Help Needed Rescuing Romania’s Street Dogs for USA Adoption

ANIMAL LOVERS HELP!

PLEASE read about the URGENT humanitarian crisis facing the stray dogs of Romania and how you can help.

After moving to Romania from the USA three years ago, a lot has changed on my perspective of the country, and of life in general. I initially moved to Romania for a sense of adventure, discovery, and an opportunity to get acquainted with my birth land. All that’s gone out the window now!

My original goal was to live in and travel around the country, blog about Romania’s rich and unique beauty, and uncover to the rest of the world the hidden treasures of the land. My blog  was dedicated to traveling Romania’s medieval cities, discovering its ancient historic monuments, and providing living guides for future expats.

I can say with a satisfied heart that in the last 3 years I’ve been successful at accomplishing what I’ve set out to do with RoamingRomania.com. However, after dozens of articles, and tens of thousands of visitors, it’s time for me to move on to a new calling, something that’s bigger than myself. I’m going to be dedicating 100% of my time to the rescue of the abandoned street dogs of Romania that are in desperate need of help.

Never in my wildest dreams had I imagined that the time I spent living in Romania would go on to change my whole life’s purpose. I had a comfortable job, was living out my dreams, traveling, blogging, meeting new people, going on adventures, I got married to the love of my life and was loving life to the fullest. However, despite all this, something was just not sitting right in my soul.

I can’t remember a time I felt so happy and had so much going for me. Why then did I feel a deep dreary sense of urgency for something? Why did I have a certain pain that cut deep into my bones? Why was I the happiest I’d ever been, but at the same time full of a deep painful sadness I couldn’t ignore anymore? Why was something nagging deep in me telling me I have a different calling than blogging?

The answer is because I couldn’t bare living with and seeing the thousands of suffering abandoned dogs living on the streets of Romania. I couldn’t keep numbing my pain by feeding and loving on them every chance I could, only to have to walk away. I had to do more! I have to do more! I am now dedicating my whole life to rescuing and re-homing homeless dogs of Romania to good homes in the US.

Romania Dog Rescue – Table of Contents

• Abandoned Street Dogs of Romania
• Shortcomings of Animal Help Organizations in Romania
• The Sufferings of Romania’s Street Dogs
• My Life’s Purpose – Helping Rescue Romania’s Dogs
• Our Goal – What We Plan on Doing to Help
• Our Idea – Social Entrepreneurship
• How You Can Help Rescue Romanian Dogs
• Romania Street Dog Video

The Abandoned Street Dogs of Romania

Romania has an estimated 2 million stray dogs living on the streets throughout the country. Although no one has an exact number of how many million street dogs roam the country, I personally don’t need official statistics to realize it’s a humanitarian crisis. After living in Romania for 3 years, I’ve had first-hand experience with how wide-spread and traumatic the situation is.

Statistics also can’t tell you the living conditions of these dogs, but living experiences can. I’ve seen dogs being kicked by pedestrians for no reason other than for whining for food when seeing someone eating. I watched dogs die in front of me in areas where farmers fed them poisoned laced meat. I witnessed cars intentionally swerve on roads to try and run them over.

I could go on all day with the horrendous and heartbreaking treatment and conditions I’ve seen stray dogs of Romania endure, but I rather spend my time talking about hope and what can be done to help. As I previously mentioned, I didn’t move to Romania with the intention of dedicating my life to rescuing and re-homing abandoned dogs, but after having my heart break for them I realized saving them is my life’s obsession.

Before embarking on the journey of starting a project to rescue homeless dogs of Romania, I first spent hours and hours researching what is already being done, my findings were horrifically shocking! I found out that the majority of organizations who purported to help Romanian street dogs were in fact only “helping” them by spaying and neutering them, and then RE-RELEASING them back onto the streets!

Shortcomings of Animal Help Organizations in Romania

Although I do agree that organizations that spay and neuter stray dogs are providing a very much needed humanitarian service, I don’t agree with the re-releasing the dogs back into street life. Most of the spay and neuter organizations that operate in Romania are foreign-based, meaning they originate from countries other than Romania. This causes a huge problem.

If the foreign-based spay and neuter organizations that operate in Romania lived day to day life in Romania like I have for the last 3 years (or their whole lives like my wife) they would have first-hand knowledge of why re-releasing dogs back to the streets is a bad idea. If they saw lived with the suffering street dogs as I did, they would search for another solution.

If the goal of an animal rights organization is to end animal suffering, why would they operate in a way that contributes to the suffering? Yes, spaying or neutering a dog will prevent future generations from being born into misery, but what about the spayed or neutered dog? Shouldn’t they have a chance at happiness? Releasing them back to the streets eliminates any possibility of that.

I know it’s cheaper for an organization to just neuter a dog and re-release it back into the streets rather than to rehabilitate and re-home it. But that doesn’t take away the fact that they’re condemning the dog to a life of pain and suffering. I know that many organizations would do more if they had the funding, but for me, that’s still unacceptable. Releasing dogs into Romania’s streets should not be an option!

The Sufferings of Romania’s Street Dogs

So, what’s daily life like for the millions of abandoned street dogs of Romania? If I could use one word to describe it, it would be the word suffering. That’s right, Romanian street dogs are suffering. They’re suffering trying to find food, they’re suffering trying to find shelter, they’re suffering from disease and illness, and they’re suffering violence at the hands of uneducated citizens who take their anger out on them.

