bout de papier, Vol. 29, No. 3 (2016), pp. 6–11
I grew up a diplomatic brat. And through four moves, our longhaired German Shepherd named Sam was a constant.
I was only 6 years old, but my parents have re-counted the story many a time. We were on posting in Barbados, and they had invited a number of guests over for a dinner party. Amongst those guests were some family friends who bred dogs. Evidently they appeared for the dinner party with a puppy in their arms, asking if we could look after him for the evening. Needless to say, that puppy never left. Sam instantly became a big furry member of the family. He moved with us to Turkey twice and back to Canada in between. In Turkey, at the time, street dogs were still a problem and so many Turks had a fear of large dogs. The driver at the embassy loved nothing more than walking into the airport with Sam on a leash and watching the crowds of people part as he headed for the check-in counter.
As a family we often joked that Sam was better travelled than most people, having been back and forth across the Atlantic at least seven times. Whenever we went somewhere new, he was always there with us — a constant whenever everything else was changing. There was no better friend an expat kid could ask for.
Sybille et B-Scotch d’Hanoi par Christine Le Blein
Qu’est-ce qui nous pousse à adopter un chat, un chien, un cochon d’Inde ou encore un poisson rouge? Pourquoi « craquons-nous » pour une de ces petites bêtes et n’hésitons pas à braver les préparatifs de voyage les plus complexes pour nous assurer qu’ils déménagent avec nous? Qu’est-ce qui nous pousse à tant d’entêtement et de dévouement envers nos fidèles compagnons?
Imaginez que vous venez d’arriver en poste : tout est nouveau, un peu intimidant et merveilleux à la fois. Vous vous sentez donc un peu comme un poisson hors de l’eau, et par-dessus le marché, vos enfants qui, jusqu’à présent, sollicitaient toute votre attention ont eu l’idée incongrue de grandir sans vous en aviser et semblent manifester un certain agacement vis-à-vis votre style parental « hélicoptère » ! Au choc culturel s’ajoute donc une situation criante de surplus affectif. Par un beau soir de printemps, alors que vous êtes sur le point de vous endormir, des miaulements stridents se font soudainement entendre dans le voisinage. Sans même y penser, vous vous retrouvez sur votre balcon au milieu de la nuit à lancer des boulettes de viande à un adorable chaton en détresse. Puis c’est l’engrenage : le lendemain après l’opération « sauvetage du mignon petit chaton blanc », vous entamez des négociations avec vos voisins d’immeuble pour tenter une procédure d’adoption qui, malheureusement, échouera. L’adorable félin disparaît, ses propriétaires ayant jugé plus prudent de le laisser à l’intérieur. C’est alors qu’une de vos collègues sentant votre détresse affective profonde, propose de vous mettre en contact avec un de ses amis qui vient d’avoir… des chatons. C’est aussi l’anniversaire de votre fille dans un mois… Vous venez donc de lui trouver le cadeau dont elle rêve depuis si longtemps! Quelques semaines plus tard, deux minuscules boules de poil, Sybille et B-Scotch, faisaient leur apparition dans notre vie.
In 2012, I was posted to Santiago, Chile, and adopted my dog Chori (aka Choripan and formerly known as Ralph Laurent) from a shelter there in 2013. He is a Catalan sheepdog/poodle mix and was found on the street as a very young puppy, only about one month old. He was in rough shape, suffering from malnutrition, mange, alopecia, fleas and lice. After spending five months at a veterinary clinic getting his health back, he was sent to a shelter where we met two months later. There were many beautiful dogs, but he brought tears to my eyes and I knew I wasn’t going to leave without him. I noticed right away that he had a problem with his hind leg and was told that it was nothing serious. After a second opinion and x-rays, it was revealed that the head of his femur was actually smashed to bits. He was operated to remove that part of the femur and now runs like the wind, pain-free. After a short stint in Canada this past summer, Chori and I are now enjoying the warm beach weather in Havana, Cuba.
Hunter and Fisher from Washington by Amanda McNaughton
– — À Pa hy Pes ~ =
Fisher and Hunter Don and I went to Washington, DC on our first posting in 1999. He had grown up with pets, but the most our own family had owned were a pair of gerbils. By June of 2000, we had settled in to our apartment and there was the option to have pets, so we started exploring local availability. I found a group named Paw Rescue in Maryland that had just taken in a pair of cats with a litter of seven kittens, newly available for adoption. Hunter, the tabby, looked just like the cat Don had left with his parents in Winnipeg to join me as I started as a Trade Commissioner in Ottawa, while Fisher was just the sort of dainty lady tuxedo that I had always thought was the epitome of “cat.”
