Paramaribo, Suriname – Sat. April 29, 2007

Yesterday we walked through the rain for about an hour through flooded streets to pick up Zero (Zee), our new puppy. We got there and noticed his eye had a tick in it. The poor puppy had the worst case of fleas I had ever seen and two other ticks as well. I’ve never seen such neglect with pets before. His mother had at least 15 ticks that were the size of nickels and knowing how people don’t care for their pets the same here as they do in the US, I decided on taking him for sure instead of picking another one because I feared someone would be mean to him if he ended up being blind in one eye or even that someone would cause him to be blind by leaving it there or trying to pull it out themselves. Edward stabbed the poor dog in the eye with needle nose pliers trying to get it out, so I’ve decided against trying and instead taking him to the vet.

At only 5 weeks old, I feel it was a better decision to take this poor animal away from his mother than leave him there to be neglected so much. Once home, he has really started to take a liking to Lucien and follows his feet around all day. We killed off two of the ticks and 90% of the fleas on him which I think is a great success for the first day.

On the way home, a man offered us another puppy, another boy and we’re supposed to pick him up later today along with our bike in the city. Yesterday and the day before, it rained pretty hard and has flooded most of Paramaribo up to people’s knees however it hasn’t rained yet today so I feel there’s a good chance things should change for the people who live in town and perhaps the water will recede for them.