Who let the dogs out?

Here in Latin America, the elephant in the room seems to be the dogs in the street. And there are tons of them. Some estimate that there are almost 500 million stray dogs out there in the world, and from my informal estimates a decent portion of that is in South America. Even this weekend, spent in sunny Valpraiso, I couldn't walk the street for more than 100 feet without running into a stray dog or two. It was the same in the southern regions, such as chilly Puerto Natales, and in Santiago--to a smaller extent.

Paola, our cheery host at Nikko's II, informed us while speeding down the Puerto Natales streets in a van that the stray dogs were rampant throughout South America, not just Chile. Very few seem to be fixed, and they get by rummaging through trash or scraps dropped by friendly neighbors. Nobody seems to mind them, or want to do anything about them. They're as much part of the steet culture as renegade taxis and grafitti murals.

Even the dogs with owners aren't fully under control. I learned this walking the hilly streets of Valpo, as I looked up to find a small dog nearly fall out a second-story window, barking at the rogue cannines on the avenues below.