Poland 2012: Polish people and their dogs (Céline, Germany)

My Polish host family has got a small dog. His name is Benio. He is three years old and - unlike the dogs in Germany -he never has to wear a collar.

Benio is allowed to stay outside around the house the whole day and in the evening the door opens and he goes in for eating and sleeping.

The food he is given consists of remnants of the food the family has eaten before. Next to his bowl are those of the cats, which every evening get their cat food.

After my schoolmate Sabrina, our Polish partner Aleksandra and I had eaten our breakfast, we had to go to school by train.

When we left the house in order to go to the train station, Benio ran along and went with us. On the first day I had to laugh because you will never see an unaccompanied dog like him in a town like Bensheim. There, all dogs have to be taken on a leash, except outside of town e.g. on footpaths.

On the way to the station Benio meets his dog friends every day and sometimes he barks, if he doesn’t like the dog in front of him. But he is a very friendly dog, when you want to stroke him. At the station there always is another dog walking around freely and Benio wants to play with him. So he just does it, because he is his own master.

Aleksandra said to me that Benio only could be free, because he is always attentive and very obedient. To achieve that, she has to train really hard with him, but for her this is much fun.

When the train arrived, we entered it and then Aleksandra told Benio he had to go home on his own – and he does just that.

This is so extraordinary!!! I’ve never seen a dog like him before. My dog isn’t able to do something like that. And Benio does this every day, it is routine for him.

We stayed the day at our Polish partner school in Klodzko and had a funny and interesting schedule. And at the end of our school day, we went home with Aleksandra. At home Benio was still waiting for us, especially for Aleksandra.

When we were having dinner Benio sat next to the table or lay on his own chair, because he had to wait until we had finished our dinner before getting his own.

I think that Benio is very intelligent, because he has managed  to learn so many tricks in the three years of his life which German dogs would never have to learn in their whole lifetime.