Well, last week we were asked to do 3 demo’s for some local schools, and of course we were happy to comply.  We set up a show, including how to approach and handle a dog safely (the Dominican idea is to jump up and down and scream hysterically), some demo of obedience, some security work and of course some discplaying.

The first demo was for around 200 kids and some parents, and was great fun.  At the last bit we divided the kids up into 3 groups according to age… and threw some discs to them which they could keep.

By the second day, word had spread around somehow, and it was around 500 people attending the 30 minute demo, which ended up being a couple of hours of kids petting the dogs, wanting to know their names, their breeds, etc…

The 3th day was hell and heaven in the same place with around 1,000 screaming kids and adults…  We arrived in the van, and looked kind of panicky towards each other…  The van was surrounded by screaming kids, and teachers acting as our security-guards, trying to give us some space… (so this is how a rock-star must feel, except for the lack of money we have and he doesn’t… lol).  How in heaven’s name were we going to unload the dogs, put their crates out, and safely transport them to the demo area…  Luckily this was a Jesuit school and the rector, who was very soft spoken, but apparently enormously respected, got everybody away from us, pulling an ear left and right… and giving us the time to rush the dogs out and set everything up…  The demo went great, and people loved it, never having seen dogs performing that way…  We decided not to throw some frisbees towards the kids as we did not want any trampling on our conscience, but decided to give the PE-department of the school the frisbees…

Anyway, it was a great week… and what is even greater is that all 3 schools asked us to come and give some additional lessons on how to react to dogs, how to safely approach and pet them… etc…  Great, because this will save a lot of children being bitten by stray dogs, and hopefully will change the way Dominicans look towards dogs…

First a show review of our WC, although the most was already explained in a fantastic way by Kata.  We arrived in Ft. Lauderdale on Wednesday at 5.30 am from Santiago.  As we had to be at the airport in Santiago at 1 am, we did not bother to go to sleep,  also because we had to explain everything to our Dominican dog-guardian…

The most boring job in the world must be to be an airhostess on Spirit Air from Santiago to Ft.  Lauderdale… 10 people on a plane, and as drinks and snacks are to be paid at excorbitant prices, nobody consumes anything…

Upon arrival, we rushed to Budget and got our car… we rented the smallest one possible as we had no dogs with us this year, but they made a mistake and assigned us a much bigger car.  So upon leaving the lot we were stopped by this very nice lady who told us we got the wrong car… so we went back to the office, and they just changed the papers and let us have the car… whahahahaha

So, on the road to Chattanooga… now, I have a problem… the roads in the US are very boring, and the speed very slow, and then I have a tendency to fall asleep… so, my solution is to drive a little faster…  Let us just say we arrived at Chattanooga a little under 11 hours, and at speeds high in excess of the 70 mph…

Thursday we did the annual shopping spree (Best Buy, FYI, etc…) and went to the party in the evening…  First hitch… not one of our prepaid phonecards from the DR worked in the US, so we bought a prepaid card in the US, and our providers here in the DR immediately locked our phones… yep… nice providers here…  As we wanted to be in contact with our dogkeeper here, we bought a new prepaid phone in the US (hey, Kata, remember this?).

On the party, we tasted the very delicious, but extremely dangerous margaritas, and untill this day I suspect  we were set up, as we were asked if would mind helping to judge the D/A the next day.  Of course they forgot to mention that there were no less than 300 rounds to judge… (Ray, Jeff… one day we will get even… )

So, on Friday we fulfilled our duty, and ended up looking like lobsters… reason why we decided to treat ourselves to a meal from Red Lobster that evening…. whahahahaha

Saturday we woke up… saw the weather and decided not to hurry, as we suspected the competition would be stopped anyways… (several of the crossings near our hotel were flooded)… of course we were right… but this also meant we were once again drafted to do D/A on Sunday…

Anyways, Sunday was a great day for us:

• a dog was lost, but luckily enough found
• after 5 years of hard labour in Europe we got the reward that Juergen and Conny from Germany got second place in the pairs, and Tiny from Germany got third place in the microdogs…

Monday we left early for Daytona Beach in Florida, where we spent a relaxing day on the beach… practising our throws… the best ones were the MTA and the boomerang…. whahahaha.  We saw a very nice looking restaurant making publicity on the local information channel and decided to give it a try… I’m still wondering why a restaurant, in a very remote area, bothers to spend tons of money on TV-Commercials and then doesn’t place signs on how to find it…  Anyways, after a couple of hours we found it and had a really delicious meal…  On the way back however, we were stopped by the local police… “how are you doing, sir”, after me opening the rear window first (oeps, those cocktails…)… “you realise you were doing 53 in a 35 mph zone?”… I first wanted to explain I was a dyslectic and switched numbers, but decided wisely he did not look like he would enjoy the joke… so I apologised and stayed polite and calm… and to my enormous surprise got of without a warning…  all the time Hilde was gniffling besides me…

