A Dog's Life in Tuwani
09-03-07
We got a dog.
A little stray dog has adopted the CPT household, probably because we are the only ones in the village who don’t completely ignore it, or worse. Dogs are not popular in Palestine. For most Muslims, dogs are ‘haram’ – unclean. Some shepherds keep dogs chained outside, or use them near the sheep. But no one keeps dogs as pets. One rarely sees dogs in the street during the day, I think because they are routinely chased off with kicks or stones. It’s not that Palestinians are especially mean, it is just that they see dogs as signs of filth and disease, and in many cases they are probably right. So, it’s a dog’s life for a dog in Palestine.
So this little stray has found her way in a small cave-like hole in the building adjacent to our house. Although we don’t allow the dog in the house, or to hang around us so much that she seems like a pet, we do tolerate her presence more than most others in the village. So she eats a lot of food scraps that we collect in a bucket for the village donkeys. And when we want her to leave, for instance when Palestinians visit our home, all we have to do is toss a stone in her general direction. (We try NOT to hit her with the stone.) She has already learned that this means it’s time to go back in the cave. So far the relationship is working out. She keeps the cats away, and probably a few other creatures we don’t even know about.
09-05-07
This morning there was dog poop in our yard. This is simply not o.k.
It’s not about being unsightly. It’s just not clean. We struggle to keep the outside from pouring in with the wind as it is. We don’t need animals using out doorstep as a bathroom. So we decided we needed to set a harder line with ‘Kelb” , (dog in Arabic). (Incidentally, to call someone a dog is a harsh insult in the Semetic world. Both Jews and Arabs use it as a strong derogatory word.)
This evening our landlord’s eldest son (13 years old) came over and quietly placed stones over the cave the dog had been living in. He said nothing to us about doing this, but it was clear his parents must have directed him to get rid of the dog for the foreigners. (I think they probably assume we are either too stupid or naïve to do this ourselves. They may be right on both counts.)
So now the dog is continuing to try to hang around. Our house is still, relatively, the safest place in town. Importantly, there are no bigger dogs to contend with here. And we throw rocks near, not at, the dog. But, still I think it’s better if kelb finds a new home.