I’m now so happy to report that we have Lord of the Fries, Pedigree, Vegan Perfection, Lush and Tigi Hair Products on board.
Lord of the Fries have even generously donated free fries for everyone that attends the Melbourne event!

Sydney numbers are building slowly but surely, it’s going to be a smaller event to the Melbourne one given that we don’t have the same support network over there. However Nicole Brown from ALNSW and Verna Simpson from Humane Society have been so amazing in trying to get the word out.

Oh! And we received some press from the Williamstown Advertiser/The Mail about the documentary which is fantastic! Check out the article below here (I would just put it in this post but WordPress have made it nearly impossible to add photos to posts- if anyone knows how to do this please tell me!): http://www.facebook.com/?ref=home#!/photo.php?pid=4965726&id=120149701614

So not long now… hopefully see you at either the Sydney or Melbourne event!

- Elizabeth x

We are super excited (and very relieved), to have finally finished organising the premieres for our debut Documentary!
At this stage we have scheduled premieres in both Melbourne and Sydney. We are also very pleased to announce that we have some very special guests attending both screenings; Kartick Satyanarayan and Geeta Seshamani founders of Wildlife SOS.
These two amazing people have very starring roles in the doco, and helped us out a lot whilst being in India, so we are very grateful for them to come all this way for it!
There will also be some lovely drinks, yummy veg food and of cause everyone is welcome!

Details are as follows:

Melbourne – Sunday 25th of July
Kaliede Theatre, RMIT University
300 Swanston St, Melbourne 3000
Doors: 5:30pm

Sydney – Monday 26th of July
The Chauvel Cinema
Corner of Oxford St and Oatley Rd, Paddington 2021
Doors: 6:00pm

Head over to our Merch Site for tickets as they are very limited.

PS. We are sorry to any one who can’t make it to a premiere. Please don’t worry we have something very special planned for you all, you just have to be a little more patient.

Can’t wait to see you there,
Andrew and Elizabeth

- Elizabeth and Andrew

But the excitement soon turned to frustration as we 1) nearly missed our plane, 2) I thought I lost my passport, 3) Cam was nearly not allowed to board the plane because he forgot he left his swiss army knife in his take on luggage and 4) I nearly missed the plane due to security reasons.

The first thing we noticed when we hopped off the plane  was the refreshing cooler climate, in comparison to the 45 degree weather we had been experiencing. In addition, the roads were clean and well-made and there was far less tooting than anywhere we’d been! Might not seem like a big deal but after 7 days of non-stop car tooting, it was a welcome change.

We headed to the Bangalore bear sanctuary ran by Wildlife SOS. Our time there was nothing short of incredible. We watched the bears being fed, we met the last ever dancing bear in India and took a ride in the jeep and fed the bears watermelons!

It was one of the most amazing and humbling moments I have experienced when I turned around to see 4 of these majestic bears running after the car for more melons. One of those things you never forget!

When our time with the bears was through we headed back to our hotel to prepare for dinner. It was our last night in India before we headed home. To celebrate, we decided to relish in the local cuisine. Like I said, southern Indian food is fantastic yet the experience was made even better when it came on banana leaves!

We were very sad that our time had come to an end. However the excitement began to mount as we realised we had captured some incredible footage that would make hopefully an equally as exciting and informative documentary.

The next day we ventured out to the chaos. When wandering around one of the main markets in old Mumbai we stumbled upon something so strange. We were at leisure in the fruit and veg section, being fed ultra hot chillies and playing with stray kittens. Then, as if walking to an alternate universe, we stepped into an open abattoir and a secret meat market (because hindus do not eat meat, only licensed abattoirs are allowed to operate in India). We were shocked. Eyeballs, intenstines and goat heads lined the tables. Rats ran over the guts whilst flies bred on the hearts. I have never seen hell, but I imagined this is exactly what it’s like. The smell of blood and death soaked the air. The blackness of the room set the tone. I wanted to leave. I didn’t have to walk far before a man stormed over to us asking what our purpose for being there was and to bluntly, “run. Get out.”

He explained with little detail that this place is “notorious.” It only took a quick scan around the room to realise that. It was only until later we were told that we were lucky our video camera (with all of our footage from the whole trip!) wasn’t smashed and one of us bashed.

This was enough for us. We were all Mumbai-ed out. Bring on Bangalore!

- Elizabeth and Andrew

Since the World wide web wasn’t as world wide as we needed, a lot of photos and posts haven’t been put up yet, but now we are back home we promise to recap on each day that we spent in India, along with photos.

In the mean time check out our photo album on our facebook page, to see what we saw.

And continue to check back and tell your friends as we will be updating everyone on the progress of the documentary as well as heaps of other things.

Cheers for being patient.

Andrew – Australian Teens Against Animal Cruelty

Many people would be surprised to know that leopards are native to India. As the population expands and agricultural communities form in the rural areas, the space between the leopards and the humans becomes smaller. Much of their habitat has been cut down to make way for sugar cane plantation. This causes a very serious problem. The leopards have begun to give birth within the sugar crops and raise their young there. As the sugar cane is left for a year to grow, once the time comes to cut it down, the farmers find a mother leopard and her cubs. The mother becomes aggressive, usually resulting in either the farmer being hurt or killed or the mother leopard being killed. This leaves her cubs alone to fend for themselves.