The next day we visited the kennedy airspace center, and although ridiculously expensive… worth the visit…

At midnight we boarded our plane to paradise once again…

Next time more about hitches, but now of to the garden with a bottle of rum, and listening to nearby neighbors having a merengue party

Yesssss…. I’m connected to the internet again, so your peacefull and quite days are over….[IMG]http://i287.photobucket.com/albums/ll159/BelgianK9/draak.gif[/IMG]

So, one of the big honchos at Hyperflite asked me to make an addition to my blog before the WC…  mind you… as we are this year coming without dogs, I don’t really need his approval… except for the fact that he is also responsible for the sale of the pizza on the open qualifier…[IMG]http://i287.photobucket.com/albums/ll159/BelgianK9/mallet.gif[/IMG]

As we move to tbe DR, and Hilde judged at the Qualifier in Belgium, we did not participate at any of the 2 qualifiers and therefore are not participating, but just cheering on all other participants from Europe…

Who is participating???  Well, as far as we know there are 3 friends of Hungary participating, amongst which is Kata, so I’m sure she will tell you all about them… but we are sure looking forward to meeting them again and are hoping they smuggled some palinka into the US…

From Belgium: we know Sven and Katrien are going to qualify with KT, their lab pup in the pairs.  Sven qualified in the microdogs with jumper, but unfortunately this is a dog which you cannot put on a plane for 15 hours.  We wish them all the luck.

Froù Germany: Conny with Quigly in the freestyle, and as Juergen is coming along, I’m sure they will be trying to qualify in the pairs as well…

So, in total 7 Europeans competing, and 2 Dominican Europeans cheering them on… not bad, compared to a couple of years ago…

Chattanooga 2010… 2 dominicans competing with Acira and Gray… and winning…[IMG]http://i287.photobucket.com/albums/ll159/BelgianK9/mooning.gif[/IMG]

CU next week at Chattanooga

Peter

Its been awhile since you heard from me, but with the move and building the kennels I was a little pressed for time.  And the lack of internet, which will become clearer after reading the following:

How to get connected to the internet?  You decide between cable and dsl, go to the office, tell them were you live, maybe pay the installation fees, and believe it or not, a couple of days later you are hooked up, ready to go, and connected to annoy all your friends and family on facebook, twitter, etc…

Oooopsss… that is the way it works in the US and in Europe.   Here is how it works in the Dominican Republic.

When you buy or rent a property in the DR, you check first on availability of internet, if you want this.  It does not matter whether you are living in the centre of a big town, on the outskirts or in the boondocks, you have to check it out.  So, I did.  The house we are renting, had cable television, and the company assured me that in the next month internet would become available there.  This was the beginning of July, and now, in the middle of September there is still no internet on the cable.

Ooopss… my first booboo… You have the Western calendar months, you have the Chinese calendar months, and you have the DR calendar…   The next month is anything between the next day or the next year…

So, no big deal!!!  Let’s go for ADSL…  Of we go to the main office, which is about 30 miles away, stand patiently in line for about 2 hours, to hear that in order to get ADSL as a “gringo” they need to run a credit check.  Kind of weird, as you have to prepay anyway, but you learn quickly not to argue but to nod friendly…  Anyways, the day before I got approved by the thoughest bank in the DR, and they gave me about a zillion checks, so who is to worry???   So, how long will this credit rating take?   Ohhh, a day, max 2 days.  So, I take my case number home with me, and not having heard anything the next day, I gave them a call.  No probs, they were working on it, and I should get an answer in the next couple of hours…

DOMINICAN HOURS !!!  Which are essentially the same as their months… whahahahaaaaaa…

So, I keep bugging them everyday for a week, and finally get a call telling me my credit was OK.

I jumped into the car, rushed over to my employers house, snatched his Dominican wife away from him, assuming I would need some supplements to my basic Spanish.  We arrived at the office, stood in line for 2 hours, to hear that the case was closed, as they tried to reach me, and failed to do so.  We explained patiently that someone had called me to say the case was approved.  Apparently this person had failed to put this into the system, and as time was over, the case was closed.  But they would be very happy to open up a new case for me.

If you are ever visiting the DR, please go over to the Codetel office in La Vega.  In the middle of their reception area there is a big concrete support.  It has several dents in it now, which you can compare to the ones on my forehead at the next WC in Chattanooga.

