I adopted a dog from chinabestfriend.org while living in Shanghai. I had lived there for a year and a half at that point. The dog I adopted also happend to be around 1 and a half years old. I named him Alance short for Clairalience. Which is similar to the world clairvoyance only describes an ability to smell clearly. It was at a time in my life when one thing I was clear of what that after moving all the way to Shanghai I needed to have a larger living space and live walking distance to work. So for six months I lived alone while my husband lived about half way between where I worked and he worked. We had lived 5 minutes walking distance to his office for the first year we were in china. Living tiny for a year and a half was difficult
A lot of things about living in Shanghai have improved my patience , endurance and ability to meditate. It has also shown me that I can manifest that which I choose and don't have to accept anything at it is. Which all starts by just being happy and accepting the change got come into your life.
I missed my family very much, and we were still going to be in Shanghai for two more years. So although my husband argued against it I adopted Alance. He lived on my two bed room apartments balcony while I was away at work.
Shortly after adopting him the reality that I had just created the same situation I felt unhappy in for him. Alone in a room...
My husband was amazing and would visit me in my little bubble out in the suburbs of Shanghai. He would even walk Alance for me while working from home , once he moved in with me over the summer.
While walking Alance one day he sent me a photo of the cutest little golden puppy. He told me that we couldn't keep her as she had already run away after texting me the photo.
She was adorable. I saw her the next week while I was walking A lance every day for five days. I saw her eating from the rubbish piles. Alance and I even played with her a bit as she ran between us and a grandmother with her grandson. On that fifth day I caught her and carried her inside. She would be the perfect family member for Alance.
The little pup and bit me in a playful manner as I tired to pick her up. When I showed my co teacher the mark on my hand she insisted that I leave the school and head to the local hospital. After confirming with the manager I was released and spent some time getting checked for risk of rabies contraction. They poured some fluid on my hand and said that the skin had not broken.
Returning to work I was happy the new pup wasn't rampant with rabies and terrible enough to bite me hard. To me this was a sign that we would definitely be keeping her.
Those are the adoption stories of A lance and Jasmine!
I named Jasmine after princess Jasmine from Aladdin while her Alance and I were on a run down a country road. The road was rapidly changing from farmland to apartments. It was the way to a metro train station that would lead to the new Shanghai Disneyland that has just opened. It was not open at the time but I had eagerly awaited it. I just wanted to name her already to call out to her so I did. "Good girl , Jasmine! " and she sped up a bit. Man, she was a great running partner.
Alance didn't like running on the leash as much as Jasmine. He liked to run free much more. While on the leash Alance would just snif and snif and he would be lazy. This made of a bit of difficulty balancing the two different personality's of the dogs.
I used my carabiner to connect their two leashes , then would put the leashed behind my back and they would pull me forward and we would all run together! I would often find areas where they could run free and play together outside in grassy areas.
Jeremy and I took them on a road trip out of town. We went camping near a lake with a group lead by a man who says he has the "cascadian spirt"love travel magazines and is fairly obsessed with my hometown Portland.
They really loved getting out of the city with us. Here is the photos from that amazing trip we had together,
July 20th-22nd 2014.
A close friend we saw everyday for six months at the park , my dear friend Semantha is who is an Angel helped me to find a Kennel for Alance before he suffered from an Addison's attack two weeks before we moved from Shanghai. After all the medical fees the stress and the new understanding of how much we would be traveling do having family on the west coast as well as in the Midwest we realized it would be better to find Jasmine and new home and Samantha loved her.
This is Jasmine today. July 20th 2016 with her new family.
Alance after his second immunity shot. Before we returned him to his original rescuer.
I will always be grateful to have fostered two dogs in Shanghai. They were my life for the past to years.
They helped me learn how to take care of myself better. The pups were my family and kept me busy. I will put into practice what they taught me when I have my own family with human children. Thank you so much Alance and Jasmine.