Holy Cow

I forgot to say that I got back from trekking and there were two less dogs in the household! So now there are 4 dogs, 4 cows, and 4 cats.

Cows are sacred in Nepal. If you kill one you go to jail, and you tend to seem them wandering free even through the city. Its amazing seeing the traffic of Kathmandu come to a standstill and gently make its way around a doe-eyed plodding beast.

There are two adult female cows at House of Hope, and a bull and a calf.

Red and Blackie are the cows, the calf is called Kanti and the bull is called Damus. The cows provdie milk for the household every day, some of which is turned into curd, paneer, cream or a kind of sweet when it turns bad. (Sugar, cinnamon and a lot of heat turns it into a kind of toffee). The cows keep giving birth to male calves which is really unfortunate for the family. They are expensive to upkeep and cannot give milk in return. Since it is illegal to kill or eat cows (the family loves beef but it has to be imported into Nepal) the male calves are either let free in the forest or are taken away by other people. All the menus here advertise ‘buff’ – not beef, but buffalo meat!

The dogs aren’t quite as helpful around the house. There is Dolly, the favoured one, Eli’s pet who yaps like there’s no tomorrow and gets fed scraps form the table.

Then there is Molly a sweet, good dog who has a ferocious bark.

Rockie is kept chained up all day as he tends to bite people, (i.e. visitors) and let off at night to guard the house. He used to go completely mental anytime I was in the vicinity but he seems to either be asleep or just ignores me at the moment if I’m nearby.

Bhai is my favourite, I think he is possibly a human. Unfortunately he always stinks because he is the independent dog that disappears for days on end and returns with nary a worry. And so I have no photo of him. But here is a photo of Boynie(sp?) who was the fifth dog. She ha a habit of ‘playing’ with all the neighbourhood dogs, and ended up having puppies. She was given away when she started on the dogs in the house.

The cat I don’t really see much since she has 3 kittens to take care of. One came out the other day and almost died of fright from the children wanting to play with it. The girls love animals, but are fairly rough with them all. The dogs are amazing at how tolerant they are! Even Rockie, he gets a swift whack from any of them – including the smallest – if he starts barking at me, but he never bats an eyelid at them, just slinks back to his wee spot on the porch.

Nepal also has wild leopards, elephants, rhinos, monkeys, snakes, and bears. We saw all of these at the zoo, but the home was terrorised by a leopard last monsoon season adn a fence had to be built to keep it from sitting on the wall watching the dogs. Monkeys are in the city and there are elephants to ride at Chitwan National Park. Other than that there are lots of domestic animals – chickens, ducks, goats, buffalo and sheep. And of course, dogs galore!