Any canine fancier would love
the dogs of Upolu. And I'm with them.
Apart from the occasional out-of-place Labrador-looking sort of thing, they all have Dingo in them. Every one of them. The face, the pointy little ears, the chops and the gait of a Dingo are unmistakable. They come in all shapes and sizes, but they're generally a mottled shade of a tan or dunn colour -- they are living, breathing proof that the Dingo breed is of Indo-Pacific origin.
By most accounts, dogs came to Samoa with the Lapita people about 3,500 years ago, and they were almost certainly the progenitor of the Dingo. The Lapita had come from southern China, and had migrated all the way down to the Indonesian archipelago, then across PNG and Melanesia, before fanning out across the rest of the South Pacific, then somehow they did a loop back and landed on the shores of far north Queensland in ancient times, and their primitive Dingo-like dogs followed.
Apia town in chock full of strays, there are literally thousands of them [no one could possibly afford to have them de-sexed even if there were any vets to be found. The Govt. apparently does do a cull from time-to-time, but they're obviously fighting a losing battle. They must breed like rabbits]. The mongrels work in packs along the sea wall, but mostly you see them just languidly wandering the streets or stretched out fast asleep under some palm tree, or creeping up on people who they suspect might have some food about them.
They are mostly pretty mangy flea-bitten creatures, but none of them are bags of bones - they do pretty well on human waste and scraps and there are puddles of water everywhere and numerous little creeks and one big river that runs through town even in the dry season. Everywhere, people put their garbage on little platforms mounted on wooden stilts about four feet off the ground to prevent the dogs from ripping into it. And everyone also seems to keep at least one guard dog - talk turned to the subject dogs with a local we met, and he admitted to owning four.
They sound and look worse than they really are; being Samoan canines, they are far from aggressive, unless they suspect you are holding foods you're not willing to part with. But I expect visiting folk who are afraid of dogs - and we saw a few - would have a very hard time in Samoa, being terrified most of the time. I just stuck with the sensible advice I was given that it's unwise to try to touch or pat them. I was vaguely confronted [it was more like an amusing Mexican stand-off] by a stray looking at me menacingly only once, so I asked him very politely to go away, to no avail, then stupidly waved my walking stick at him, no use, then told him to fuck off, no response, then finally I somehow remembered the Samoan word to yell at dogs to get rid of them..."HALU!", and he instantly turned on his toes, scarpered and disappeared.
In the bush, dogs dart in and out of the gorgeous beautifully maintained lush tropical garden displays that line the road in and out of all the villages everywhere, lounge around in one of the large oval-shaped open-air fale tele ['meeting house'] that are in every village, you even see them wandering into churches with impunity. They also like to curl up in piles of dead leaves that have been swept up under trees, or are just sniffing and lazily working foraging for scraps or wild foods.
They wouldn't do much damage, as there are no native land mammals in Samoa [unless the dogs themselves count, or why not throw in the pigs, they're everywhere too]. The pretty and ubiquitous buff-banded rails - a prolific almost flightless bird that can run like the wind - would be far too quick on their long legs for dogs, and the pooches also couldn't get through the sturdy wood-picket pig fences that are built around all the taro gardens to prevent the porkers from digging up the staple crop of Samoa.
They all have a very smart road sense, otherwise they wouldn't survive [only stoopid puppies are afforded the same favours as pigs and chooks, who are always given right of way when they're crossing the road]. The Samoans are the least sentimental of people. I never saw one pat or scratch a dog - in the country side and in town they are all there for a reason - working guard dogs to keep other animals and people out of their particular patch. If there were too many puppies in a litter, or there was a "bad apple" in the village, I am sure they would have no compunction at all in dispatching them with one of the very heavy hardwood war-clubs, or one of their most peculiar cricket bats, which are like lengths of four by two.
When we turned up at out beach hut at Lepa village on the south coast of Upulo, the first thing I heard our affable, charming host Carmelsita say was HALU! HALU! at a bitch who had full teats and was obviously nursing puppies somewhere. Fran asked her if the dog was hers and she said "oh no, no, it's one of the neighbours...I think".
