Donate
Donate

Care for rescued abandoned dogs & cats in Lisbon

Amelie P Start Date: Oct 6, 2025 - End Date: Oct 5, 2026
  • Lisbon, Portugal

My Travel Story

by: Amelie P Start Date: Oct 6, 2025 - End Date: Oct 5, 2026
This campaign is about investing in welfare - directly, of domestic animals, but this also positively impacts humans - people who live amongst stray animals, for example, and as a whole, investing in care for abandoned animals builds a healthy society with good standards for our lives and other lives. By raising funds, we are doing our bit in this communal action for good change. Funds will be a significant input to reach this goal.

I have always been passionate about the welfare of animals. I started my action to support this at around 9 years old by raising and donating money for a WWF campaign, supporting the fight to keep endangered animals across the globe safe. Further down the line, as a teenager, i helped my mum foster and re-home dogs who were on death row in rescue centres that ran out of space. Now, at 18 years old, i am making this campaign, ambitious to raise funds for a volunteer trip i will be going on in November to work for a dog/cat rescue shelter in Lisbon, Portugal, where i may keep animals and their living spaces clean, interact with and socialise them, raise awareness, organise adoption events, etc, keeping them well cared for in an area designated to them, which is, in turn, keeping them off the streets and making local’s lives also easier with less roaming street dogs & cats.

I look forward to working with a community with this same passion as me. This volunteer work will impact my education, my career, and my life, by pushing me out of what and where i am used to. I’ll be exposing myself to harsh realities to learn how i can help change or even solve issues borne from them.

high numbers of dog & cat homelessness continuing to rise, post covid. There are an estimated 346 million homeless cats and dogs worldwide. This issue means that in certain places with poor regulation, locals face serious public health challenges due to, for example, dog bites, and the rabies or diseases that come with them. And for the animals themselves, the suffering is unimaginable. Starvation. Fleas. Diseases. Harsh weather & no shelter from it. This is not natural. It is not how they would or should be living. Natural environments are rare now and humans are at the top of the food chain. Many of these animals were bred by us, used, then abandoned.

Euthanising is a whole other sad issue, in many shelters there is a policy that animals stay for a certain amount of time, such as 7 days, before they are killed, to 'tackle overpopulation in shelters due to lack of adoption'. I am passionate to help animals find adoption opportunities in my volunteer project with this fact in mind.

contributing factors to dog/cat homelessness include abandonment, lack of spraying/neutering, limited shelter capacity, etc, all are not the fault of these domestic animals who must suffer as a result.

My goal in my volunteering at a rescue shelter in Lisbon, is to contribute to the life-changing help for some of these animals. Statistics show big shocking numbers, which may lead to the thought ‘this is something i cant help’, but zooming into the bigger picture shows one dog or cat experiencing their life like its the whole world - because it is to them - and to make their life happier is huge to them for this reason. By participating in this experience, i will be empowering social change to make their world and, inevitably, our world a better place.

The IQ of dogs' & cats' minds are comparable to that of a 2-3 year old human. They deserve the effort and kind treatment we provide to 2-3 year old children. I hope this campaign can be the start of my bit in raising awareness and helping as many animals as i can.

I chose to volunteer in Lisbon because it is my first time doing such a trip on my own. But if i can raise money, i will be able to help longer term animal populations in need of such care by doing these volunteer projects, where i physically and psychologically care for the animals, interacting with and socialising them to make them more likely to be adopted (in turn, making space for the shelter to take in more animals who need care) or to identify issues that may prevent their adoption and find ways around them. Helping animals within a society helps that human population in return, keeping animals safe, keeping streets safe, keeping humans safe. Fundraising for this safety is an opportunity to invest in a cause that will change the world for the better.
  • Lisbon, Portugal

More Travel Information

Report this Campaign