Saki is home!!!!!!!!!!!

And he is wonderful!!!!!!!!

Despite him not being totally house broken he is so lovely and loving and we are all very pleased to have him here.

This morning he arrived in NZ at 05.45. We were told that we should be ok if we arrived around 06.15.
So in our “naive ness” Bill and I thought to get some papers signed and then take Saki home by 07.00. But nothing was further from the truth as we were sent from office to office filling in papers and paying each for the honour.
The longest wait was at the customs office. I told the two young custom officers that helped us the Saki story, he was a rehomer from England via Aussie and we paid nothing for him except for part of his flight over. Away they went to complete the papers. After about 30 minutes they came back with one very angry supervisor that told me that he quite frankly though my story very unbelievable and that because Saki was an extremely rare breed he was no doubt very expensive and I was to pay tax accordingly. I told him my story was not a lie and that Saki was not a dog that was to breed from, he had after all been castrated a few weeks earlier. Well that may be but according to him Saki was still worth a lot of money and since Estrelas sold for about 800 euros in Holland he would let me import Saki with a tax calculated on “very reasonable” 1000 dollars!
At this stage it was extremely lucky that Bill had come with me as he helped to keep me from doing something very unkind to the custom officers supervisor. I guess these people see a lot of un-honest people in their line of business so they turn into the most cynical mean people imaginable. We were made to wait another hour….. poor Saki still waiting…
For me the principle of basically being called a liar was the biggest anger maker. But we were being held over a barrel, we either paid the nearly 300 dollar tax or leave Saki where he was. When the papers were finally ready we paid the money and left wondering if these people can still enjoy life if they feel they can never trust anyone and treat everyone like (please excuse my language) shit.
I have to admit if it was up to the 2 young customs officers it would have gone in a much friendlier way so I apologize to them for my unkind words.

Off to the third and last office. Here they told us we were missing a form from customs AAaaagggghhhh now I really did look somewhat frustrated. My dear brother Bill went back to get the forgotten form. He probably didn’t trust me with them again. This time it didn’t take quite as long.
In a room at the back somewhere was Saki. The people here were really nice and all were so impressed by Saki. One woman had taken a photo of him to show her young son and proudly showed me her memento of him. Others asked in amazement if “the big dog” was going to go home with us. They were all charmed by this big boy who found it all a bit scary what was going to happen to him now. I thought at the time that he was going to need a lot of tender care to give him confidence but once we had him on the leash and he saw our car he just jumped in and enjoyed the ride and hasn’t looked back since!
So after nearly 3 hours Saki was finally going home!!!

Once home we let him into the garden with Kiwi, then Rowi, then Tieka, Zanna and Vaglie and lastly once things had calmed down, as there was a lot of running and playing going on, Rusty.
He just fitted in. Sometimes the girls, or should I say bitches, will tell him off but that actually makes him want to love them more ;-). Hahaha men are such suckers for a forceful girl.

Why anyone would have wanted to give Saki away is beyond me. In just one day he has proved he is so loving, has a great sense of humour, is really smart and very gentle.

My baby Kiwi has grown up. She has taken it upon herself to play with Saki outside and be the strict “bringer upper” inside. He dose need it a bit because he is slightly naughty boy (in a funny way) in puberty having lacked enough close human contact at this crucial time. But its nothing to be worried about, he is a great normal young man.

Oh, and the extra bonus of Saki at the moment is that because of his haircut and his still furry large head with small ears he looks just like “Fozzie bear” from the muppets. And his happy attitude and character is the same as Fozzies too. Well who wouldn’t walk around with a permanent grin when you see that all day LOL.

Im sure he is going to be a pain in the butt and no doubt break and chew things but in the mean time…….

Thanks to you all for helping us get Saki home and making him and our family so happy!!!

Just 8 nights of sleep and Saki will be home with us!!!

On the morning of Saturday the 24th of May we can pick him up at the airport!

Before that Saki has another adventure.
He will be taken to “Sherae Kennels” (that is also a pet-transport company) next Monday and stay with them until Friday.
They will do all the organising to get him ready to fly to NZ. The main things being getting all the correct tests and paperwork done. NZ is very strict so its vitally important its done correctly.
On Friday evening they will take him to the airport for what I think will be a 6 hour flight home.

A month ago we were blissfully unaware that another man was going to enter our lives LOL.

Cheers to all that have donated! Looks like half his flight has been catered for now so I am over the moon!
On behalf of Saki and myself…..Thank you, thank you, thank you!!!!
Kisses and hugs to all our dear friends around the world.

(donations can still be made. You can find information in the "Saki story" below)

Hi all

Just a note to say Saki has been "fixed" (stupied word huh..) and should be coming home to us this week!!!!!!! OMG its so exciting!

Thanks for the donations for his flight! I have no idea how its going but just the though you are thinking of us is so heart warming.

Hope to tell you more soon.

cheers

Suzanne

Well I am itching to give you an update on Saki but I haven’t heard anything about him since Monday.
He was to be castrated last Monday but they had an emergency so he was postponed to be done on Tuesday but despite questions from me I still haven’t heard how it went. Gosh I can only hope “no news is good news”… There are many dogs in the sanctuary so I’ll have to be patient as I’m sure they are busy.
So in the mean time I would like to thank you for helping to “get Saki home” which I hope will be with in 1 or 2 weeks. Every contribution is just so wonderful and I find it difficult to express my gratitude. Believe me it is huge!
Please have a giggle at this next blog entry. I hope it puts a smile on your face, its our first way to say thank you from us. Xxx
As soon as I have new news about Saki I will post it.

Rowi and her “revealing” day.
Still looking pretty….