Her dog [the only one with a collar on I saw in all of Upolu] was a handsome battle-scarred kind of fella. We heard him get into a scrap late one night - he came off second best and was a bit lame and proppy the next day with a few new minor flesh wounds. He gave us a barking welcome, but as soon as he saw us move into our faleo'o ['little house'] and knew we were there to stay, he just hung around, either sniffing our stuff, lying alert alongside the road near our hut, or just scratching himself in a desultory fashion, but usually biting his own arse. One time I saw him on the beach [and he was very protective of his beach, chasing away any other dog he didn't like] furiously digging a big hole in the sand, and then rolling around and over and over in it, then digging some more, and doing some more barrel rolling in a vain bid to rid himself of the maddening fleas. As the Samoans like to say "the beach is your friend!".
Some of the few other tourista who were around from time to time would cautiously give him a pat on the head which was his cue to immediately roll on his back for a tummy rub, all the time pawing the patter with both front paws, but as soon as something more interesting altered him, there was the prospect of food to be had, or he had guard dog duties to perform, he'd be off in a flash.
One day we were driving along the Main South Coast road at the national speed limit of 35 mph [25 mph through the villages], and a dog appeared out of nowhere and chased our 4WD right alongside the passenger side window at full pelt for a good couple of hundred yards, furiously barking at us all the way before we managed to drop him off the chase. Not many cars that go along that road, but you'd reckon he'd do it to everyone driving on his side of the village - he looked like a very fit Kelpie impersonator indeed.
There are also bloody cats everywhere too, and they were constantly trying to get into our cottage, fale, room...they don't respond to HALU!, so my walking stick got a good workout. I suppose wherever there's rats, there's cats, and they seem to do a good job as I didn't see a single rodent on all of Upolu. One cat ran in through the patio door to our room at the Samoan Outrigger Hotel in Apia, ran around like a mad thing, and then promptly hid under the bed. Fran shooed it out from underneath the cot, and I got it with a good wack of the stick on its arse as it shot out of the room. A perfectly timed hit! It never came back.
There is one place in Samoa that has no dogs. The island Manono in the Apolima Straight between Upolu and the "Big Island" of Sava'ii. The story goes that a dog once bit a high ranking matai ['chief'] and she later died. All dogs were banished from the island forthwith. We never went there, but we heard that at the place where it happened many moons ago, there is no memorial to the poor unfortunate matai, but there is a small bronze statue of the canine responsible. Go figure.
Apart from the occasional out-of-place Labrador-looking sort of thing, they all have Dingo in them. Every one of them. The face, the pointy little ears, the chops and the gait of a Dingo are unmistakable. They come in all shapes and sizes, but they're generally a mottled shade of a tan or dunn colour -- they are living, breathing proof that the Dingo breed is of Indo-Pacific origin.
By most accounts, dogs came to Samoa with the Lapita people about 3,500 years ago, and they were almost certainly the progenitor of the Dingo. The Lapita had come from southern China, and had migrated all the way down to the Indonesian archipelago, then across PNG and Melanesia, before fanning out across the rest of the South Pacific, then somehow they did a loop back and landed on the shores of far north Queensland in ancient times, and their primitive Dingo-like dogs followed.
Apia town in chock full of strays, there are literally thousands of them [no one could possibly afford to have them de-sexed even if there were any vets to be found. The Govt. apparently does do a cull from time-to-time, but they're obviously fighting a losing battle. They must breed like rabbits]. The mongrels work in packs along the sea wall, but mostly you see them just languidly wandering the streets or stretched out fast asleep under some palm tree, or creeping up on people who they suspect might have some food about them.
They are mostly pretty mangy flea-bitten creatures, but none of them are bags of bones - they do pretty well on human waste and scraps and there are puddles of water everywhere and numerous little creeks and one big river that runs through town even in the dry season. Everywhere, people put their garbage on little platforms mounted on wooden stilts about four feet off the ground to prevent the dogs from ripping into it. And everyone also seems to keep at least one guard dog - talk turned to the subject dogs with a local we met, and he admitted to owning four.
They sound and look worse than they really are; being Samoan canines, they are far from aggressive, unless they suspect you are holding foods you're not willing to part with. But I expect visiting folk who are afraid of dogs - and we saw a few - would have a very hard time in Samoa, being terrified most of the time. I just stuck with the sensible advice I was given that it's unwise to try to touch or pat them. I was vaguely confronted [it was more like an amusing Mexican stand-off] by a stray looking at me menacingly only once, so I asked him very politely to go away, to no avail, then stupidly waved my walking stick at him, no use, then told him to fuck off, no response, then finally I somehow remembered the Samoan word to yell at dogs to get rid of them..."HALU!", and he instantly turned on his toes, scarpered and disappeared.
