Kara’s STORY
– Coral Pethers Back in 1975 my husband and I were sent to Papua New Guinea as part of the team building a hydroelectricity station. It was a construction town built specifically for this project and we were up in the highlands, a long way from anywhere. A short time after we got there one of the men was sent back to Australia and he was looking for a new home for his dog. Kara was a German Shepherd/Choux cross and two years old. I have had many dogs since then but Kara was my first dog as an adult and, to this day, is the smartest dog I ever had. When Peter brought her down to my house on the day he left I kept her inside till late in the afternoon. I then took her up to his house and let her run all around and check out the empty house. After a while I called her and we went home. From that moment she became my dog and went everywhere with me. Kara would lie at my feet under the desk at work during the day and sleep inside our house at night. One of my extra duties was to run the bi-weekly pictures at our town hall. Kara would walk down to the hall with me, wait till I opened up and then go home. My husband said she would sleep at home until all of a sudden she would wake up and he would let her out of the yard. She would come down to the hall and be there ready to walk me home. The international company supplying and installing the hydro equipment was Yugoslavian so there were many men without their families and they lived in single men dongas on site. Frequently, we would have some of them for a meal at our house and they really enjoyed their slivovitz (a rather strong spirit) and, consequently, would be a bit unsteady for the walk home. I would tell Kara to take them home and they would hang on to her collar and she would take them back to the dongas. She never lost one.
A morning cuppa was often enjoyed at a neighbour’s house and, living in the wet tropics, it was the custom to kick your shoes off at the door. Kara would come with me and wait outside while I had my cuppa. However, if I was longer than an hour, when I came out she and my shoes would be gone. She would take them home. I often had a barefoot walk back to our house. I can still remember vividly the day I gave Kara a shinbone to enjoy in the backyard. Hearing a ruckus outside I went out the door only to see Kara and a very large wedgetail eagle having a Mexican standoff over the bone. Luckily, the eagle decided to back off and flew away without any harm to either dog, bird or bone. When the project was completed some years later and it was our turn to return home to Australia we had to make the decision on what to do with Kara. Back in those days dogs coming into Australia had to be in quarantine for six months. After the free lifestyle Kara had enjoyed we felt we could not subject her to that so we rehomed her with a local family so that she would have a forever home for her remaining years. Kara was the first stepping stone in my adult life training and working with dogs and I could not have asked for a better teacher and companion. It started me on a lifelong enjoyment of the dog world.
DOG WORLD August 2020
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