Individual Impact Of Individual Lives Saved

ziko was rescued from abuse and now found hapiness

Born, in April 2017, rescued in August 2017, adopted in November 2017

Breed: Mykonian Mastiff Cutie

Current Home: With Pat S, Tracy C. and Sadie and their Rottweiler Sonny  

My story:  I lived with the gypsies in Mykonos, Greece. Nobody knows how I ended up with the gypsies. The small children were great, they played with me and ran back and forth with me. But the elderly of the gypsy tribe were throwing stones at me, kicked me and didn't treat me well.  One day in August 2017, I was found by tourists in Mykonos town in a small enclosure. They took me to their hotel and reached out to Zero Stray Pawject who organized a temporary foster home. But then the tourists got terrible advice from the local animal welfare organization in Mykonos, to just bring me back to where they had found me, leave me off the leash and see whether I will find my way home. At this point I was 3 - 4 months old and of course I got lost. The tourists were heart broken. Thank god, the founders of Zero Stray Pawject were not far away from Mykonos during that time and came to intervene. They figured out where to find me, went to see the gypsies with a friend and convinced the gypsies that I will have a better life with them, rather than the gypsies. The gypsies agreed as they had planned to only keep me until the end of September and then to abandon me anyway. So Zero Stray Pawject's founders saved me.  I afterwards stayed for a week in Mykonos in a private foster, before I traveled on the boat to Athens where I first stayed at a vet and then at a dog trainer for overall 4 weeks. Silja, the Co-Founder of ZSP tried to find a home for me locally and traveled back to Greece to interview potential families. But all of them bailed out because of my breed. I am a cane corso mix, and many people were afraid of my breed. So after some time my only chance was to travel to NYC. To get me safe to NYC, Silja traveled back to Greece and picked me up to fly to New York with me. Afterwards I have have been living with Elizabeth and Jason from Pawsitively Love Trainers for a few weeks who fostered me.

On Saturday, November 4th 2017 I moved to my new family whom I had met a few days earlier for a couple of hours as part of the last step of Zero Stray Pawject's adoption process. I now live with my new family in Pennsylvania in a beautiful house on the lake where I can swim. My house has a big fenced beautiful garden for me to run and play with my new friend Sonny, a beautiful 12 years old Rottweiler who wagged his tail so fast when he realized that I move in that it was hilariously cute to watch him. Sadie, their 7 years old daughter was so excited to have me moving in that on Sunday she woke up at 5am to greet me. Both Pat and Tracy are super excited to have me living with them as a new family member and are in love with him.

On Saturday, I already went on a hiking trip and played with Sonny’s toys on Sunday. I sleep next to Sonny and love to pounce off Sonny’s bone toys and Sonny even allows me to play with toys which is a wonderful sign!

I thank Zero Stray Pawject because without them I would be dead by now. I would have not survived on the streets of Mykonos. But they saved me and found me this amazing loving family! My future shines bright!