The Stray Dogs of Odessa
It’s impossible not to notice all the stray, feral dogs in Odessa and Kyiv. They are of all shapes and sizes, all scraggly and weathered in their appearances and sly glares, as they stealthily cross busy intersections with a certain street-wiseness, somehow always sensing when it’s safe to dash or dart or stroll to the next sidewalk where they prance along at the same pace as people, but never engaging them. There’s a look of distrust and desperation in their eyes, but you can easily overlook it because they try as hard not to look you in the eye as we do them. Eye contact is an awkward encounter, especially if you’re a dog lover, and more especially if you have pets at home who you know are safe, warm and comfortably not worrying about their next guaranteed meal because, even if you find the heart to, you know you can’t feed them all, or you’ve just realized you have nothing in your pockets to feed them, so why tease with a look of love when you can’t even deliver a morsel? And a few are mean and snippy too, so the easiest approach is cautious disregard.
These creatures, these ruff animals, who mostly roam at night and hide in the shade and shadows of day, or in the early mornings before the city fully awakens, expect no such human service anyway. They rarely engage even the rare human who notices them, like me. They simply stride on by in apparent confidence, at a pace that gives the impression that they are late for an important meeting somewhere across town, while scouring and scanning the streets for any kind of bounty. If they are in a pack, it seems to consume their every fiber as they mingle, sniff and snort their elusive exchanges which undoubtedly are focused on mating and marking of territory in their endless quest for sustenance and security.
Where do they come from? I wonder, are they former pets, now abandoned, permanently panicked but cautiously searching for their masters? If this, they must also be angry or at least depressed over their abandonment, wondering what rule they must’ve broken to deserve being left alone on these endless streets? Or were they born on the streets, not ever having known comfort and safety? I prefer to think the latter, but I fear the former because some of them still have the imprinted scar of an old collar, an almost invisible remnant of a life long since fallen off them. In fact, looking it up, you will find that most are abandoned former pets, referenced at the end, amounting to perhaps 50,000 in Ukraine’s cities, but there’s no reliable count to confirm this fact, or any figure of how many strays are born into street life, nor how many cats (which far outnumber the dogs) are covertly roaming the streets at night either.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RsFN1b6j30k&t=723s
For those lucky enough never to have known kindness, safety, or the satisfying feeling of a full stomach, they can only imagine what lies before them today. This kind of stray is fortunate to only have to be attentive to the immediate goals of food, shelter, and perhaps the occasional mating partner in mind on any particular day of desperation. Not knowing any other life, they cannot imagine another…
There’s a tipped over dumpster down that street where I pissed yesterday. There’s a dead pigeon in the empty lot where I buried it the other day. I know where because I pissed there too. And there’s four stray cats by those tall apartments, where humans leave milk and scraps that we can steal from them. I should piss their too, so my other pals won’t disturb or fight me for it.
I call them my pals, but that’s not really what our relationship is. We are an excitable group of like-minded beings who use each other as clever protection and guidance to destinations not yet discovered. More noses in the air and on the ground to find food, and the occasional romp in the bushes in the abandoned playground. It’s kind of convenient to have this one around, she always lays down for me, and she’s raised my two girls who are right now curled up underneath that broken down Volga that’s been sitting in that parking lot for years now. A good home for my kids until they get old enough to walk the streets themselves. My boy starved weeks before, which was lucky for him I guess, since he wasn’t strong enough to fight for the scraps I left for all three. He wouldn’t have survived this life anyway.
And I know those other animals, the ones that look a lot like me, same tails and smells, but I don’t know what they are, always tied to those humans by a rope, leading them towards who knows where? Why do they have that spring in their step? And how can they have so much energy to jump and bark and just play for no reason? I wonder, if I jumped around, would one of those humans give me a slice of meat too? Is that all it takes? I think I could be someone’s muse. I could walk that human as well as they do, better probably. But would they wrap that strap around my neck? Would I only be able to roam where the human wants to go, or would I lead them to the fantastic places I know of? What must these look-alike dogs be thinking? I don’t dare approach them, or even look their way. They are guarded and I am unwelcome and tattered. They won’t even bother to sniff me, so I know they have other business elsewhere, somewhere important to go, just look at them go!
This one time, on an early, cold morning a month or so before the water turned solid and I couldn’t drink it, the old lady with a red and white cloth covering her head approached me while I was walking past her apartment on my way to the sunken, abandoned doorway in the back of the building where I rest during the day. She put her hands out for a moment, just long enough to drop some pieces of meat on the ground, then scurried away. I didn’t go to it until she fled, but was grateful for the scrap, it was tasty! A nice way to start the day, not something you can count on every day here in the city.
On another day, my pack and I were chased by men with poles and nets, backed into a corner behind the schoolyard. I wasn’t sure what they were trying to do but I wasn’t about to let them grab me, so I lowered my head and growled like a demon so they would leave. But there were three of them and one had snuck behind me and then tried to catch me with a noose. I managed to struggle free and ran, with two others, but I saw that they captured one in my pack and led her to a van, which then drove away. I never saw her again, but I have seen a few others in my pack get captured and then, surprisingly I saw them back on the street months later, but in another pack this time. They looked and smelled different. I always wonder what happens when you get caught.
Whatever happens, it must be better than being hit by a car, something I’ve seen many times here. This one dog I used to run with got struck and fell and couldn’t walk, so he just laid in the street while other cars whizzed by. One of those net guys eventually arrived and took him away, not sure where, but it can’t be a good place. You’ve got to look out for those cars, especially the ones that go fast.
Anyway, I better go check on my babies. I’ve got this old bread I found near the dumpster and I bet they are crying again, always crying. Their mother has stopped coming around the old car where they sleep, not sure where’s she’s gone to. Stop at the intersection. Look both ways. I see my opening, I can make it across…now.
If you would like to donate to a Ukrainian animal shelter, do NOT use municipal services (such as Kyiv Communal Services). They are underfunded and do not take good care of animals they capture. Instead, donate to one of these private shelters run by volunteers who care:
https://en.hromadske.ua/posts/meet-the-people-saving-and-caring-for-stray-animals-in-ukraine
Sirius animal shelter in Kyiv
Facebook page for Sirius: https://www.facebook.com/Shelter.SIRIUS/
Berserk Animal Shelter, Odessa:
https://m.facebook.com/pg/far.berserk/posts/?ref=page_internal&mt_nav=0
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