More Birthdays and Anniversaries, plus some Animal Advocacy!

It is so hard to believe that December is already here. The weather here is the same as always, sunny and warm, making it no easier to accept that Christmas is nearly upon us and that 2007 is drawing to a close. With the start of December comes several important occasions, our anniversary is on the first (celebrating 12 years since our first date and 4 years of marriage) as is Eric's Gran's birthday (Happy Birthday Gran!). The second marks the birthday of my dear sister Dawn (Happy Birthday to you too, Dawn). I unfortunately had to work on my anniversary, but I did leave early so that Eric and I could go out and have lunch together. We spent the rest of the day relaxing and putting off the housework...



On the following day we went to meet a lady that I had met through a blog on-line. I had found a blog early last week that discusses cats in Bangalore and I posted a comment in the hopes of finding some like-minded individuals. Cats are DEFINITELY not popular pets in India so it is difficult to find products for cats and also advice and care for cats is hard to come by so I had hoped that I could make some contacts to maybe help us out if and when we needed. A lovely lady named Yasmine e-mailed right away and invited us to her home to meet her, her husband JP and her 20 cats and one dog. So we made our way there Sunday not quite knowing what to expect. We were greeted by two of the sweetest and most intelligent people that we have ever met. Oh yeah, and we also got to meet their 20 cats (only 19 though as 1 has gone missing) as well as the 2 cats that they are boarding for friends while they are out of town, and a mother cat and her 5 newborn kittens which Yasmine rescued from the school that she works at and the one poor cat-abused dog. It was a wonderful visit, Yasmine and JP are very caring people who want to try to improve the conditions for animals in India and have been working very hard at it since they were teenagers in Bangalore.



I have already described the conditions of the shelter from which we adopted Mira and Chaya, Yasmine has reported this shelter many times to the government and has actually managed to get herself banned from the facility because they apparently find it easier to ban her than to improve the conditions for the animals. The life of most animals in India (at least in Bangalore) is difficult at best. There is huge population of stray dogs and cats which leads to a great deal of starvation of the animals. Every day I will find at least one dog that has been injured by a car, broken and missing legs are very common and these dogs almost never get treatment. Animal dumping is a huge problem, people will adopt a puppy and find that it is too much trouble or has outgrown the apartment and they will just throw it out. Often if a pet becomes ill or old or disabled, it is also dumped. New litters of puppies and kittens will be thrown out because the owner never bothered to have their pet sterilized but doesn't want the babies. Additionally many people see their pets at stats symbols are want only pure-breed and are not interested in adopting a stray at the shelter. There was an effort to sterilize the street dogs, but in the last few months that practice has been minimized in favor of simply picking up the dogs and killing them. This was in response to a couple of incidents that happened in Bangalore last winter where two children were killed by packs of stray dogs. It is of course, terrible that 2 children were killed but based on the conditions in which these animals live and the abuse that they suffer at the hands of humans every day I would think that these tragedies are inevitable events that are brought on the population by the same population. When you hit and kick a dog, can you blame it when it bites you? Of course not.



Before coming to India I would never have claimed to be an animal lover or an animal advocate. I believe in the humane treatment of animals, but I am not a vegetarian and I do believe that there is a need for animal testing. But my heart goes out to the cats, dogs, horses, and even cows of Bangalore that are living in such an incredibly hostile environment all alone. I feel that we have a responsibility to all animals to look after their welfare, were are after all the only species that can so profoundly affect the lives of all other species. I have been horrified by the conditions that these animals are experiencing and I found that I was complaining about it often. But complaining doesn't help so I have decided to volunteer at another neighborhood animal shelter and start making cash and food donations to pay for food (proper food is quite expensive here as it is all imported as far as I know). I don't have much time to offer, but something is better than nothing. Eric and I also want to assume responsibility for the stray dogs that live on our street, we would like to make sure that they are well-fed, sterilized and vaccinated. If only 1 person on every street would do just these simple things, the problem would be nearly solved! With the help of Yasmine and JP, we hope that we can make a small difference in the lives of some of the animals of Bangalore. Wish us luck!




“The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated.” Mahatma Gandhi