The monument to the dog, which had been waiting for its deceased owner on the street for several years, was unveiled in Chelyabinsk on Thursday, said Oksana Khudyakova, press secretary of State Duma deputy Andrei Baryshev.
A monument to the Chelyabinsk Hachiko was erected opposite the Main Post Office on the Railway Station Square. Master Alla Davidovich completely reproduced the appearance of the sculpture from photographs and videos in which the dog was captured.
“The monument was made the way a dog was - scary, unkempt, but very cute and touching,” said the agency's interlocutor.
According to local resident Elena Drozhzhina, who became the author of the idea of erecting the monument, a dog named Belyash, named after the dish that was fed to him by the sellers of the nearest catering, lived at the bus stop for at least two years and waited for the owner until he died in 2015.
“The dog died three years ago, just like the owner, under the wheels of a car, in the Metallurgical District. Andrey Viktorovich (Baryshev) knew this dog personally, when he went to work, he fed it. I wanted to take her to my place, but she was not given. He made a booth for her, but she did not live in it and still got wet in the rain and snow and waited for the owner. When she died, the residents asked to perpetuate the memory of the local Hachiko,”Khudyakova said.
According to her, the local residents themselves organized a fundraising for the sculpture, but for several years only 50 thousand rubles were collected. The missing sum of 500 thousand rubles was brought in by the deputy of the State Duma Andrei Baryshev, he also agreed with the local authorities on the place of the monument.
As the organizer of the fundraising added, the money collected by local residents was spent on the manufacture of a wooden piggy bank, which in two weeks will be installed near the monument to the Chelyabinsk Hachiko. She noted that all funds that can be collected will be used to help stray animals.