So, we opened up a new case… “sigh”… and waited patiently again…

Somehow… and don’t ask me why or how… they mixed up case-numbers… and therefore closed the case again… “several new dents in the concrete at Codetel”

I thought I was lucky, as my employer wanted me to be on the internet for the job I have to do for him, and proposed that he would just take an extra account on the company, and that I would pay him every month…

THANK YOU, Robert!!!!  Please let me kiss your feet in gratitude!!!  I do not care not having television, but internet is my lifeline to my parents, to the rest of my family, and to my friends all over the world…

So, of we go again to the “in”famous Codetel office, my employer and his wife securely tucked away under my arms…  I WAS GOING TO COME HOME AGAIN WITH INTERNET BEING A SURE THING…

WHAHAHAHAHAHAAAAAAAAA….

“Yes Sir, no problem Sir.  Could you please give me the phone-number of the nearest house who has a Codetel line?”

You have to be joking!!!  Sure you  guys know this better than I do?  Nope… forget it… you have to provide them with this info… “sigh”

But they do have “Banda Ancha”… in English broadband, Vodafone, or whatever you choose to call it…  You plug in a device, working with the chip you use in your cellphone, and yesssss, you are on the internet…

So, yessss, please give me banda ancha….  It may cost a little more, but I would be connected again, and I would worry about finding the nearest phone within a 100 yards later on…

And yes, we sign the contract for banda ancha… and then an official shows up… telling us that he wants to be sure the signal for banda ancha is strong enough before he commits us to the contract.  “ SIGH…”

We assure him that the Codetel tower is no less than 200 yards away from my house.  That I have a contract for a cell phone from them, which works perfectly…  That I have the strongest signal possible on my phone, so banda ancha should be no problem…

Nevertheless… “Sigh”… he wants to assure this himself… but no problem… he would be in the neighbourhood in the next week (this was last Saturday, and today we are Saturday once over), he would check it and connect me at the same time…

So, this is Saturday and still no official, and still no internet… my head is aching… I have to run over to my employers house every day so I can check my emails, my bank accounts, skype real quick to my parents, etc…

And I’m not even mentioning my poor animal farm on facebook… those poor beasts must be starving… lol

Anyway… I still have high hopes of being connected in the next couple of days…  and if you hear about a building collapsing in La Vega in the DR… it is not an earthquake… it was my forehead…

Looking forward to seeing you all on the WC…  I’m the tanned guy with the quite flat forehead…

CU

Last weekend we were booked for demo’s at a hot air balloon race.  Kind of funny, as the balloons did not go up because of the wind.  Nevertheless the demo was very special for Hilde and myself, as it was our last demo in Europe.

Yes, you are reading it right, and as I have informed the 2 guru’s running these blogs, I can now let the cat out of the bag.  Therefore I would kindly ask you to put your dogs on the leash, as it would be a shame if the cat got chased away, and you would still know nothing…lol

Next month Hilde and myself will be moving to the Dominican Republic, and this for several reasons, one of them being the fact that my joints were starting to creek quite hard, and the climate over there is superior for this.  We will be living in the Dominican Alps, in a very nice village.

And what about the sport !!! I hear all of you asking…  Well, first of all, we are leaving Skyhoundz in the Benelux in the very safe hands of Sven and Katrien.  Save is of course relative, and they can continue to count on our support which we will be happy to give, sitting on our porch, sipping a mojito, grabbing a mango from our very own tree, with the laptop on our knees, thinking about Sven and Katrien in the rain…

As for ourselves, we will try to launch the sport over there, and start a new club.  We did not want our faithfull speaker at the WC to stumble over the clubname of Dominican Republican K9 Disc Heroes (and try to print that on a disc), so we chose the name of “Los Perros Voladores”.

Our biggest task: transporting all of our 10 dogs over there… pffff… we have been buying second hand varikennels left and right, and will bring 5 dogs at a time (thanks to several friends willing to take a couple of our dogs while we take the first bunch over).  Getting them to the airport and on the plane will be a hassle, but once arrived there I have to find a way to transport them from the airport to the mountains in a rental car…

Well, we will keep you informed and post pics here regularly, and anyway, we are coming to the Worlds (we are those 2 with a nice tan.. )

CU

The last couple of weeks I have been exploring a part of the world where these tiny dogs seem to be very popular.  I will be honest, I was never a great fan of these mutts, and although this will make me very unpopular, untill recently I was convinced they were not dogs but some kind of mutated rats…

Since my stay here I have changed my mind and have discovered the following facts:

