August 11
The Snow Monster is proving difficult.
The issue is flying a dog internationally – particularly from an Asian country, particularly to South Africa. Particularly during a pandemic. See, we’ve been trying to plan our exit from Korea to her home of South Africa, and obviously we can’t leave a third of our family behind when we go. But arranging the flight has been throwing up wrinkle after wrinkle for us.
In general, there are three ways to fly a pet:
1)As a companion on the flight, in a small carrier that fits on a seat or under one.
2)As excess baggage – the crate is checked and the animal is flown in the cargo bay.
3)As manifest cargo – with no humans on the flight, just as part of a regular cargo run to a country.
Now, South Africa will only accept pets flown into the country as Manifest Cargo. That means that Snow can’t fly with Kajal and I, but must travel on his own. So, step one was to arrange the flight. There’s a company in Korea that she’s been working with that would contract the flight details for us – but they will only place the animals on a single airline that they trust: Dutch airways.
So, in order to get from Seoul to Joburg, Snowball has to fly via…Amsterdam.
Step two is his crate. First, the dog had to be measured so that a custom crate could be built (at great expense) – he couldn’t fly in a plastic crate bought off the shelf. Nose to tail, ears to paws, waist – try and work out how many centimeters the crate must be. So, Kajal measured him and gave one set of measurements for the crate. Then, I measured him, and got a completely different set of measurements. Snow hates anything that isn’t built for dogs. He shrinks and cowers when I bring him his harness for his twice-daily walks in the park. Trying to get him to hold still for a tape measure? Impossible – such vile tortures could never be inflicted on such a poor, innocent pup as Snowball! But with much wrestling, we got some approximates and sent him the measurements.
Then the airline changed the rules.
Crates went from requiring “a few” centimeters of clearance over the ears to requiring fully ten centimeters. So he needed a new crate. And new measurements.
So we wrestled the dog again and sent him the revised measurements. Then he replied, shocked at the new numbers. We double checked. We had measured him wrong. We sent him the numbers for a third time and he accepted those, and began working on a new estimate for his crate. It was much more expensive than the last one. Well, whatever.
Step three was to get the dog medically prepped. He needs a rabies certificate, five other vaccines, a blood test, and a medical clearance to fly.
Now, it takes specialized training and equipment for a vet to carry out a blood test to international standards. Was our little provincial vet in Yeosu, a kindly old man who spoke not a lick of English, up to the task? No, of course not – we would need to find a capable vet, one who spoke English so we could explain the situation. In the whole country, there were two – one in Busan and one in Seoul.
So the Monster needs to get to Seoul or Busan. BUT! He’s too big to travel in a little mesh bag anymore, like he did when he was a tiny puppy. Snow is 10 kg of active dog now, and needs a big, heavy crate. He needs a car, or cargo space – not a bus. We don’t have a car and are dependent upon public transit, so that means the only option is the train. Furthermore, the train doesn’t run direct from Yeosu to Busan – we’d need to transfer, dragging the big, inconvenient crate between trains, to get there. Therefore, Snow would have to go to Seoul on two separate occasions for his blood test and for his medical clearance.
Another problem rears its head: Snow hates the crate. He’s never spent the night in it, or even an hour. So he needs to be trained. Otherwise he will cry and scratch and bite and whine and generally tear himself to pieces over the course of the 4-hour train ride (forget about the more than 24 hour plane journey to the far end of Africa!). Kaj and I lock him in once a day, and feed him treats, and tell him what a good boy he is. He seems to accept it, not panicking too much, but he is clearly mistrustful of the crate and is very hesitant to go in. Hopefully we can manage when the time comes.
Now, the blood test needs to be done within 30 days of departure. That means the blood is taken, flown on a specialized transport to South Africa, where they carry out their tests, and the results flown back to clear him to fly, and then he needs to leave within 30 days. So we can’t just stroll in any old time – it has to sync with the flight.
Okay, os when’s his flight?
Ah. That’s also tricky. See, the company only flies via Dutch airways. The airline only flies animals on Fridays, due to COVID (how this prevents the spread of COVID is beyond me, but I could say that about a thousand different asinine, useless measures around the globe). And thousands of American servicemen and expat teachers are coming and going from Korea in August, and many of them are flying their pets. Bottom line: There’s no flights in August.
So, we need to wait for the company to find us a flight. Then, 35 days before that flight, we need to load Snow into his crate, buy train tickets, and get to Seoul on the morning train. Then we’ll take a cab to the vet and get his blood drawn. Then back into the crate, back into the cab, back onto the train, and back to Yeosu. Then get his other certificates, then get those translated into English by a notary. Then, 10 days before the flight, back to the crate, back to the train, back to Seoul, back to the cab, back to the vet, to get his medical clearance. Then reverse all that (crate-cab-train-Yeosu-home), then reverse it again (crate-cab-train-cab-airport) to fly him.
All done at that point, right?
Well, no. Once in South Africa, since Asian countries are known to be, er, ‘recent’ dogs-as-pets countries (that is, they rarely eat dogs anymore and now accept them as companion animals), the authorities mistrust the dog’s disease-free-ness, and require them to spend two weeks in quarantine (much like how Korea mistrusts foreigners and requires us to spend two weeks in quarantine, vaccine or no vaccine, negative PCR or no negative). This is done in a special facility in Cape Town – conditions aren’t great but Kajal assures me we can bribe the workers to get better treatment for Snow.
Then, and only then, we can welcome our dog to his new home in sunny Durban.
SO, that’s where we’re at. Waiting on a flight – we already had to delay our own departure from the country once, since we would have had to abandon Snowy. The company assures us he can make something happen by the end of September. I hope so, since my visa is up on September 22 and I’ll have to leave the country by then! So we wait, and pray.
“If they told you it was going to be hard, would you still want it?”
Of course I still want it.
Fingers crossed, friends!
Gwangju Dreaming 