This is for you DAD

They lead their own separate lives. They roam this city of 125,000 and they are well aware of the people’s traffic and even more aware of the people's cars. They belong to their own subculture. No, not punk-rockers, but the dogs. Of the 125,000 inhabitants of Ramnicu Valcea, our canine friends must comprise a good five grand. It really is their city, the rest of us just happen to live in it.
They run in packs, I like to think of them as family units. In every unit exists the runt. He is usually short, squat and wiener dog-esque but he also possesses the fiercest bark. In front of my site-mate Janet’s block it’s the runt that controls the right traffic lane each day. He patrols for cars, conveniently starting his job at five a.m. Each car that comes along, a potential intruder is warned by a constant howl until exiting the lane. This lasts until midmorning. At that time the leader of the pack, “Papa” a pit, German Shepard, poodle mix has located breakfast in the garbage bins behind her block. Every unit has a cripple; a three-legged, one-eyed mutt, that you can’t help but pity. He takes the handouts, pig intestines, lunch leftovers and whatever scraps he can round up from his human neighbors. Handouts are never shared. Next in line is “Momma.” Her belly sags to the ground pulled down continually by Mother Nature’s gravity. Her tits are bloated and pink. The bags under her eyes droop down to the ground and her back legs flinch at the continuing whining behind her. Her three pups follow, nipping at her ankles. They are fat and fuzzy gray, eating constantly, gnawing intermittenly on Momma’s milk and the better table scraps laid out by the baba who lives on the second floor. The cripple looks on jealously. Every now and then, away from the watchful eye of Momma, he steals some booty. Don’t ever get between Momma and her pups. If you walk in their direction, fierceness will enter her eyes that could chill pavement on an August afternoon. Suddenly a barrier is broken, the human and dog worlds collide. She’ll draw blood. Two dog bites later, trust me, it isn’t good.
Short history of the dogs: Ceasescu, a man with much foresight, saw a somewhat fantastical vision of Romania. What was formerly a state of villages and rural peoples he quickly transformed under his regime into an ultra modern workers state. He designated city sites and built factories. He tore down existing houses and farms to build concrete blocs to house the factory workers and their families. In this way, his vision tore down and reconstructed the country so that now Romania consists of a network of artificial bloc cities, dilapitated cement monuments to Ceasescu and his wife. I live in one of them. But not only did the people fall victim to the destruction of life the way they knew it, so did the dogs. When the houses were plowed down and replaced by blocs pets were forgotten. Dogs and cats were ousted out of homes where there was barely enough space for the children. As a result the stray population skyrocketed and the packs began. What is interesting (from a purely evolutionary point of view) is the mixture of breeds that occurred. The first strays were the purebred dogs of the people, Labs, Shepards, Pitbulls, Terriers and Poodles. Over time the have mixed and interbred so much that strange new breeds roam the streets. The Ceasescu purebreds I like to think of them. The are short and squat with German Shepard markings, or colored like a pitbull with a poodles curly hair. At this point they have forgotten their domestic ways and have adapted to life of the streets.
Two canine friends live outside of my bloc, blackie and blondie. Blackie whom I have renicknamed Captain Ahab is an ancient laborador mutt. His hearing is gone and so is his right eye which has turned into a mush of pink flesh. He groans and sighs when you enter into the bloc, angry that you have interrupted his nap on my neighbors front step and then he rolls over and goes back to sleep. We had a tenuous relationship at first. To be honest, the Captain scared me a little. Once a while I would catch him asleep on my front stoop and gingering trying to enter my apartment I would inevitably wake him up, scare him and end up in a growling match. Finally I got wise and left out a bit of chicken fat. He seemed to enjoy it though eyeing me all the while through his good eye. I kept on feeding him table scraps and eventually we got to the point of ignoring each other which was fine by me. But the other day, I am pleased to announce that I got my first tail wag. Walking down the alley to my bloc, he spotted me coming toward him, wagged his tail once and walked away. Finally, I made my first Romanian friend in Romania.
Now blondie is a completely different story. He, whom I have renamed “The Prez” was instantly friendly. He is a dog of the people, the dog ambassador of our bloc pack. On move in day he made his presence known with a full butt wag, which is funny because Prez is an all blonde dog except for his tail which is black. When his tail wags it looks like a black apparition that has separated from his body. He is sweet but busy. He has a weekly bloc rotation maximizing his food sources and spreading his message of doggy cheer between my neighbors. We all know Prez, and we all feed him as well.
Some people come to Romania and exclaim, “Those dogs! Something must be done about those dogs!” Since I have been here I have taken to watching the packs. I have analyzed the way that they interact. The way they watch for the light to change at the crosswalks before they cross the street. The way they weave in and out of pedestrian traffic, running their daily errands. And once in a while I will catch Harold a grandfatherly terrier mutt who sleeps outside the steps to the Diana supermarket, wake up from his nap and stare out into the crowd. He stares for five minutes watching the bustle of the city rushing past; kids running by screaming taunts at each other, taxi’s cutting each other off, the occasional argument between fruit vendors on the corner. And I swear he shakes his head, and makes a little grunt as he falls back into his former comatose state. “Those people! Something must be down about those people!”