May 06, 2006
To doo or not to doo...
There is a lot of talk in Vienna these days having to do with dog doo aka dog poop, dog shit or fucking dog shit! I first took notice of the liberation that European dogs enjoy over here when I made my first trip over the Alantic to go to Amsterdam back in March 2004. I have to say that so far they take the cake. I almost couldnt enjoy the sites for fear of triping on or walking into a dog doo tower. Not only was there an abundance of the doo but it was the biggest dog doo I have ever encountered. It left me wondering damn, what are they feeding these dogs here, obviously too many space cakes. Other European cities that I have visited since don't come close but is obvious to me that dogs can do as they please, well at least where they please. So after hearing all this talk on FM4 ( FM vier )on how people were trying to get laws passed or raise the penalty on fines( currently there is a fee for not picking up your dog doo. Its about €7 )I decided to hit the streets to see how dogs felt about doing their doo and all the buzz around Vienna these days.
My first encounter was with Tony, my friend Jo walks him. She is just one of his many walkers. His owners hire dog walkers to talk him for strolls through the Vienna streets. Tony told me that he is tired of what he called the Americanization of Europe. Growling loudly Tony said "It's bad enough we need to speak English everywhere, but now they want our owners to pick up our doo. Next there will be no smoking in the bars in restaurants or even no drinking in the streets, and no nudity on tv. I tell you I think it stinks!"
After Tony heard I was going around to get dog's opinions on this topic he decided to join me. Next we ran in to a couple of dogs, and thats when the debate got really heated. One dog, Jan (Yan) said " I think the humans have a point, I mean if they don't want dog doo on the sidewalks or on city streets I can understand that. My master takes me to the park where I can go in the bushes or by trees like its supposed to be anyway." Then the next dog Hanz, contested Jan's remark by saying " thats how it starts, first they will have us not dooing on the sidewalks and city streets and next they'll have us going in litter boxes or something! Thats how it is with the humans, its bad enough we have to use leashes and some of us even have muzzles on." Before I knew it the dogs were barking up a storm and I decided to get out of there in a hurry.
Next I ran in to this dog named Sinclair and on his back was his friend Stu the rat. Sinclair said " I dont know what's the big idea, I've always been of the doo and let doo school of thought. You know who has time to think about where I'm going to drop my doo, when the time comes I just doo it. when you gotta doo you gotta doo." Stu seemed to be squeeking in agreement but I have to say I dont talk rat yet.
So next I decided to ask a resident of Vienna and I found a guy who also had a rat on him after talking with him for a bit I asked him his name and he said it was Matrix. Anyway I've seen Matrix around the neighborhood asking people for money or hanging out drinking beers with his other homeless friends. He is part of this group of people I call the homeless goth punks. He is the first one of these Homeless Goth Punks that allowed me to take his photo. So any way when I asked him about dogs dooing where ever they pleased he responded, " I don't see what's the big deal. When I have to doo I just doo in the closest convient place. I mean I have to say that in Vienna there are plenty of public bathrooms so most times thats where I doo, but there has been the occasion that I doo just like the dogs doo."
So, any way we'll see how Vienna tries to fix its doo problem. I'll keep you posted on any breaking news.
Posted by Victor at 01:34 AM | Comments (3)