Perritos

Stray dogs in Chile are part of life. Walking down the street, you are bound to come across dogs that just meander around the streets all day. From what I understand, Chileans are not too loving with their dogs, and if they ever feel the dog is too hard to take care of, they just leave it in the street.

Until today, I was very negative about the dogs. Sure, they are cute, and I love dogs, but these dogs bark at you as you run by, poop on the sidewalks, and carry fleas! I didn't like the dogs following me or coming up to me or getting near me.

But today, Selma, Scarlett and I went to the beach where there was a group of dogs that came and sat by us. They were really cute, so we were OK with them staying by us... but I still didn't have any intention of being "nice" to them.

Then, a real flaite (or sketchy character) started coming closer to where we were sitting and started to try to talk to us. Of course, my natural reaction was to ignore first and move away if he kept talking. But, to our rescue came our stray dogs. They started barking at the flaite, defending and protecting us.

I was so surprised! First, that the dogs knew this guy was sketchy and that we did not want to be talking to him and second, that the dogs would defend us as if we were their owners. I did not expect this intelligence and loyalty from dogs we'd known for five minutes. [However, they are similar to Chileans in general - very helpful and friendly.]

From here on, I have a new respect for the Chilean perritos. Although, I'm not sure I'm ready to pet them yet....