Rags adoption story: Rescue Yiddish

Rags, whose life was saved
because he understood Yiddish

          Yarl, Marty’s wife and the co-owner of Rags, the dog for whom he tried to get a pregnisone subscription, enjoys telling the Rags adoption story:

         “I was teaching English as a second language to a group of Hmungs, the hill people who helped America during the Vietnam war.  The class was mostly men.

         “One night a dog strolled into the classroom as they were answering questions I asked in English.  The dog began wandering around the class, sniffing the students.

         “Since this was disruptive and since some Vietnamese were known to eat dogs and I didn’t want him taken home to become someone’s dinner, I said to the dog “Sit down,” in Yiddush.  I said, somewhat forcefully, ‘sezn sich.’”  And the dog sat down.

         “You have to realize that, there I was, teaching English to Hmung-speakers and here was a dog who apparently understood and obeyed Yiddish.”

         Yarl and Marty named him Rags.  (His actual name was Shmatta, the Yiddish expression meaning Rags, but that name was seldom used.)  Rags was some combination of poodle, cocker Spaniel and another type of dog or three.

         After being rescued and adopted, partially because he sat at the precisely right time in an English as Second Language class, Rags  spent the remainder of his life sitting on a big leather chair with Marty, watching television and enjoying popcorn. 

     “And then there's the personal question so many of Lassie's fans want to ask: Is he allowed on the furniture? Of course he is — but, then, he's the one who paid for it.”  Julia Glass