Soon after I moved to my new place about a year ago, an unfortunate incident occurred. While walking my dog around our new neighborhood, a dog jutted out from a shack and bit my dog. She had some scares on her face and a cut on her eye. I had to take her to the doctor, but first I called 119 (the Taiwanese version of 911) to get them to send the police.
Well that didn't work out, so I asked a friend to do it for me. While waiting for the police to arrive, the guy whose dog it was went away on his scooter but I copied down his license plate number. When the police arrived we had a nice conversation where I would talk to him in English and then he would type his responses to me in English on his phone then show his phone to me to read it. He seemed embarrassed, but as I am the foreigner living in Taiwan who doesn't speak chinese, I was grateful for him going so far to communicate with me.
After speaking to the police, I had to deal with getting my dog to see a doctor. Unfortunately since I had just moved, I didn't know of any vet in the area, let alone a good one. So I hoped in a taxi and went to her usual vet by my previous apartment. There she got checked out and some treatment. The doctor also called the police officer I had spoken with to give him the dog's situation.
That night I got a call from the police officer who arranged to come and see me. When he arrived he said they saw what happened on the street's camera (still upset they didn't use this for my friend's car accident) and then they found the guy based on the license plate I gave him. He also reimbursed me for the taxi and the treatment, and told me if there was anything else just call him and he will get the money from the guy to pay for it.
Well I did need another eye drop medicine that was like three bucks, and the guy never paid for that, but that's where the street justice will come in. On top of having three dogs, that guy also has a bunch of chickens and a turkey. The previous turkey was big and fat but is since gone, around thanksgiving in fact. But that's ok, I'm waiting for this one to plump up and then something "mysterious" may befall him. This solves the problem of his dog's vicious attack, the missing three bucks, and that it's so hard to have fresh turkey in Taiwan.
Well either that or I will just go to the deli and have a turkey sandwich. That seems much easier than plucking a turkey, and then cutting it into tiny pieces so I can try somehow cook it in a microwave (no big ovens in Taiwan).
As for my dog, well she recovered physically in about a month. When she is wet you can still see where the scar was on top of her nose. However the bigger effect on her was her emotional state. For many months she had no interest in socializing with other dogs. Over these past few months she seems to be coming out of her shell more and more. I wonder is she likes turkey....
