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Tuesday, November 13, 2012

Perros de la UC

There are a lot of street dogs in Chile, really in Latin America in general. I like to call them "perros callejeros" (street/vagabond dogs).  But it's sort of a misnomer to call the dogs that live on Campus San Joaquín perros callejeros. They have really adopted the campus as their home and the students have adopted them as their pets during the school day. I love dogs and I love observing and making friends with the campus dogs. They all belong to certain areas of campus:

There is a larger black dog who is always with the guards at the front grate. In the humanidades quad, where I have most of my classes, there are two gordas negras regalonas that are often caught sleeping in the computer lab under the desks during bad weather. One is above to the right. The other one is a little taller.

Towards the front of the engineering area next to the food garden, there are several younger skinnier playful dogs that are always wrestling and chasing each other. On the northern side of the engineering area, Titi (a very friendly little black and light brown girl) and a dog I call "oso" are usually sleeping. You can see why I call him/her "oso" above to the left. Although, in this picture, oso moved from her/his usual area to my Chilean geography class in the humanidades area for a few hours.

There are other dogs that are permitted to wander, especially smaller dogs into the humanidades area because the two gordas regalonas are usually too flojas to actually get up and kick them out. The one to the right, for instance, came into my World Regional Geography class and slept underneath my chair for an hour. There are also others that are just perceived as non-threatening by the other dogs because of some aspect of their affect and behavior. The one to the left sleeping inside the hall universitario is a good example. For whatever reason, he is just allowed anywhere he wants to be. I think maybe it's because he doesn't go begging for food in other dogs' territories.

But, there are some dogs who are very territorial and other dogs that just incite territorial responses. The younger dogs I mentioned who hang out near the food garden are usually that way. They are playful only with each other. The other dogs get barked at and chased out. They sometimes even end up with bite wounds on their shoulders. The dogs that hang out near Starbucks (pictured on the left) are another example.

And in regards to the people... some of the dogs have psuedo-owners on campus, usually the guards or maintenance workers, that they follow around all day and get lunch from. But most dogs beg for food during lunch (left) or get food from Animalia UC, a student organization that feeds, de-parasites, sterilizes, vaccinates, puts up for adoption, takes to the vet, and dresses (collars and sweaters/shirts during winter) the campus dogs. Most of the dogs are very nice to people and enjoy being pet, but some have the bad yet cute and protective habit of following you everywhere for the rest of the day if you show them any sort of affection or give them food.
I will miss these dogs when I leave. And I will miss having dogs around 24/7 in general. But I will be happy to see my baby Lucy. I miss her so much!

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