Don't work with children and animals they say. Certainly don't even think of adopting strays ! However, what do you do when a starving critter turns up on your doorstep on the point of death ? Ignore it ?? Easier said than done. When I arrived I swore I would not take in any stray animals.
Then this thing turned up on my doorstep. It had no hair, was covered on open sores and just a bag of bones. His hairless tail looked like the tail of a rat. His ribs stuck out and his abdomen was tucked up towards his spine.
Reminding myself of the induction course we had in Manila where we were told it is cheaper to ship home a man / woman than a dog or cat, 
I ignored him for a day. He stayed.
I ignored him a bit longer. He still stayed.
Faced with the prospect of him dying on my doorstep I'm afraid I gave in. I fed him.
I told him not to get ideas – just because I fed him didn't mean he was my dog. He ignored me and started spending his days lying in the shade waiting for me to return home and feed him. I still keep telling him "You are not my dog. You need to keep foraging for food."
I nicknamed him "Bones" since that's all he was. At first he was very frightened and timid, but time and food cured that, and he has gone from strength to strength.
As his strength has returned he has become very puppy-ish. He started stealing the neighbours shoes and piling them up outside my door.
Then he appeared with a childs vest.
Another time it was a pair of knickers !
I now have to surreptitiously creep round the neighbourhood under cover of darkness trying to return pilfered items without being seen.
By the time six months had passed one of my fellow volunteers who lives next door to me (Don from England) decided he was a "Born Again Canine" and should be re-named "Kusog", which means "Strong".
And so Kusog was born (or re-born !). He seems to be enjoying his second puppyhood.
I have no idea what to do with him when I leave. I think I need to find someone to take him over when I go. Shipping him home is not really an option. Apart from the cost, and problems of quarantine, he is what's known here as a "street dog" who has never known a lead or a collar and is completely untrained, although he is now affectionate and likes people (now he has learnt he can trust some of them !). In the meantime at least he is healthy and happy for two years, when he would otherwise have been dead by now.
Last week I went to the island of Bohol for nine days for a conference.
As I left I gave the neighbours (whose shoes he steals) a bag of dog food and, while pointing out that he was not my dog (That shoe-stealer ? Mine ? Never ! Nothing to do with me! He's just a Street Dog) I asked them to give him one measure of dogfood a day for the week.
Not that he's my dog, you understand.
