What do you do?

We have been experiencing one of those situations where in the states handling it would be easy, but here is much more difficult. Our neighbors across the street have 4, luckily little dogs, that are very aggressive when let out. They do not put them on leashes and let them run freely through the cotto. The problem we have is that they are overly agressive with our children. They run right at them, surround them and begin barking. One even bit joy on the ankle 2 weeks ago. In the states, you would try to handle this in a civil manner. You would go over and talk to the neighbor and express your concern. Regretfully, our language skills, while growing, are not at the level where you could express yourself in a very respectful, loving, converstaional tone as you would need in this delicate situation. We speak in sentences still, not conversations. Of course, we could possibly get a bilingual neighbor, but then you create a hostile, multi-neighbor situation. We want to be sensitive.

Then this morning, Joelle was out petting our other neighbors 14 year old, floppy eared beagle, who adores children. While she is out doing this I hear the lady across the street let out their dogs. You always know as you can hear the annoying cacophany of yapping. Then the door bolts open and Edan has run in to escape them. Joelle is not so fortunate. I hear a hysterical scream, I run outside and Joelle is surrounded by several dogs yapping at her. I pick her up and begin to leave. At the same time, the neighbor across the street heard the scream and comes out to get her dogs. Do to my anger at that point, I just give her a look of frustration. This is not the first time this has happened. Anyone who knows me knows that I have a pretty intense look of frustration. No doubt my point is not lost on my neighbor.

I walk in and I immediately feel horrible. What do you do? On one hand, you have a little girl who keeps getting terrified by these horrible little rats, but on the other, I am hear to be a witness. I can only imagine the witness my glare conveyed. I am convinced one of these days that I am going to have to kick one of these rodents as they nip at Joelle which will only exasperate the situation. As a dad and witness, you are torn between the intense desire to defend your little girl when she is horrified and the knowledge that the truth of the kingdom of God is so much greater then the headaches of little dogs. At least it is for me, for Joelle I doubt this is so. Throw in the inability to have a real adult conversation and you have a constant tension as this issue has to be dealt with several times a week. What do you do?