Page 28 - Book about Friendship and Future.Stories of Volunteers.

Olga Belyaeva

KFC Novoslobodskaya
Moscow

My friend Ekaterina decided to get one more cat as a pet. She
did not address cat-breeders but consulted animal rehabilitation
centers. Finally, she chose the rehabilitation center “Yuna” – she
liked it more than all others. Of course, before choosing it we
sat together reading a lot about it, we studied the feedback of
people who had contacted this center somehow. At this stage,
my eye was caught by the information about the website run-
fordogs.ru, which was cooperating with the rehabilitation center
“Yuna” as well. “Yuna” was offering its pets for participation in
the “Furry Race”. Such a “comfortable” name for a sports event
caused my interest. I decided to search for more information.
It turned out that the runfordogs.ru site has a substantial back-
ground and a large list of the held events aimed to provide sup-
port and care for all creatures great and small.
I shared this information with my peers in the KFC restaurant –
some of them are dogs and cats’ owners. My curiosity and de-
sire to help my friend resulted in our first and the most popular
volunteer project – participation in the 10th jubilee “Furry Race”.
Five employees from our restaurant took part in it. Kuzminki Park,
great mood and “wonderful” weather (no sun and light frost)
were making this day unforgettable. We were helping at the kids’
and adults’ races, directing the flow of participants in the appro-
priate direction. And also took part in a splendid quiz, answering
the questions about dogs.
Together with my peers, I consider this date the starting point
of our volunteering. We have participated in the “Furry Race” al-
ready twice, have implemented many other volunteer projects,
and Ekaterina has got a cat named Glafira.