Photo Margarita Kosior by Unsplash
In my last post, I talked about the gypsy attack on the ICAR rescue dog farm while I was volunteering there in the summer of 2012. Now I’m going to light up some of the next day’s events. The day after the attack, when I returned from the hospital sometime in the afternoon, the gypsy boys threw stones again into that fence on the field side of the pound, and I had enough.
I decided to put an end to it and called 911 and demanded that the police have to come there. After a while, the local police arrived. Because they didn’t speak English, they asked Iulia what my problem was. He wondered to me why I have called 911.
The cops told me to sit in their car, and they wanted to see my passport. After a while talking to each other, they told me to get out of the car and hurried me out. I asked Iulia with astonishment and dismay that what on earth were they going to do about it. He said those cops didn’t think it was appropriate to intervene.
Finnish Embassy intervenes
I got nervous because I didn’t want to go through the same thing again the next night. I got an idea to call the Finnish Embassy in Bucharest and ask them if they could help. I called there and told them what had happened the night before. I said I was worried about my safety because I had to make it for another 1.5 weeks there.
The official on the phone said she’d get back to me in a few minutes. About half an hour later, my phone rang, and the woman said she was in contact with Giurgiu’s central police station. She said that she had talked to the chief of police who had promised to take care of the problem. The chief had ordered local police in Baneasa to patrol the field behind the pound at night for the rest of my holiday.
I was very grateful for the help I received from the embassy. The officer asked me to contact her if the order hasn’t complied. To my surprise, this happened. In the evening around 9:00 p.m, a police car appeared in the field. I don’t know what time in the morning they left their scouting, but they showed up nicely every single night since my departure.
Iulia’s friend Doina had also hired a private security company to guard the farm area against the outside. On the gate side, there were two guards on call, 24/7.
Iulia’s broken car and windows in the slacks
Iulia’s car went through a lot outside the shelter. The windshield broke it to altogether remove it and dents on the hood. All the windows on the end of the road were all shattered from the shelter building. Her son had guardian angels involved because a block of concrete had come through the window of Iulia’s bedroom, but thank God it hadn’t hit a boy sleeping in bed. Adrian and volunteer Stelica fixed the rear corrugated fences.
Luckily, the kennels of the dogs spared, and miraculously none of the dogs were injured. A couple of little dogs in the kennels at the back got away from the attackers, but we found them and returned to shelter.
A news reporter from some tv station appeared to interview Iulia, and I, too, was able to tell them what happened. So quite a dramatic evening and night there was, but fortunately, besides me, no one else got injuries.
Consequences of the attack
Luckily, the fences got repaired, and some cardboard placed in the windows, but Iulia’s car required more significant repairs. We had to arrange a water pick up for the dogs some other way. Luckily, the neighbor who helped us had a horse and a stroller. So in the morning, we loaded empty barrels of water to his stroller, and he returned a couple of hours later after filling them with a volunteer assistant Stelica.
A week later, Iulia got a call from the central police station that I should go to a forensic expert there. So one day we drove to Giurgiu and visit her. The assistant who was there measured and photographed my injuries, and everything recorded in the papers. The rest of my time in the shelter was peaceful, as the guards were there and also police patrol overnight.
A couple of months after I returned, I called the Finnish Consulate in Bucharest and asked if the matter had already gone to court. The next day I received an email that these men had been released and got only fines. That is very typical of Romania, which means that corruption ensures that the vandalism that happens to private rescue dog shelters never leads to penalties for those vandals.
How did that event affect me?
After all that, I was increasingly concerned about the safety and future of those poor dogs. I thought I’d like to give a home to one of those snoops and adopt a rescue dog myself. Of course, it would first require clarification that all the regulations concerning dogs imported into Finland should meet. Also, I still had four big dogs at the time, which my husband thinks is the maximum number.
So it took a couple of years before Dede and later Dede’s sister Lissu joined our family. I got to know many rescue dog people because of that dramatic evening because it attracted attention both in Finland and in other countries around Europe. One of those great people was Mihai from Bucharest, whose lucky heart-takers are my current family members Dede and Lissu.
But I decided to find other ways to help those homeless, sad-eyed hairs. On Facebook, I shared photos of those dogs in ICAR and many other private shelters looking for adoption. I was also helping a few heart-takers get to Finland and into their forever homes.
I was an interpreter, helped organize things, and book flights here. Because I have quite diverse craft skills, I prepared all kinds of crafts and donated them auctions on Facebook. Volunteer groups are raising funds with auctions sterilizations and castrations, the necessary veterinary costs, dog food, etc.
So I lost my heart to those homeless, mistreated dogs, and I made it my life mission to save as many as possible. I supposed to adopt from the ICAR’s farm a dog I named Hero, whom I had asked Iulia to save from Giurgiu’s public shelter. However, Hero’s adoption and arrival to Finland stayed only a dream, because Iulia refused to give me that poor sweet thing at the last minute.
Next time, I’ll tell you about my second trip to ICAR, and I began to expose myself to an entirely new side of that woman. On that trip, I also visited the mayor and the public shelter of Giurgiu and visited Constanta with my new friend Diana.
