Animals in Laos

Oh my gosh, Laos is the hardest place for an animal-lover to live. 

First of all, there are tons- TONS- of street animals.  The concept of spaying/ neutering an animal is completely foreign to the Lao population. This results in a lot of the animals being killed, or a lot of animals that come out looking like this: (Starved, and with bodies haggard from having so many litters)

And on Monday, the hairdressing salon next door to the office had these two TINY, adorable kittens. 

When I went up to pet them, the black one snuggled against my ankle, and then I realized that its eyes were so infected it couldn't see.  When I asked (in what little Lao I know) what it's name was, the owners said it had no name, and asked if wanted to have it. (I can't, as (a) our apartment doesn't allow cats + has maid who would notice if I snuck one in, and (b) getting animals back into the States requires a ton of time and $). I sadly said no, but convinced Nick that we could take the cat to the vet, get it some shots/ medicine, and nurse it back to health before finding it a real owner... but by the time we went back to get it, the kittens were gone. I haven't seen them since, and I'm too scared to ask the owners of the salon what happened to them.

Lucky animals are sometimes "adopted" by restaurants, in that the restaurants don't actually care for the animals, but don't shoo them away when they beg from restaurant customers. So the animals (typically cats) snuggle up to you in hope that you will feed them. Which, of course, Nick and I do.

Last week it was particularly rough, as Nick and I were waiting at a stop sign and a scooter came up with a tiny cage holding a bunch of adolescent puppies, way too many to fit in a cage. Nick and I just looked at each other and new exactly where those animals were headed: to be killed for food. Before we came to Laos, we had thought that if we ever saw people caging dogs for food that we would intervene... but when you can't adopt the animals yourself, there are no animal rescue groups and already the city is overpopulated with street dogs, there isn't much you can do.