I got a dog! I came back to the village after vacation and told one of my ausis that I might want to have a dog. She told me that the next door neighbor dog had a puppy. We went over to see it after school the next day. Sure enough, there was a fat little fuzz of a puppy. I told her I maybe wanted a dog, and then and there she told me to take it. So I did. I carried the little sucker into my ‘me’s house to show her, and she agreed that it was quite a good looking puppy. He is black except for a little tiny white chunk on the chest, so I decided to name him Bosiu, which means night in Sesotho. Bo, for short. My host family seemed to be very amused by this choice of name.
My reasoning for wanting a dog started a long time ago when my ‘me scolded me for going hiking alone. I figured that since I didn’t really want to hike with any other person, going adventuring with a dog would be perfect. Secondly, lately, I have been so bored with life. I realize that teachers in the US put in so many extra hours planning and grading and whatnot, but the demands of being a teacher here are so much less. I sit around at school quite bored when I’m not actually teaching classes or spending the 5 minutes it takes to plan my next lesson. Then, when I get home, there’s really not much to do at all since I live in a village in the booneys. Even the larger tasks that I put off, like washing my clothes, really don’t take that much time. So I spent my afternoons sleeping, reading, watching a TV show on my laptop, or doing the odd workout. As other volunteers also started to feel, I did not see much usefulness in myself as a volunteer here. I’m told that your actually feeling useful comes during year 2 or even many years after your service entirely. So I was feeling pretty purposeless. Now, with this little nugget around, I feel like I’m actually doing something productive on the daily. I am responsible for another life form who needs me to be on my game for the sake of its survival. That and he is pretty entertaining to play with.
Right now, he is about 7 weeks old, and definitely acts like a baby. The first few days, he peed all over my house (good thing I have polished concrete floors), even waking up several times in the night and crying because he had to pee. Now he’s learning slowly to go outside only. He also has two modes: hyper as all get out- running around, biting my feet and shoes, jumping on whatever he can jump on- or asleep. He sleeps in a small basin that I put a towel in. I desperately need to go to town, which I’ll do next weekend. This weekend, we had school because we needed to make up for the snow days in June. I need to make some kind of crate for him in my house so he doesn’t destroy whatever he can get his teething mouth on. Again, I live in a booneys village, so there’s no hardware store, no nothing except for the basics. I have to go to Quthing camptown to at least get a strong rope to tie him up with (he chewed through the thick ribbon thing my ‘me gave me), if not building materials to make a crate. I’m thinking wood and chicken wire? I don’t know. Right now, I made a little triangular-shaped enclosure with my dresser doors, which I took off of the dresser a long time ago because they don’t stay closed and it was obnoxious. I put them sideways on the floor, propped up with water buckets and against the wall. Little Bo can almost jump over this short wall, though, so I’m really gonna need to make something else. I’m heading over to the orphanage tomorrow to talk to the director, who has three dogs herself, to talk dog logistics like worm and flea prevention and this crate dilemma and whatnot.
Once he is big enough, he’s not gonna have to be inside anymore and will just be an outside dog, but since he is so small and will still try to run next door to be with him mom, I need to keep him inside unless I’m outside watching him. He has already hiked to school with me all this week, needing help on only a few big jumps and over the streams. What a little trooper. He’ll be climbing mountains in no time. I had tied him up at school, but since he chewed through that string, he’s just been free to roam around near the staff room, and hasn’t caused any trouble or run off or anything. I’ve been feeding him papa and milk for breakfast and dinner, and he happily eats whatever we’re having at school for lunch. They do have frozen chicken livers at the shop, so I’ll give him those occasionally for more protein. I’m not about to haul a heavy bag of dog food from town when all the dogs in all the villages are surviving just fine off of papa and whatnot.
The little fart is sleeping right now, phew. He is definitely going to be a lot of work. I’ll be sure to update with lots of photos as he turns into the huge dog my mom thinks he is going to be. Stay posted!
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