My Best Bark about Egypt: Catching up to the biggest cat in the world – the Sphinx!

Worst Woof about Egypt: The Heat! Yelp…

I never knew hot until I sat myself under the Egyptian sun. My tongue nearly touched the pavement it was panting so much! I kicked off my Cairo visit with S.P.A.R.E. Headed up by Amina Abazna, you cannot begin to imagine the passion that exudes from the beautiful face and mouth of this incredible woman. I was left panting trying to keep up with her and her determination to improve the lives for all animals in Egypt! She started a shelter for dogs almost 10 years ago when her husband told her to stop crying about the plight of animals in Egypt and to ‘Do something about it!’ Nothing can be closer to the reality for Amina and the staff at S.P.A.R.E. She also has a donkey sanctuary in Cairo and it’s probably the most quant spot in the whole of Egypt! Palm trees, carrots and happy donkeys that should have been dead ages ago. Our visit was slightly overshadowed by the brutal slaughter of all the pigs in Cairo ‘due to swine flu fears’, but I did get to meet with the veterinary Council and begged them to stop poisoning and shooting the stray dogs in Egypt. They seemed like smart and intelligent ‘top dogs’ – and even Mr. Talib Murad Ali Elam from the United Nations was also present so I bet the barks are in better hands now. (He looks just like Dustin Hoffman!). My visit also included a live visit onto Egypt’s #1 news Cannel ‘Dream’ with talk show host ‘Mona’. Found myself a little lost in translation, but stood my woof! Just to get a paws up in Cairo is something to woof about so mission accomplished. I also managed to take a skinny dip in the Nile and also meet the biggest cat in the whole woofing world! The Sphinx was smaller than I thought, but much too fat to run. Lucky cat – little did the meow know that I was too hot to chase anyway…
A special bark of thanks to Amina and Ralf for hosting me and my team, as well as to Ahmed Diab and Amr Handy of Animal Welfare Association for Research and Education (AWARE) for all your help at the pyramids in the squelching son. To all the media who don’t usually focus on dogs, thank you for coming along to shake my paw for your programs– and sorry for splashing around in the Nile while you were trying to get me in my groomed coat!

 Did You Nose? : Adopt A Dog in Arabic is ETBANNA KALB