Starving, scared, in pain… but never hopeless

This is probably the shortest description of a street dog’s life. If you ever experience the feeling of being hungry – you know how exhausting this is. Thirst on hot summer days is real torture. On that, frozen paws are very painful and it’s worse when the dogs stop feeling them at all…

Parasites like ticks and fleas are frustrating and cause weakness while worms usually kill just-born puppies, poisoning them, right in front of their mother’s eyes.

Abused by people, often injured by cars, crippled for life – these are the Romanian dogs that live day-by-day life on the streets of the town or at its edges, in the industrial area.

It takes so little for a dog to be happy: just some food, some exercises and some hugs and love from his human companion. So maybe you ask yourself, given the conditions mentioned above, how do these dogs find resources inside to be hopeful?

Meet Yelena!

We rescue her from the bus station where she was lying on the grass, fed by people’s mercy. The lady selling bus tickets knew the dog was hit by a bus some days ago…but she didn’t call us or a vet to take a look.

First-person that saw the dog lying down and crying, trying to crawl on the grass was Yelena – a lovely young lady from Switzerland that came to volunteer with us. She arrived at the train station and came to the “meeting point” at the bus station – from where I picked her up to go to the shelter.

Yelena is not a stranger to ROLDA dogs as not many months ago, she adopted Homer, a very old dog that went to Oasis des Veterans – a great shelter from Switzerland from where he was discovered by Yelena’s family.

This is how she learn about Romanian street dogs, and about our work and she decided to come and see them first hand our shelters. This is how we discovered the dog lying in the grass: we heard something crying and saw a pair of innocent, beautiful eyes staring and begging for help.

The vet checked the dog and noticed that the injuries from the bus didn’t happen just a few days ago but longer and the bone started to heal naturally, in the right position – luckily for the dog, who is very young and will not remain crippled.

In the beginning, the dog still crawls a bit when trying to walk on all her feet but only a few days later,  standing up and walking become easier and now, almost normally.

But the best part to tell you – starts now!

The volunteer Yelena felt a special connection with this dog and decided instantly to adopt her. She spoke with her parents on the phone and I saw a big smile lighting her face.  I read the answer in her eyes.

We called the dog…Yelena. She is the fastest adopted dog.

One life was saved! Hundreds of others are waiting… and can get a chance if you offer them one!

There are hundreds of dogs that wait in our shelters and thousands of others that live in misery on the streets. We can’t save them all, that’s a fact. But we can at least try to save them, one by one. Who knows, maybe when we’ll look back to count the results we’ll be surprised about the miracle made by a teamwork effort.

There are many good people like Yelena from Switzerland. You are one of them.

Take two minutes and have a look here and please, don’t forget to share this story with your friends.