Napoleon Complex

I didn't realize dogs could have an ego until I came here. I suppose I shouldn't be surprised--Freud was born in the Czech Republic. Obviously there must have been something in the air here that made him put a name to such self-awareness and, well, ego. I have met my fair share of people who think highly of themselves, but I have honestly never met a person with such a bloated sense of self-importance as some of the dogs I have seen here.

This observation may stem from the fact that I have had my fair share of interaction with dogs since I got here. The family I am staying with has two big dogs: a German Shepherd, and a dog that's part "Czechoslovak wolf" (I used to think this was a breed, now I think it just means "wolf"). These two dogs are total sweethearts, though their physical size combined with their tendency to bark at anything that moves is a bit overwhelming at first. Whenever anyone walks by, the dogs know, I know, and the neighbors (much to their dismay) know as well that there is someone outside the gate. I have to say that I think their senses of self-worth are much higher than they should be, though given their size, I will let it slide.

However, there are some dogs where I don't understand where it comes from. Big dogs? Sure. They are large and could maybe kill you. They have a right to feel like they are superior to me. Little dogs? Not a chance. I have found that little dogs know just how to position themselves so that their barks will echo as you walk down the street, making you shiver and stop in your tracks as you look around, wondering if a German Shepherd is about to launch itself over some garden gate to kill you. But when you look around, all you see is a beagle, looking you straight in the eye, it's little (very little) body quivering as he tries to make you back down.

To these dogs, all I can say is, "Really, dog, really? Dog, you are about two inches tall. If you pissed me off, I could pick you up and put you in my pocket before you had the chance to attack me." And then I continue walking. This interaction continues to happen, so I can only assume that they only understand Czech and that the language barrier is the one thing that prevents them from understanding that I'm not impressed.

Honestly, weiner dogs don't scare me, and I don't think they ever will, regardless of how loud they bark. Or maybe if they were somehow able to hide from me the fact that they weigh twelve pounds on a good day, I would be a bit more scared. This is another problem. And I tell this to them sometimes when they are barking at me. Sometimes I say, "Dog. I can see you. You are behind a gate, not a wall. I know that I could step on you and crush you if I weren't paying attention. Show a little respect." Once again, language barrier.

And I have had a lot of opportunities to experience these dogs. The Czech Republic is teeming with dogs. They are literally everywhere--on the metro, on the tram, sitting outside grocery stores, walking in parks, playing in the grass, pooping on the sidewalk, killing wild hedgehogs, etc. If I were told to think of one word that would give the essence of the Czech Republic to other people, I would without a doubt and almost immediately respond with, "Dogs." They are impossible to escape.

Part of the problem with them may be that none of them are neutered, so they keep reproducing at incredible speeds. I don't know what another reason is, except that the Czechs like dogs. In class yesterday, we asked our teacher about this phenomenon. A couple of us were discussing it amongst ourselves, trying to find the reason. When we asked her about it, she responded with, "Yes, I suppose we do have a lot of dogs," and then continued on to say, "I'd say we have more dogs than Germans."

I'm still trying to decipher exactly what she meant by the "more dogs than Germans" comment. She either meant, in the Czech Republic, there are more dogs than German people, or else she meant, there are more dogs in the Czech Republic than there are in Germany. Either way, there are a lot of dogs. I like to think that there are more dogs than Germans here, just because it has a nice, somewhat xenophobic ring to it.

Well, I just looked it up (on Wikipedia) and I have discovered that Germans make up 0.4% of the population in the Czech Republic. I am going to take a wild guess and say that there is a considerably larger population of dogs here, judging from the number of dogs I have seen on the metro compared with the number of Germans I have seen (please take into account, though, that I have no idea what real Germans look like). It is difficult to say this for certain, however, because unfortunately the CIA World Factbook does not (apparently) consider dogs to be a minority, and therefore have no listing of them in their demographic statistics.

Regardless: dogs in the Czech Republic are like the ugly frat boys on campus--they think they're hot stuff when really it's too easy to ignore them.