What Could Possibly Go Wrong?

I really like living in Portugal, but nearly every yard has three crazed, snarling dogs nearly eating each other to get through the fence to get at you (except for the one nice dog in the field with the horse and donkey and the dog that starts humping the other dog in the yard with the hibiscus as soon as that other dog starts barking at me). Every once in a while, the gates to a yard are open, and then you either get crazed dogs surrounding you barking or else you get dogs that want to follow you home. I don't speak Portuguese well, although I suppose I should work out how to ask people to help get their dogs away from me. Today, a large puppy who looked too clueless to find its way home again followed me. I couldn't get it to leave me alone and had to walk back and forth in front of its house a number of times trying to lose it, before its owner finally came out and the puppy ran home. I really wish that if people were going to have uncontrollable pets that they would keep them inside where they can be obnoxious only for their owners.