Quantity with Quality

Wet Noses Everywhere and Not a Dry Eye in the Place

How a former Golden Gloves boxer is now fighting for stray dogs

This is my next story in a series of articles responding to a challenge to produce a short quality article with three take home points each day for thirty days.

I have chosen to use Wikipedia’s main page as inspiration, choosing one item from the “Did You Know” section as topical encouragement.

British-born former Golden Gloves boxer Christina Beckles is severely allergic to dogs.

This fact would not be particularly noteworthy if Christina wasn’t the founder of The Sato Project which rescues thousands of abandoned and abused dogs in Puerto Rico. Christina takes weekly injections to keep her allergies in check and allow her to work on her passion which is to provide homes for the Satos — a term reserved for mongrel and homeless dogs in Puerto Rico and Cuba.

Starting out with a handful of volunteers on “Operation Paws” in 2011, The Sato Project has since grown to include a team in Puerto Rico and one in the United States. Other projects undertaken by the group have been to airlift dogs before and after natural disasters as well as conducting “Spayathon” a program to spay and neuter dogs to control the Sato population.

The group logs all stray dogs they can find and help to provide them with food and any needed medication prior to attempting to find them homes. When space becomes available, they move the dog into their shelter where they are spayed or neutered and receive all vaccinations. From there the dogs are flown to the United States where they are placed in a forever home.

What We Can Learn from a Dedicated Dog Savior

Christina’s group attempts to be both responsive to the large Sato population with rescues and placement and proactive in addressing the problem of so many abandoned dogs by launching the massive “Spayathons”.

Several rescued Satos have been featured in the Puppy Bowl which shows dogs playing as a parody of the U. S. Superbowl game during the halftime break.

Christina is fighting to have the Sato recognized as the national dog of Puerto Rico to raise awareness of the overpopulation issue.

Take home points:

• Don’t let setbacks keep you from your passion. Christina is allergic to dogs but didn’t let that stand in the way of pursuing what she believes to be an important goal.
• Dogs are awesome. They just are, no further explanation needed here.
• Helping another living creature pays dividends. I firmly believe that karma, mother nature, or some higher power smiles when we treat other living beings with respect.

Are you willing to work around minor and major issues to chase after your passion?

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Timothy Key spent over 26 years in the fire service as a firefighter/paramedic and various fire chief management roles. He firmly believes that bad managers destroy more than companies, and good managers create a passion that is contagious. Compassion, grace and gratitude drive the world; or at least they should. Follow me on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter, and join the mail list.