Luckily, the Wildlife SOS leopard team are able to respond to such problems and rescue cubs and other leopards that have unfortunately wandered into the wrong areas. As said above, the leopard rescue centre receive very little funding. This results in more than half of the 27 leopards being kept in temporary, yet very small enclosures. ATAAC has decided we want to dedicate much of our fundraising to the leopard sanctuary and leopard awareness. Stay tuned for more information.



- Elizabeth

Our first morning in Agra began with a visit to the equine team’s stand right near the Taj Mahal. Again many local people brought their working horses and donkeys to be assessed by the vets free of charge. The horses and donkeys suffer from such things as the flu, sore legs, sore backs and many other conditions. This would be our last visit to the equine team. Needless to say they do just amazing work. So inspiring!

Our next stop was the Agra bear sanctuary yet again, except this time we crossed the river to the other side of the sanctuary. The sanctuary is located in a national park so needless to say the scenery was just breathtaking. Unfortunately the Indian wildlife officials are very strict and we are not allowed to put up any photos of the bears. Rest assured they are so beautiful, happy and healthy.

We drove back to Delhi and our great friend Tandrali from Friendicoes introduced us to some southern Indian food. It was an all veg restaurant and needless to say, it was incredible! Indian food is India is just as fantastic as you imagine. If anything, visit India for the food!

- Elizabeth

Today was even more action packed than the others. A word of advice: when travelling in India, expect the unexpected. We left Delhi for a four hour car journey to Agra. On the way we stopped off at a restaurant where an elephant is owned by a holy man. Wildlife SOS are planning to take the elephant off its owner as it is chained up all hours of the day however they have to wait until they have raised enough funds to establish a sanctuary.

Elephants have a majestic quality which is likeable to whales and tigers. Her sheer beauty was enough to give us all chills down our spine. During breakfast Andrew ordered a glass of orange juice, unknowingly it was mixed with unfiltered indian water… more on that later.

After the restaurant we met with the Friendicoes Equine Team and followed them through rural towns as they assisted working donkeys and horses. Along the highway, gypsies have replaced their dancing bears with monkeys they have trained to perform tricks for money. It was an awful site to see monkeys performing back flips and walking around in circles on their hind legs for the amusement of foreigners.

We stopped at the first equine stand in Utter Pradesh, the state next to Delhi. The people were not used to foreigners and video cameras as it was a very small, agricultural town. As we assisted the equine vets with their work, a large crowd soon gathered around us and asked us for photographs! Some of the horses were very skinny and had branding all over their hind legs. It seemed the life had been zapped out of them from working such long and exhausting hours. Thank God for the equine vets who are able to visit these towns once a week to check on these beautiful and helpless creatures. After we had finished up, Andrew became really unwell and his vomiting began. This spectacle also gathered a large crowd. Soon Andrew was vomiting to an audience of around thirty people!

The next stop was in a state called Rahjastan where the equine vets check up on the horses and donkeys once a week. As I said earlier, expect the unexpected in India. Along the way we noticed a donkey lying on the side of the road. We all jumped out of the car and ran over to find one of the most heartbreaking sites we had ever seen. The donkey was lying flat on the road with mud and dirt all over the poor little thing. His life was slowly disappearing from his eyes. The equine vets transported him about 50 metres up from the road to a quiet area where they could assess the situation. They found broken legs and a donkey on the verge of death. As this too was a small town, around forty people gathered around the donkey and the equine team to see what was going on. The vets assessed the donkey and made the rational decision to euthanize him. I stroked the donkeys face as he embraced his last minutes of life. I was sure that this was probably the only kindness he had ever received.

The most heartbreaking aspect we later found out. Our friend and guide Tandrali informed us that the locals had told her they had seen the donkey lying there for two days already. He had fallen down the drain and some of the local people pulled him out and laid him on the road.

After the donkey was put out of his misery, we finally made it to Agra and visited the Wildlife SOS bear sanctuary. In case you are unaware, Wildlife SOS successfully shut down the centuries-long dancing bear trade through the whole of India. Now they care for the surrended ex dancing-bears in both the Agra and Bangalore sanctuaries. There were around 70 sloth bears in the sanctuary. Each living a peaceful and compassionate life that they so deserved.

- Elizabeth

Today we ventured out to Gurgoan to visit the Friendicoes sanctuary, which is about two hours out of Delhi. This is home to rescued dogs, cats, monkeys, donkeys, horses, cows, ducks, geese, roosters and even rats! It was so amazing to see the animals living their lives with kindness and care, which unfortunately we can’t say for the rest of the animals on the streets. The vets that work on site sterilise local dogs in the area and return them back to their territory.

The dogs living there are ones that couldn’t be re-homed. There was one dog that stole our hearts! He had one eye and one ear and followed us around everywhere! He was just gorgeous. We want to bring him back to Australia! Now we just have to work on customs…

On our way back to Delhi we stopped at McDonalds to have McVeggie meals. India is heaven for vegetarians! So much so, that every food product is labelled as ‘veg’ or ‘non-veg’! It is considered mainstream to be a vegetarian here. It’s time for Australia to follow suit!

With no time to rest, we headed to Old Delhi, where we would meet the Friendicoes Equine Team. We helped and observed whilst the vets treated working donkeys and horses. The Indian people can bring their horses to the vets free of charge for any condition their horse or donkey may be suffering from. This is such an excellent initiative as the state of some of these donkeys and horses is just so sad from working such hard and long hours.

- Elizabeth