• not all chihuahas wear dresses
• they do have fur, and generally it is a light brownish colour
• as everybody knows they have 4 matchsticks underneath their body, which are referred to as legs.  I always assumed these were just ornaments stuck on just for better looks ( comparable to a lot of the cartuning parts).  To my surprise they can actually walk on them, and even run.  As I had only ever seen chihuahas being carried on the arm, in a purse or buggy, I naturally assumed the chihuaha I saw running was a freak of nature… but since then I have seen hundreds of them actually using their legs…
• not all chihuahas put on pj’s at night…
• not all of them try to bite your ankles
• a chihuaha is not the most expensive meat in the world at 1000 $ per pound, here they actually cost around 6 $… which makes them still twice as expensive as a good slice of beef over here… whahahahaha…

I had to change my mind about this little creature… actually, if they are allowed to be a dog… they are nice, and lovable creatures, like any other canine…

But one fact remains… their name is a pain in the butt to type…

CU

Last sunday was somehow special and a first for us.  We had to give 4 shows on the Open House of the Belgian Army…

An interesting experience to say the least.  They had more than 30,000 visitors, who could enjoy all kinds of shows, and do all kinds of stuff.  Children could crawl onto the tanks, you could take very cheap helicopter-rides, etc…  What did this mean for us?  Well, we had to give shows while F-16 were flying over very low, helicopters kept hovering above us, in the distance they were shooting out a “fake” war, etc…  and yes, I can confirm… for all dogs the disc was more important than all the noise and commotion…

In between show we went to have a look at this “fake” war, where the purpose was to show how an elite army unit would conquer terrain over the enemy.  For me it was hilarious… F-16’s straved the “enemy”, tanks were shooting “fake” shells, and the unit progressed… at a certain time “the enemy” decided they could no longer hold the terrain, so obligingly stood up, with their hands in the air…

Either the guy in the tank was blind, or he was wondering why those guys weren’t falling over, but he kept on shooting and shooting, while “the enemy” were giving themselves up…

I think we broke the Geneva Convention by doing this… or knowing our army, maybe the fire button in the tank was stuck…

We had a joyful week… the first foals of our stables were born last monday… one stallion and one mare.  Because Hilde helped with the birth of one of the foals, she became godmother to the little mare, a beuatiful brown little creature, with just a white spot on her face…

Of course this was the perfect excuse for the proud owners, and ourselves to give a bbq last saturday.  We were with 14 people, of which 5 do not drink alcohol and 2 children… nevertheless we managed to empty 2 bottles of Havana Club rum in a little over half an hour.  As it was close to a 100° F, those Mojito’s sure hit the spot…

For the less educated Americans amongst you, here the perfect recipe for the perfect thirst-quenching Mojito… Take a wide coctail glass, throw in 2 quarts of a squashed lime (exotic green kind of a lemon), add one tablespoon of rough cane sugar (or more if you like it sweet), add about 7 crunched fresh mint leaves, and mix everything together so the sugar is dissolved.  Fill up your glass for 3/4 with crunched ice, and fill it up with a good rum (the best one is Havana Club, but if you can’t find that one in the US, take a good Dominican rum, and if necessary Bacardi).  Personally I prefer dark rum for the Mojito, but it is also very nice with white rum.  Add some soda water to top up the glass.

Peter, Jeff… it is just a hint… but damn,  most players are very thirsty after the open qualifier….

And your hair does not hurt the next day…

And now up to the next Skyhoundz local, which will find place in Belgium, at a very big hot airballoon event…  They contacted us, and I made sure that the first price of the freestyle was a free ride that same day in one of the balloons…

CU

A couple of months ago we were asked to give a demo on a fundraising day of the “Make a Wish Foundation”, and of course we were more than happy to accept.  After all they do such fantastic work, and it is not only a pleasure, but an honour if we can help them even a little bit by giving a day of demo’s.

We only had one problem because a German discdog club, which always attends our competition were holding their 2-day competition that same weekend, and we did not want to say no to them either.  So we contacted them, eplained the situation to them, and they were more than happy to let us play everything on Saturday.  So Saturday morning we woke up early, raced for 2 1/2 hours (literally) to Germany, had a fantastic day with lots of fun, attended their bbq, and raced back (again literally) to fall into our beds.

Next morning rising and “shining” up early again to go to the Make a Wish Foundation.  Luckily enough this was only about 20 mi away.  Beautifull sunshine, not too hot, nice playing field, lots of cowboys, hells angels, and American vans, and loads of people.

It was a nice day (but never give a demo next to the Country band who plays the music for the line dancing, just try to explain anything over that much decibels), loads of happy children enjoying the free rides on the Harleys, and in the Vans, and enjoying all the dogs.  And if I looked at the beertent, they had a very nice fundraising…

All in all, a very nice weekend.

this weekend we are off to the North of Holland for the UFO Major, but decided we would make it a 5-day break, and by god, we are looking forward to it…

CU next week