Vaccination Time

Last week (Friday and Saturday) I took five of my six dogs to the vet's to get their annual vaccinations (which now includes rabies). Erjhen isn't due for her vaccinations until April. All of my dogs were originally strays that were abandoned by their owners or by puppy mills. What you are looking at there is very expensive: over seven years of personal sacrifice in time, money and energy to look after them properly. That is why I have no time for people who want the government to build shelters for Taiwan's countless stray dogs. The solution lies not with government, but with yourself.

Coco; always very relaxed and unafraid when I'm with him. You can also see I'm beginning to develop a bit of a beer belly; I need to get back onto the skipping rope, running track and bicycle.

Wanwan; the brother of Shaobai who was murdered two years ago. Wanwan is usually the best behaved of all the dogs and is probably my favorite. Again, he's always very relaxed when I'm with him and trusts me without question. I tend to pay more attention to him than the others and that may be me compensating for not being able to prevent Shaobai's death. I at least have the small consolation that his murderer took a bloody good hiding and public humiliation. He hasn't dared to come back to the park since that day.

Black & White; a Taiwanese "tuguo" and husky mongrel who was already mature when I adopted her; she must be close to eight or nine years old now. She really doesn't like the vet's table and was struggling to get down all the time. She is the oldest of all the dogs, she's probably the most intelligent and certainly the most independent; after walks at the park she often refuses to come back to the house meaning I either have to wait for her, or I have to go back out to pick her up and bring her back to the house.

Pups; I originally named her "Gunny" after the suggestion of an American friend whom I haven't heard from in a long time now. He offered to adopt her, but I couldn't bear to let her go. Eventually what began as a nick-name, "pups" just stuck. She is also calm and relaxed in my presence and she is normally more compliant than all of the others, but occasionally she needs to be spoken to sharply to dissuade her from investigating the garbage tips at the local parks or from bullying little dogs.

Tinkerbell; my first dog in Taiwan. She is over seven years old now and is still absolutely terrified of the vet's table, as you can see. I have recently returned to the practice of walking her on the lead because the problem of local people fly-tipping their trash in the parks is becoming worse. Tinkerbell has to be kept away from those with constant supervision which is more difficult when I'm also trying to carry on a conversation.

Erhjen is my newest dog, adopted at the end of Chinese New Year last year. She'll have to wait until April for her annual vaccinations...