Community means a lot to us, and we love to highlight the work of worthy organizations, and especially animal welfare organizations, when we get the chance. But sometimes, we end up getting something much more meaningful than a sense of community. A couple of years ago, we got a valuable team member. Dog’s Voice is an NGO that operates right in the middle of downtown Athens. It opened in 2015, the initiative of a young woman – Elena Dede – who is both an animal lover and a lawyer, who was specializing in nonprofits. She found a team of other young women equally devoted to animal welfare. The goal of Dog’s Voice is simple – to find a loving forever-home for as many dogs in need as possible.
This inspiring team of young women has found forever-homes for over 4,250 stray dogs since they opened – that’s a lot of happy stories.

One of those strays is Arro. His story was a particularly difficult one; Arro had already been long abandoned as a puppy when he was rescued in August, after some of the terrible wildfires that plagued Greece in 2021. That meant that not only was this skinny, undernourished animal covered with ticks, but he also even had some burns. But that was not the main challenge facing Arro. After an already difficult life, the fire itself had been a traumatic experience for him. From anxiety, he lost all of his fur. In addition to needing to grow back his fur, he had a much greater challenge; he needed to overcome his anxiety, and learn how to experience trust, which was something completely new to him.

Lots of other things were completely new to Arro, too – being indoors, for one. Arro had lived all of his life unprotected from the elements before he was rescued. Needless to say, he had also never had a reliable supply of regular meals. Nutrition, shelter, and above all lots of love helped him to regain his health and above all helped him discover new confidence. But after the trauma he had been through, he had some deeper fears and insecurities to overcome – he was very afraid of loud noises, and he did not feel comfortable socializing. A professional trainer Dimitris Kanakis worked with Arro and he gained confidence quickly. Less than a year later, with patience and love, the urban streets of Pangrati started to feel safer to him, and he began to enjoy socializing with people. In June of 2022, he started to come into the office daily.

We are happy to say that he is now an integral member of our team full-time – we call him our Barketing Manager. We hope our colleagues are as lucky as we have been in finding team members.