The country of Romania is one of the poorest countries in Europe. Many Romanians wish they could do something to help the street dogs, but on an average salary of just $300 a month, they just don’t have the resources to do anything. Compared to US standards, the majority of the country is living in abject poverty and struggling to get by day to day.

Because Romanian’s can’t afford to help out the abandoned dogs that roam the country’s land, desperate help is needed from outside nations to end the misery and suffering of the innocent dogs. Not only is there a massive need for dog rescue in Romania, it now comes with a magnitude of urgency. In 2013 the Romanian government signed into law an order that allows the euthanization of captured strays.

The new murder law, dubbed the “Stray Dogs Euthanasia Law” gives captured street dogs who are kept in horrendous and tortures kennel conditions only 2 weeks to get adopted before they are euthanized. In just 2 years Romanian euthanized 300,000 innocent dogs. If that wasn’t bad enough, in the same time frame, it’s estimated that private citizens killed more than 3 times that number of dogs using vigilante methods such as poisonings and drownings.

My Life’s Purpose – Helping Rescue Romania’s Dogs

After finding out all I could about the few street dog “help” organizations in Romania, and seeing their magnitude of shortcomings, I decided the best way to really help was to take matters into my own hands. After talking about it with my wife, we realized that we were in a position to turn the dog rescue world of Romania upside-down… by actually RESCUING dogs!

I and my wife are in a unique position to bring to the country a much-needed change, a solution, hope, and salvation to the street dogs that have never felt love. The advantages that I and my wife have that we feel put us in a position to actually do something to help the dogs in need by matching them with compassionate adopters in the US are as follows:

• Lifelong animal lovers;
• Fluent in the Romanian and English language;
• Have dual citizenship with Romania (me) and USA green-card (wife);
• Have experience living in and navigating Romania’s conditions;
• Have experience achieving outcomes through Romania’s bureaucracy;
• Have immediate family, relatives, and many connections (including government) in the country;
• Have legal Romanian documents, passport, bulletin, driver’s license, etc.;
• Have experience rescuing, handling, feeding, and carrying for Romanian street dogs;
• Have a desire, passion, and burning want to help out the street dogs of Romania.

As you can see from the above list, I and my wife have advantages and ties to the country that most of the foreign organizations that spay and neuter dogs in the country and then re-release them to the streets don’t have. It’s those exact ties of being born in Romania that fuels such a burning fire of wanting to do everything we can to help the unfortunate dogs who have no home or love in their lives.

For me specifically, being born in Romania and then growing up and living the majority of my life in the US has given me a unique perspective. In the United States, there is no shortage of animal lovers who have a four-legged friend that are a part of (and treated like) their family. Like it was for me seeing it, I think it’s a shock for every American reading this to find out about the conditions and abuse the street dogs of Romania are subjected to in daily life.

Like me, I know many others have a broken heart for the sufferings of the poor street dogs of Romania. I know you wish you could do something to help. If you’ve read this far, you’ve already done a lot more than I could ever ask for, but if you have a kind and giving heart and want to directly contribute to helping save the lives of innocent abandoned beautiful dogs, I hope with all my heart that you continue on reading on how you can help me.

Our Goal – What We Plan on Doing to Help

So how do we plan on rescuing as many street dogs in Romania as possible so they don’t have to live another day of suffering or be killed by the government or uneducated citizens? Our plan is to open an American based Romanian street dog rescue and adoption kennel that will partner the right Romania rescue dog with the right loving American adopter.

The plan is simple, but implementing and continuing it will take a life’s worth of time and work, something me and my wife are both dedicated to give. The main hurdle that we will encounter will be financing. A project like this will require a lot of help, and we don’t want to fall short of funds like so many other organizations by relying solely on donations to fund the rescues.

Our Idea – Social Entrepreneurship

To fund our rescue and adoption project, our plan is to open up an online and local dog retailer that sells dog accessories and merchandise. We plan on donating 100% of the profits from the sales to our dog rescue operation. This way we won’t rely solely on donations, but rather on providing valuable merchandise to pet lovers and using the profits from the sales to fund dog rescuing in Romania.

We believe that if we sell and provide everyday pet products that animal lovers need, they’d be more than happy to shop with us or buy online from us if they know that 100% of profits from their purchases will go towards dog rescues. We will use the profits to buy land to open up a dog kennel in Washington state where we will bring rescues from Romania to rehabilitate and provide for adoption to residents.

How You Can Help Rescue Romanian Dogs

The biggest way you can help our dream and mission is by giving a donation. We set up a GoFundMe page where we break down everything that our plan involves. We sincerely ask that you consider providing a contribution of any amount. Small amounts help, large amounts help even more.

Other ways you can help is by informing people about the crisis and pain that abandoned dogs in Romania face every single day. You can share this blog post or our GoFundMe on social media, you can talk with your friends and family and see if they’d be willing to contribute. Your voice is our pathway.

Together we can provide a future where one didn’t exist, we can save a life they said had no hope, and we can show love where none was found.

If you’re interested in helping the cause in anyway, or have any other inquiry, please use the contact page and send us an email and we’ll reply as soon as we can.

Romania Street Dog Video