I grown up in a city called Wuhan.
I don't have any siblings which is kind of sad.
My mum used to be an accountant but she stay home, look after family and be more supportive.
My dad run his instrument making business.
He makes all kinds of Chinese classic instruments.
My parents' idea was to send me to study in Sydney.
I met Simon, my future husband, and he was helping me in studying English.
And he introduced Adelaide to me and that's why I came to here.
He helped me a lot in all kinds of ways
but I still had to make my own effort to find out more things because, you know, you can't
rely and depend on other people.
I heard about this organisation for a long time and I'm here today to try to discover
more
and I really want to see how those homeless animals are looked after.
We've been in the Wingfield shelter now since the seventies and since then we've looked
after in excess of twenty thousand lost and abandoned animals, companion animals, each
year.
Hello, how you going?
I'm good.
I'm Michelle, nice to meet you.
Hi, Irena.
I just want to ... just wanna know, you know, why,
what is the reason that so many animals ended up here and what can we really do about it.
A lot of the animals that we get here, they haven't had the best of lives, you know.
They're the kind of animals that no-one wanted to come back for so we try and make whatever's
left of their life,
even if they aren't able to be rehomed, just really comfortable and as happy as we can
for them.
Yeah, so on this side we've got dogs.
You've got your three dog rows and you've got your cat rows.
There's two cat rows that are available.
It's quite an emotional thing.
I had a Rottweiler puppy when I was a child.
It unfortunately only lived up to three months and I had a couple of Persian cats.
Yeah, oh, we lived in apartments so cats were more suitable.
We have a lot of people who donate bedding and food and things like that and that's pretty
much what keeps us going.
I don't think we could really run without all the generous donations we get.
Animals are so real and they just being themselves and they enjoying freedom.
They don't have to put on a mask, and trying to interact with human beings,
and you can learn from them and they are beautiful creatures.
Oh, you don't want to come out.
Come on.
I'm trying to test whether I'm allergic or not.
So far so good because I would be 'atchoo atchoo', all the time.
You like that.
He likes it.
To be honest I've been thinking about having a pet.
We just moved to the new house.
I like animals.
I think they are just so close to human beings.
So this is Bronte and she has come in as a stray.
We just pick a name either out a book or whatever they look like.
Yeah.
Apparently she looks like a Bronte so ...
I can see that.
How does other animals end up here?
We do get a lot of owner surrenders.
Right.
Surrender.
For what reason?
It really depends, everyone has different circumstances.
It could be someone's moved and they can't bring their animals with them.
A lot of people don't actually realise what their puppy's gonna be like, so they'll buy
a puppy that is a working farm dog or a Labrador,
Yeah.
which are very, very high energetic dogs.
So they end up sort of getting stuck in a back yard and then people have enough of them
so they have to bring them in because they're just not working with their family.
You really gotta find out what breed is best for you.
You can't just buy a dog and think that it's gonna be okay.
We just want to educate people to show them that they're not disposable.
They're a big part of your family and we really want you to realise what you're gonna have
to do.
Good girl.
And this is Danni, our temperament tester for today.
Hello.
This is Michelle
Hello, nice to meet you ...
We took Bronte to the behavioural tests and she performed so well.
Good girl Bronte.
Okay so she's a fairly calm older dog.
She's happy to say hello to me but she doesn't really want to stick around me too much which
is completely fine.
Yeah, and I'm so happy she passed everything.
So, Michelle, what we do now is once the dogs have passed their temperament test,
Yeah.
my job is to check out their general health.
So I suppose I'm basically looking for two main things.
One is to see if they've got any conditions that need treating right now that we could
treat and so enable them to be adopted.
And also look for any chronic problems,
Yep, okay.
that then might be a problem for the new owner.
Because she's older, I'm going to make sure that she can see okay and that she's not developing
any cataracts which come with older age.
Okay.
She's got excellent teeth for an older dog, she must do a lot of chewing.
Or has done a lot of chewing.
Good work.
You're such a good dog aren't you?
How's that?
You like a massage.
Back massage.
She seems to be in excellent health.
This is where we desex them, if they're not already desexed.
Right.
We also microchip them.
The microchip goes in here.
It's injected in this
Neck sort of.
Back.
area here where it's not painful.
It's a little silicone chip about the size of a grain of rice.
And that contains in it a barcode and when you pass a scanner over that chip,
that's a unique number for that one chip and that number is linked to a central computer
database
So it's a way of indentifying Bronte and re-homing her if she gets lost.
Yes, okay.
I heard from friends that all homeless dogs and cats, they will be put into euthanasia,
in a certain amount of time but it's actually not true.
If the dog has great potential and they pass the checks, Animal Welfare League will definitely
keep them forever until they found their new owner.
So that's really good to know.
We're back home.
I'll prepare your bed in a minute.
I was a little bit concerned, you know, is it a depressive environment to be in?
But, no, it's actually really positive.
Every staff are friendly and really energetic, passionate about what they're doing.
I think it's really important, to have such a organisation.
I can't imagine without them what it would be like.
It's a place where you can give those homeless animals, whatever reason they ended up here,
a chance for their second life.
No, I can't take you out.
Oh, I so want to get out.
Bye.
I can see that pair of eyes when I was leaving
She wanted me to take her, go for another walk at least.
I don't know whether she wants me to take her home.
Try not to think like that.
Yeah, it's a little bit sad, but I'm positive.
She's great dog.
She will find someone, yeah.
Great work Michelle.
Now after the break we'll find out why some people love buying and selling from trash
and treasure markets.
See you soon.