OMG LOOK WHAT THEY HAVE DONE TO ME! I LOOK LIKE A SNAUZER!
STOP LAUGHING AT ME!
To add injury to insult…. I think perhaps the Snauzer look wasn’t so bad after all… Actually Rowi was ecstatic to have lost that bundle of fur and spent the next hour hurtling round the garden with Tieka barking and chasing her and Kiwi doing the same but without the barking. Rowi seemed to have gained the speed she needed to be able to pester the others and get away with it too.
All evening we humans spent chuckling away each time we saw Rowi, her eyes glowing at having been given a new image!
She’s the funniest looking dog hahaha. Kadoes what do you think of your sister now? LOL

Life never takes the coarse you think its going to take. It just throws obstacles and opportunities in front of your feet and you of coarse deal with them as they come.

It is a lazy Sunday morning as I sit and type this in the comfort of my bed. I promised myself a lay in but I am too restless to sleep so typing a long awaited update is time better spent.
Next to the bed Kiwi is in deep sleep and dreaming. Her breathing a little erratic and her paws slightly twitching as she dreams. And then she is quiet again, she must have dealt with whatever she was doing in her sleep.
On the bed next to me lay 4 Lagotti girls bunched up together enjoying the sleep in too. Rowi changed her position to come and lay hard against me and the laptop knowing that’s the best position for the occasional massage as I sit and think how to put something in to words.
Total peace while it just started to rain outside making the lazy Sunday sleep in complete.

I have big news, perhaps the main reason for my unrest at the moment…..

2 weeks ago I received an email from Marcia, a friend from England. She is an Estrela lover, a breeder, and has a half sister of Kiwi all making our bond in life despite the distance greater.
She wrote that the Estrela club in England had received an email from Sue who works for a dog sanctuary in Australia. An Estrela had been surrendered to then and after having done their homework exceedingly well they realised this was not a breed to be placed with just anybody. It’s a breed not for the faint hearted and finding someone with experience with this kind of breed was their preference.
So the question was if they knew anyone in Aussie that fitted their search description, and in turn Marcia asked me if I knew the same.
Well I do know a family in Perth (where Saki the Estela is now residing) but they are not really “doggy people”, at least not for an Estrela kind of dog, so the answer for Aussie contacts was no.
But I did know someone that was down under only on a different island… ME!
I cant explain it but immediately when reading “Sakis plight email” I felt a bond and wanted to rescue him.
I let my sister-in-law read the email and she had the same reaction and then with out a word we let my brother read the email who said “so I guess we have to save Saki”. With a huge grin on my face I said “I didn’t suggest that” and immediately Kate said “nether did I!”
“you woman are all the same, I knew that you were setting me up” Bill said as we all sat laughing knowing what our next mission in life was.
And so it came that for the past 2 weeks I have been emailing with the Estrela emailing group for any information about Saki. At the same time swapping a lot of emails with the Aussie dog sanctuary full of information of who we are, how we live and what sort of family Saki would come into. And with dog transport companies how his eventual transport would have to be done.
It was a first for the dog sanctuary to have an adoption application form overseas so the committee had to gather to discuss this and fortunately finally late Friday evening the finale verdict was announced and they are happy to send Saki over!!!
About Saki.
He is a year old and has already experienced more than the average dog in a whole life.
His owners emigrated with him and family from England to Aussie when he was about 10 or a 11 months. Then he would have spent a month in quarantine. I don’t know how that was arraigned. Whether his owners could/would have visited him often?
After he came out of quarantine he spent a short time at his owners place before being surrendered to the dog sanctuary. We can only assume he did not do well in their back yard (he was an “outside dog” in England so no doubt in Aussie too) digging large wholes to get to cooler soil and barking loudly as Estrelas can do so well. The city of Perth was not prepared for such a dog. Not to mention the hot temperatures that he would not have been able to avoid in a “small” suburban garden.
When brought into the dog sanctuary they had to shave him as his coat was extremely thick and matted so brushing was not an option. His owners were obviously having a hard time with this emigration. Thus the next photos to show you our handsome short coated boy who when his coat comes back will look exactly like Kiwi! I think that is rather cute, people will perhaps think them brother and sister :-)

The cost to fly young Saki over was rather a surprise. For a “mere” 2500 Australian dollars we can get him here. Not a small amount that has come at a time that I also just spent enormous amounts to get my family over from the Netherlands to NZ.
So with some profound blushing (and most of you know how well I can turn a lovely shade for red) I would like to appeal to you to make a donation to “get Saki home”. I include an email Sue’s sent how you can do this. The money goes directly to the dog sanctuary so as to keep things nice and clean. Every dollar helps and I thank you from the bottom of my and Saki’s heart for your help

Hi Ellen

Thank you so much for your email and the offer of sponsorship to get Saki to Suzanne in NZ.

If you are able to help with our fundraising to ship him over that would be absolutely wonderful.

We receive no government support at all and rely entirely on community support and our own fundraising efforts to meet our costs and as you would appreciate there is never enough money to go around.

We do have a secure donation link on our web-site - http://www.dogshome.org.au/ - and if you own a Visa or Mastercard credit card you can make a donation there. If you are able to do that and then send me an email saying that you have made a donation, I shall make sure that the amount you have donated goes towards Saki's transport and not anything else.

Or alternatively you can print out a donation slip and mail it to us with a donation and just write on it that the donation is for Saki's travel.

I'm sorry that we aren't more sophisticated than that but our web skills are a little lacking and we have not had such a situation before - it will spur me on to upgrading our web-site however to make donations for special purposes easier.

Thanks again Ellen for your interest and for your support.

best regards

Sue Leitch

General Manager

Dogs' Refuge Home (WA) Inc

http://www.dogshome.org.au/