Who is Joe?

For months Joe lived in the lane outside our house. He was a homeless Bali dog who was scared of people. If I tried to approach him, he’d bark and snap at me. When I took him food, he still barked and tried to bite me if I got too close. Each time I’d toss the food under our car and hope he’d find it. I also left a bucket of water at our front door and refilled it daily. Our efforts to calm and train Joe were futile. He was scared and vicious.

On the 29th October, Joe walked into our house, sniffed Rina, licked her and sat down beside her. She was lying on a pillow beside my desk and was in the last stages of life. Joe sat vigil over her for the next 24 hours until she died.

The dog who always barked and snapped at me had disappeared and Joe now nudged me wanting pats and attention. In my grief at the loss of Rina the last thing I wanted was a new dog. Joe had other ideas. Joe followed me everywhere I went; to my office, to the villas and even the toilet.

Joe has some bad habits. He likes to bark at people and nip them to get attention. This is not what we needed when our businesses are people focused. We decided to try and find a home for Joe. We went to BARC to see about them taking him. They were over crowded with dogs, but offered to help us by sterilizing Joe and giving him all his vaccinations. We had this done two weeks ago.

Daily I took Joe for long walks, petted him and started the process of calming him. He learnt to live in our house  and his barking reduced, as did his nipping. But I didn’t want a new dog. I was still grieving over the loss of Rina.

I am going to Sri Lanka in less than a week, so I urgently needed to find a new home for Joe. Yesterday I sent a request to a dog refuge in Denpasar, asking them to take him and offering significant donations. Bayu helped me draft this message. I had no sooner hit send when Bayu asked, “Do we really want to get rid of him?” And a discussion followed.

We now have a new dog and his name is Joe. He needs a lot of training and my contribution to this will continue when I return from Sri Lanka. We are happy to welcome Joe into our family.