter has been broken and there are also financial difficulties.

“The donators think we can build the needed fences in 5000 euros. They do not understand that it is impossible but keep continually asking when the fences will be ready”, Steve huffs.

The shortcomings in the shelters are usually concealed in the fear of losing sponsors, as well in other countries as in Greece. Instead of demanding improvements to the faults the associations assisting the shelters keep up a false reality on their internet-sites. 

In mid-May  there are still 46 dogs in Chania. Angels Ark which is supporting the shelter, informs in its facebook-site that the family is not until further notice supported financially. However, the dog-food will be delivered to the shelter as before. 

The feeding of inmates in dog shelters - as well as vaccinations - is paid with the donations of foreign countries. But it is not enough.  Most of the dog shelters are private. Due the lack of money or workers they are doing their best in overwhelming situation.

“In the animal welfare world there are three types of people”, says Linda, “Those that want to make money from it, those that like to sit behind a computer playing the "animal welfare" people and those that really do the dirty work like me.”

“People who are on their feet from 7am to the middle of the night. With injured dogs in the car on the drip, shit all over my hands and feet and suffering from exhaustion.”

For how long can nearly 60-years old, petit Linda go on?  And what will happen to the dogs when she cannot go on anymore?

Elisa Kissa-Öberg


Update 30.06.2014
What I wrote about the dog shelters kept by Cretan was just hearsay. After printing the article I learned that at least in Coustoula Stoupi’s shelter the dogs are treated well.

The dogs are now moved from AH Chania shelter. The founder of Angels Ark fetched the last two dogs and three cats to her home a couple of days ago. Some dogs are still in her care but most of the dogs are now in Agia Pelagia.



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