Perros y Pollos y Pez

And the dogs – haven I written about the dogs yet? I think I mentioned them in Hermosillo, how non-aggressive they are, even the starving, hurt ones.

A peoples’ animals tell you a lot about the people, I’m thinking.

The dogs here make me think of my friend Janet and how this place could be for her! With dogs that never come close except when invited.

Dogs here roam around, often in loosely gathered packs, but often alone too. They rarely bark and I have never seen them be aggressive – to me, other people or to other dogs.

Can you imagine, dogs that don’t fight with each other? Dogs that barely interact with each other except to keep a respectful distance (although there are times when they don’t obviously as many dogs are mamas).

Dogs that don’t chase chickens or cats!! Dogs that don’t bite children or adults. Dogs that are so pliable they allow children to jump on them, ride them, tumble around the ground with them.

Dogs that lay in the street, in the sun, in the shade and just be. Dogs that are RELAXED without dog therapy, drugs, or mind control!

Dogs that don’t race frantically around, pulling on leashes – dogs that do not know leashes yet are very, very mellow without a leash.

I’ve heard dogs bark on occasion chasing a bicycle down the street and bark begging when the guys get off the boats carrying buckets of fish – yes dogs here consume fish!

But they are totally ignored by both the bike rider and the fisherman. And that’s the end of that – they wander off or lay down.

But dogs that don’t snarl at you when you’re approaching their homes or chase you when you’re on ‘their’ property. Or act manic when they’re in a pack of 8 or 10 other dogs?

It’s amazing really. Chickens also roam wild around homes and into the streets and they seem to have a mutual ignoring-each-other party going on with dogs and cats.

I can’t believe that. I remember once when I was little we had a dog that kept getting into the neighboring farm’s chicken coop and killing the chickens – not so much attacking them as chasing them around and giving them a heart attack.

Much to us kids chagrin, we had to give that dog away eventually when my dad got tired of paying for dead chickens.

The cats I’ve seen around have been very well behaved also – or maybe the condition is well adjusted to living compatibly with humans.

This is another indicator of the level of violence here - even the dogs are non-violent.

The only pesky annoyances are the fuckin flies. But even they are limited on the beach but right off the beach, they are swarming on all the fresh fish! Which makes it very hard to eat the fish when people try to share, especially for a striving vegetarian. Maybe deep frying the fish kills any fly bacteria…

Maybe not…