Stray Dogs.

It has been a couple of days since I've blogged, but the trips that I made this past weekend are worth mentioning. I will be sure to update them with pictures as soon as possible.

We had the priveledge of going to three beautiful sites on this busy day. Our first stop was Korinthos, a beautiful harbor city that played an important role in both archaic Greece and Roman Greece. We spent our time exploring the ancient ruins, petting stray dogs (Greece has a lot of them), and enjoying corn bread and lemonade at the home of our Professors' friend, who is an archeologist in Korinthos.

Before I get into the weekend, let me begin a short subtopic on.....

STRAY DOGS

I feel like I should talk a bit about the stray dogs here in Greece, because they seem to be a reoccuring theme during the course of this trip. I mean, in the United States I will see stray dogs occassionally, but here they are just so common. Most strays in the U.S. get picked up fairly quickly and taken to an animal shelter, a pound, or the humane society. These leash laws about animals wandering free must not be as big of a deal here in Greece. If they were there probably would not nearly be as many strays. I mean, even here at the American College there are stray dogs that wander around the campus. They seem fairly happy too, since people are always feeding and taking care of them, almost like they are a community pet.

I think a community pet is a good way to look at the strays here in Greece. Since these animals are given free reign of the downtown areas, are allowed to sleep in the metro stations, and are fed and pet by the community, it almost makes sense that there is no need to have them captured and sent away. All of the dogs that I have met are incredibly kind, and seem to be no burden to anyone at all. They don't even aggressively beg for food, rather they are fed whenever someone has extra food in their meal. Since there are so many people, this food is more than enough for the strays, most of whom seem to be slightly overweight.

I think it's kindof neat. Somehow the Greeks in Athens have found a way to create a harmonious relationship with these wandering animals; a mutual transaction between a dog looking for food and a person looking for something to pet and take care of. They feel no need to turn these dogs in, or to take them to their own home, but instead the community effectively cares for the animal, everyone doing just a little bit to make sure that the strays dogs can have healthy lives wandering the streets of Athens. That's something that I wouldn't quite expect in the states.