Our home

Once upon a time, when I was 17 years old, my family was living in Almalik which is a little town 80km:s from Tashkent, Uzbekistan, situated near the mountains, there we often made camping trips. When my father and grandfather were fishing at the river, me and my mother was picking mushrooms.

One evening before darkness, my father invited me to go to meet some people. They were herding their sheep up the mountains. The shepherd were sitting alone at the campfire when we arrived. Suddenly from the darkness a few enormous dogs appeard. They inspected us but had no real interest in us.

I asked my father if he could communicate with the shepherd and ask him about the dogs, which I had already fallen in love with. The shepherd told us that the dogs called Alabai had saved his life many times. As well as plenty of sheep from wolves and bears. Further more he told us that the dogs are of a very modest nature and that he only gave lavash(local bread) to the leading male. The other dogs had to find their food of their own from the mountains. Later I saw the dogs eating even mushrooms.

Years later I still often thought about those marvelous dogs. I planned to one day have one of my own. Many years later(after a career in sports) I emigrated to Finland where I met my husband. Now we are happy owners of five dogs, which we here want to show you more of.

Svetlana Kamila