Either coincidence or a general recognition of the positive effect cats have on dealing with stress led to all seven kittens being adopted by diplomatic families from various embassies, leading them to be named the “International Litter.”
Fisher passed at the age of thirteen but Hunter is still with us after two boys, four moves, and fifteen years — both having been far more pampered than many FS.
par Lionel Jobin (1 0 ans)
Nous avons déménagé en Chine a cause du travail de mes par voulions un chien. Notre femme de ménage, M™ Kong (là-bas a montré la photo d’un bébé chien qu’elle avait recueilli chez ell s’il nous plaisait. Mes sœurs et moi, on a convaincu nos parent promettant de le promener et le nourrir nous-mêmes. Ils ont € Kong ai est venue nous chercher à l’école, elle avait un bébé ch là que tout a commencé.
On devait lui trouver un nom. Notre petit terrier avait un po on l’a appelé Oreo, comme les biscuits. La chienne était encor chez nous, alors Kong-ai la rapportait chez elle tous les soirs semaine qu’elle a pu rester chez nous, mais la pauvre pleura: s’habituait à nous. On lui a donné un coussin et des jouets. Elle a un mois, alors elle dormait sur mon lit.
La première fois que j’ai promené notre chienne, je l’ai libérée un bâton. Je n’étais pas conscient qu’elle pouvait se sauver, mai revenue avec le bâton. Je me suis tellement attaché à elle que je f avec elle. J’ai supplié mes parents de l’emmener avec nous à r C’était compliqué: un ami a dû garder Oreo pendant l’été et on a d d’autre de la ramener à l’automne. Pendant les vacances, je reg quand je voyais des chiens, ça me faisait penser à Oreo. À n je demandais tout le temps à mes parents quand Oreo nous re\ pas aller la chercher à l’aéroport avec mon père parce que l’a merveilleuse j’avais! Oreo était là, devant moi !
Elle est importante pour moi. Tous les jours à mon réveil, ell elle fait des folies pour me faire rire. Elle aime le Canada. Elle des statues de lion et elle pensait qu’ils étaient vrais… elle abo dans un autre pays et j’espère pouvoir emmener ma chienne.
by Sabrina Yoong
About a year into my first posting in Tel Aviv, it seemed everyone I passed walking down Rothschild Boulevard had a dog or a stroller. I wasn’t ready for a stroller, but knowing two of my colleagues had adopted dogs in Israel, the former seemed like a good idea.
My husband and I set off to the SPCA in Ramat Gan and met the adorable 6 month old puppy who would make us a family. He was the only dog in the whole place not to bark at us when we approached his cage. We suspect he lived on the streets before coming home with us, and we made up an impressive backstory to explain his many fears. (If you’re curious, we pretend he was lost during an exercise while training to be a canine intelligence agent for the Mossad and that is why he is so skeptical and suspicious of bicycles, garbage cans, wide-brimmed hats and trench coats!) We named him Miles after Mr. Davis, and he answers commands in English and in Hebrew. Four and a half years later, he lives the charmed life of a diplo-dog in Los Angeles, racing off-leash in Runyon Canyon with the canines of Hollywood celebrities and nobodies, and frolicking in the Pacific at Rosie’s Dog Beach in Long Beach.
by Kate Solomon
Both Ramallah (home to the Canadian Rep Office) and Jerusalem (where RMLAH CBS live) are full of stray cats. It’s not unusual to see a dumpster with ten or more cats sitting on the edge, picking through the trash for food. This makes it all the more surprising that this cat, who now goes by the name Philip, made it home with me. As far as we can work out, he was born in the taxi rank beside RMLAH, and was thrown out of the litter by his mother. I had acquired a reputation as the mission’s resident soft-heart, and one Friday, the guards asked me to come outside. I wasn’t expecting what I found down there: an approximately three week old kitten, covered in dirt, vomit, and blood. He was tiny and sick, injured by rock-throwing teenagers and taxi drivers who smacked him with sticks.