In the bush, dogs dart in and out of the gorgeous beautifully maintained lush tropical garden displays that line the road in and out of all the villages everywhere, lounge around in one of the large oval-shaped open-air fale tele ['meeting house'] that are in every village, you even see them wandering into churches with impunity. They also like to curl up in piles of dead leaves that have been swept up under trees, or are just sniffing and lazily working foraging for scraps or wild foods.
They wouldn't do much damage, as there are no native land mammals in Samoa [unless the dogs themselves count, or why not throw in the pigs, they're everywhere too]. The pretty and ubiquitous buff-banded rails - a prolific almost flightless bird that can run like the wind - would be far too quick on their long legs for dogs, and the pooches also couldn't get through the sturdy wood-picket pig fences that are built around all the taro gardens to prevent the porkers from digging up the staple crop of Samoa.
They all have a very smart road sense, otherwise they wouldn't survive [only stoopid puppies are afforded the same favours as pigs and chooks, who are always given right of way when they're crossing the road]. The Samoans are the least sentimental of people. I never saw one pat or scratch a dog - in the country side and in town they are all there for a reason - working guard dogs to keep other animals and people out of their particular patch. If there were too many puppies in a litter, or there was a "bad apple" in the village, I am sure they would have no compunction at all in dispatching them with one of the very heavy hardwood war-clubs, or one of their most peculiar cricket bats, which are like lengths of four by two.
When we turned up at out beach hut at Lepa village on the south coast of Upulo, the first thing I heard our affable, charming host Carmelsita say was HALU! HALU! at a bitch who had full teats and was obviously nursing puppies somewhere. Fran asked her if the dog was hers and she said "oh no, no, it's one of the neighbours...I think".
Her dog [the only one with a collar on I saw in all of Upolu] was a handsome battle-scarred kind of fella. We heard him get into a scrap late one night - he came off second best and was a bit lame and proppy the next day with a few new minor flesh wounds. He gave us a barking welcome, but as soon as he saw us move into our faleo'o ['little house'] and knew we were there to stay, he just hung around, either sniffing our stuff, lying alert alongside the road near our hut, or just scratching himself in a desultory fashion, but usually biting his own arse. One time I saw him on the beach [and he was very protective of his beach, chasing away any other dog he didn't like] furiously digging a big hole in the sand, and then rolling around and over and over in it, then digging some more, and doing some more barrel rolling in a vain bid to rid himself of the maddening fleas. As the Samoans like to say "the beach is your friend!".
Some of the few other tourista who were around from time to time would cautiously give him a pat on the head which was his cue to immediately roll on his back for a tummy rub, all the time pawing the patter with both front paws, but as soon as something more interesting altered him, there was the prospect of food to be had, or he had guard dog duties to perform, he'd be off in a flash.
One day we were driving along the Main South Coast road at the national speed limit of 35 mph [25 mph through the villages], and a dog appeared out of nowhere and chased our 4WD right alongside the passenger side window at full pelt for a good couple of hundred yards, furiously barking at us all the way before we managed to drop him off the chase. Not many cars that go along that road, but you'd reckon he'd do it to everyone driving on his side of the village - he looked like a very fit Kelpie impersonator indeed.
There are also bloody cats everywhere too, and they were constantly trying to get into our cottage, fale, room...they don't respond to HALU!, so my walking stick got a good workout. I suppose wherever there's rats, there's cats, and they seem to do a good job as I didn't see a single rodent on all of Upolu. One cat ran in through the patio door to our room at the Samoan Outrigger Hotel in Apia, ran around like a mad thing, and then promptly hid under the bed. Fran shooed it out from underneath the cot, and I got it with a good wack of the stick on its arse as it shot out of the room. A perfectly timed hit! It never came back.
There is one place in Samoa that has no dogs. The island Manono in the Apolima Straight between Upolu and the "Big Island" of Sava'ii. The story goes that a dog once bit a high ranking matai ['chief'] and she later died. All dogs were banished from the island forthwith. We never went there, but we heard that at the place where it happened many moons ago, there is no memorial to the poor unfortunate matai, but there is a small bronze statue of the canine responsible. Go figure.
