Amid loud growling and gnashing teeth, the dog catchers of Bangkok started to round up all the homeless hounds, as Thailand is preparing itself to clean up the city for the Asia-Pacific summit next month.
With Bangkok having more than 100,000 stray dogs alone, Thailand's officials are focusing their efforts and inadequate manpower on the mayor tourist sites and entertainment areas of Thailand's capitol, Bangkok.
We don't want these homeless stray dogs to embarrass our Thai leaders, a Bangkok dog catcher said. After we catch them. we are taking them up country, said city official Khun Sompop Chatraporn, who is heading the new team of 70 canine hunters in Bangkok.
Armed with huge nets on long wooden polls, the newly appointed Bangkok dog catchers, snatch snoozing dogs from under cars or while enjoying themselves with loitering the dustbins outside on Bangkok's busy streets.
Don't catch him, don't catch this poor dog, he is blind !, shouted an small Thai lady, while pointing at an ageing old street dog chased by the dog catching city workers who are getting 30 baht (US$ 0.75) per dog caught.
Younger, faster and more street-wise dogs slip through their nets. Those dogs have the survival instinct, Khun Sompop said. They see us coming in the truck and run away, said Sompop, who is aiming at catching as many dogs as possible before the 2003 October 17-21 Apec summit.
The Kingdom of Thailand has millions of homeless street dogs, but unlike many other countries, it does not kill them because Thai Buddhists revere all forms of life.
In July, a Bangkok street vendor confessed of poisoning 48 stray dogs living on the grounds of a Thai Buddhist temple, because the dogs stole his lunch, had been sentenced in court for cruelty to animals and fined 1,000 baht (US$ 25).
Last year, the Thai King, elevated Tongdaeng, a former stray dog from Bangkok streets, to the status of Royal superstar overnight. More than 100,000 Thais queued daily outside shops to buy a book about the famous street dog, written by her new owner, King Bumibhol Adulyadej. The book topped on Thailand's bestseller lists and hailed Tongdaeng as being one of the most respected dogs in Thailand.
The city of Bangkok, last year, tried to go high-tech with a microchip implant in pet dogs carrying data about their owners, as to prevent those owners of abandoning their pets. But the Thai legislation is still heavily in debate about this new procedure, Sompop said further.
In this latest clean up action, for the Apec meeting in Thailand, the stray dogs will first be sterilized, then vaccinated and driven to a special compound near the Thailand's Cambodia border. There they will get plenty of food and live the rest of their lives in happiness, added Khun Sompop.