He was only supposed to come home with me for the weekend. Long enough to get him to a vet in Jerusalem, patch up his wounds, and bring him back to Ramallah. No such luck. Our (large) dog took very quickly to being the kitten’s nursemaid, and attended him, day and night, for weeks until he got better. I like to say we kept him because they match!
by Pierre-David Jean & Jean-François Parizeau
Biscuit came into our lives on my first day in Haiti (her adoption was a “surprise” by my spouse, who had arrived a week prior). In meeting her, I had a strange mix of emotions. I certainly felt a bit of revulsion as she was in an awful shape and looked completely haggard. You could tell she had had a rough time in the streets. But nearly immediately, my revulsion was mixed with, and then overtaken by, a strong paternal bond (puppy love I guess?). This was our dog, we rescued her from the Haitian streets, we would ensure that she thrived. And thrived she has. We are amazed to this day to see her transformation from a frightened little creature into a strong, energetic, happy (and we would argue good-looking) dog. She’s been a great source of comfort and entertainment in our more confined environment here. She’I1 always represent our link to Haiti as well as one tangible thing we were able to do to help. Our friends refer to her as the “luckiest dog in Haiti” (which I guess is true) but we also consider ourselves quite lucky to have stumbled upon her and to now count her as a member of the family!
Le titre de son éventuelle autobiographie fera inévitablement référence au fait que ’adoption de Sammy a radicalement changé le cours de sa vie. Une « amie Facebook » a publié sa photo quelques jours avant Noël 2010, la veille de notre départ vers Montréal. Enseignante au primaire, elle venait de le recueillir auprès d’une famille qui s’apprêtait à le conduire à la fourrière… Sammy avait alors 13 mois, passé la majorité de son existence attaché à une corde dehors et on l’a d’abord cru gris jusqu’à ce qu’il prenne un bain ! Il n’avait toujours pas trouvé de famille adoptive quand nous sommes revenus à Washington le 28 décembre. Nous sommes donc allés le chercher en banlieue de Baltimore et dès notre arrivée à la maison, il s’est roulé en boule sous le sapin et a dormi pendant deux heures. Sammy a depuis ce temps vécu trois ans à Ottawa où il a fondé son fan club. Lallemand lui donne du fil à retordre depuis notre arrivée à Vienne et les écureuils de Manor Park lui manquent cruellement, mais il s’est bien adapté à son nouvel environnement. Il se la coule douce, est gâté pourri et nos voisins se bousculent pour le garder en notre absence!
Mokey from Hsinchu County
by Toby Schwartz
Sometimes in life, timing is everything. My husband and I grew up with dogs, and were planning on getting a dog when the time was right. We had decided against getting a dog in Taiwan, despite the fact that there were adorable abandoned puppies to be found around almost every corner. We always came up with the excuse that we were too busy with full time jobs to give a pooch the care it would deserve. When we found Mokey though, it seemed as though fate had somehow intervened.
We were on a camping trip in the forested mountains of Hsinchu County, Taiwan. When we arrived after a gorgeous drive through the Taiwanese wilderness, and were just about to park the car, we noticed what seemed like a rather random box discarded on the road side. When we got closer, up popped a furry black nose and there she was. The puppy had rather obviously been discarded there, perhaps as the owners had hoped that the men paving the road nearby would take her home. She was tiny, no more than 8 or 9 weeks old, and would Toby, Mokey and Erin likely not have made it if left there for too long. I scooped her up, and took her down the river bank with us for a swim. When we came back up to the car about an hour later, the box had been completely flattened with a massive tire track imprinted on it. One of the paving vehicles had run it over. Timing, indeed.
We weren’t initially planning to keep her, but the vet back in Taipei convinced us that Mokey wouldn’t stand much of a chance if we brought her to a shelter. That was all we needed to hear to tip us over the fence we’d been sitting on, and she was ours. She has brought much joy, warmth and cuddles to our family, and is the best possible souvenir of Taiwan — a place we came to love during our posting.
What’s the lesson learned from finding Mokey? First, timing can often make all of the difference. Second, sometimes it’s easiest to come up with excuses to not do something, but it’s the decisions to go ahead and do something — while invariably harder to make — that can be the most rewarding.
Après l’obtention d’une maîtrise en études théâtrales de Trinity College Dublin, Anne-Marie Leclerc a rejoint les rangs du service extérieur en tant que déléguée commerciale en 2006. Elle a eu le plaisir de servir brièvement à l’Ambassade du Canada au Brésil ainsi que pendant trois ans à Paris. Elle se prépare maintenant à partir en Turquie.
Originally published in / Publié à l’origine dans bout de papier, Vol. 29, No. 3 (2016), pp. 6–11. Read the rest of this issue / Lire le reste de ce numéro →
