I will never forget the first time I saw him. He came into my inbox as a .jpg file, one amongst a hundred other pictures depicting, in a way that left nothing to imagination, the daily life of the puppies living at the Yeniciftikilk shelter just outside Istanbul.
He caught my eye… he was tiny, a ball of black fur rolling in the dirt, surrounded by waste and disease, stepped on by every other dog in the shelter. Too tired to do much other than stand up, take a couple of steps and lay again in a shallow hole.
I looked at his piercing, pleading eyes. Eyes that spoke to me without words, telling me that he was ok but asking me to hurry, to rush there and whisk him and his litter mates away to a place where they would be more comfortable, where they could drink clean water and eat nutritious food, where they wouldn’t be disturbed by burly men in the middle of the night, a place where they wouldn’t die.
An unbearable feeling of guilt assaulted me. What could I do? There were too many… I was too far and besides, I was too busy with other cases. This baby would have to wait.
With the click of a button, he disappeared from my my computer screen, but not from my mind.
Over the next few days I kept on hearing about that shelter. The inhumane conditions in which the animals were being kept were claiming lives every day. I asked about the tiny black dog that spoke to me. What dog? There were many of them like him.
Weeks later I received another email loaded with pictures. I saw dead rats floating in putrid waters, and bodies, the inert bodies of little dogs that couldn’t stand disease and lack of water and food.
The limp body of my little friend was there laying still on top of a piece of wood. He was still alive, but by the looks in his eyes you could see it was too late for him. The pictures had been taken a couple of days earlier. The baby had died minutes after the photographer took the shot.
My heart shattered. I cried. Silent tears. Enraged with myself for having looked away. I replied to that email, I would help!. None of those babies would die. We would rescue as many as we could, in stages. We would save generic xanax price cvs them all. The following day we rescued 15 of those puppies, the smallest, the weakest, those that would have died without ever having a chance at their dreams.
A few days later I went to the shelter to check on the remaining puppies, we gave them all a quick check and inoculated them with the basic vaccinations against the biggest killers, parvo and distemper. We made sure they would be ok for a bit longer.
We have worked extremely hard to find those babies a home. Many of them have, but many are still waiting at the shelter.
Tomorrow three of them, Baby, Billie and Lucy will board a Turkish Airlines flight to Freedom and Life. Three more will fly the following week, and this will continue as long as it takes to save them all.
We need your help. This is the Chipin we have been using to pay for the veterinary and boarding expenses of the 15 babies. The chipin has also saved close to 50 lives from the Gas Chamber of Nashville in North Carolina. Of all the possibly charitable contributions you could ever make this month, this is the one where you will be able to truly make a difference.
Please, join me, this is life changing, this is important…. Please contribute to our Chipin… let’s lend this babies a hand that takes them away to LIFE!
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Every dog needs a family that provides him with a loving pack structure. They need love, they need exercise and good food to thrive.
Sadly, in this shelter in Turkey dogs get GARBAGE for food and RAT JUICE instead of water. Don’t believe it? Click here for a hi-def picture in all it’s grotesque glory.
15 of them… each one more loving and playful than the other, living in absolute squalor and deprivation in a municipal shelter that can only be described as Hell on Earth.
Being there, hearing the cheerful yelps of the playful puppies mixed with the muted last breaths of the babies that are too weak to survive was a most harrowing experience. One that I’m sure very few people would be able to go through without breaking down in tears.
We have started the process of getting ALL the puppies out. And for this we need you.
We need to find loving homes for these babies, and it’s urgent. In this case, and due to the fact that it would take at least four months for us to organize the paperwork needed to send them to Europe we are going to prioritize adoptions in the USA and Canada.
But first, we need to get the babies out. Have them checked by the vet, etc… etc… then, once we have approved families for them we will organize the logistics of sending them all to their final homes.
Due to the sheer number of puppies this rescue is going to be a logistical challenge, involving tens of people, from the rescuers, to a number of clinics scattered all over town. Add to this that we don’t have enough foster homes in Istanbul and you get the idea.
You can help us in three ways:
1. SHARE this blogpost and seek assistance in your immediate network. Click on LIKE and SHARE…
2. ADOPT/FOSTER: If you are in the USA, Canada or Turkey please offer to become a long term foster or even better to open your home to one of this babies as a final adoptant.
3. SPONSOR: Please, please… Chipin here… that is going to be the only way we will be able to pull this one off.
These babies were born in the gates of hell. Show them that life can be a very different experience, that humans can also be beautiful and kind.
Contact me and apply for adoption: viktor@myletsadopt.com
Here are some more pics of the babies we need to rescue, and it will give you an idea of the brutality they are being forced to endure in that hell hole.
