Leaving our Heart Behind

One of the problems with having pets as an expat is that they are expats too.  Sooner or later the time will come when you have to make a move and you will have to sort out the endless paperwork that makes it possible for them to join you.

With one pet (our move to KZ and many of the moves I made as a child/young adult) it is difficult but relatively doable, you just need to throw time at the problem.  I remember taking our pet dog from the Netherlands to Venezuela when I was 19 and, aside from a last minute hike in fees (thank goodness my mother had given me her debit card) and having to manhandle my case and a dog crate from my hotel to the airport with no help whatsoever we got through ok.

Two pets is a little more time-consuming as we found out on our move from KZ to Malaysia.  Each pet had slightly different quarantine requirements but at least they were the same species.

Three pets (two separate species) is really starting to get complicated and we have started to wonder if we are really quite right in the head.  Bizarrely with this latest move from Malaysia it is not the cat that is causing the problem, she is easy enough but our new country does not routinely allow dogs to enter and we have had, for the first time in our lives, to engage the services of a pet agent.

Usually when we transport the pets we rely on a combination of our vet at origin to get the export certs, a vet known to friends in the country we are moving to to advise on import and then take the pets as excess luggage.  The new host nation does not, so we are told, advise this because of the strict import rules associated with dogs.  To make matters even more complicated the city we are going to be living in is not authorised as an import location.  Finally we cannot import the pets until both Mr EE and I have full residence permits which may not be for some months.

Bessie and Perdie, our old English girl and our Kazakh beauty

As we looked at the initial quote for the agent's services we began to understand why people have their pets adopted when they move country.  Some of our friends have done that in the past and it was the right decision for them and my parents had to make the hard decision to adopt their first pet to another couple when they could not take her to Nigeria (they received regular updates and she went to a truly loving family).  We thought about it for half a millisecond but we could not do it, we just could not, at least not while there was any other option.  Bessie has been with us our entire marriage, she is now an old, old dog and we want her to spend her last years with us.  Perdie and Kismet came to us more recently but when we took them in it was on the understanding that they would always have a loving home with us.

Our wonderful vet in Ipoh agreed to board them in her home so that they would be able to stay together and have loving human company rather than being in an unpleasant and stressful kennel environment.  This is a particular relief for us as regards Bessie as at 14 1/2 we know that she does not have many years left and we want her to be in the care of someone who really knows how to take care of her (and warn us if we need to try to get back to Malaysia to say goodbye should the worst happen).  The pets will stay with her until we are able to import them to our new home.

Kismet - our Malaysian surprise

While we know that we have made the very best decision for the welfare of our animals and that we will see them again as soon as we possibly can we still miss them horribly. In the week before we left them I spent as much time as possible stroking the dogs and cuddling the cat and when I dropped them off at their temporary home I felt like Judas and cried all the way home.  (Goodness knows how we will feel when we have to drop the children at boarding school for the first time.) I know the dogs will remember us, dogs do but I am so worried that Kismet will imprint on the vet and resent me for taking her home.

I am counting down the weeks till we can see them again and let them know how much they mean to us.  In the meantime we have to be content with Whats App pictures of our furry family members living half a world away.

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