The harsh realities of life tend to be more visible in Mongolia than in America. For example, every year millions of cats and dogs are euthanized in America, but unless you volunteer at a shelter or are passionate about animals, this is just a sad, but fairly abstract fact. You didn’t know any of those animals and it doesn’t really affect you. But here street dogs are quite common, and it is not unusual to walk past tiny puppies, injured pooches, or even dead dogs on the street. Last Friday there was a cull of all ownerless dogs in Hanhongor. While the problem was not as bad as in Ulaanbaatar where there is a group of city employees who shoot approximately 300 dogs a night, there was a fairly sizable number of dogs running around. As someone who loves animals enough to not eat them, it makes me very sad to walk to work now and not see, as Brian and I named them, Pink Feather, Farkus, Bendy Legs, Clown Pooch, and many others.  The only dogs left in town are those owned by people and two very lucky/wiley puppies in my neighborhood. Animal control in Mongolia, aside from shooting them, doesn’t really exist. We have gone out of our way to have Santi, Monster, and Lulu fixed, but that was an expensive and fairly laborious thing to do. There are no vets outside of Ulaanbaatar who fix cats and dogs and the price, while cheap compared to America, is well beyond what most people would pay. My heart breaks for all the sad homeless pooches, but we just can’t fit any more of them in our ger. Where is my magic sterilization wand when I need it?