Hi! My name is Dr. Luqman and I'm a veterinarian who recently moved to the beautiful city of Porto in Portugal. I feel incredibly blessed at the opportunities I've received to be able to explore this urban landscape. Much to my surprise, despite being very tourist-friendly, I realized that the city lacks an animal shelter with the ability to facilitate long distance adoptions, public education drives, pet fostering services, and assistance for patrons in both English and Portuguese.

I've found out that within Portugal, there are ways to raise awareness for causes through petitions. If successful, these petitions can request a local government to fund efforts on our parts to make our visions a reality. Understandably, this is a complex legal process which requires the assistance and services of a local law firm/attorney.

As such, I've decided to begin a fundraiser to help start this project. With these initial funds, we'll be doing the following:

+ Hiring legal counsel to begin the process of launching a petition recognized locally (from a legal standpoint)

+ Launching the petition

+ Looking at web domains to establish a website for a pet shelter (we will brainstorm names with our top donors) - this will require hiring web designers/developers

+ Hiring local translators as we'd like to have a Portuguese version of this fundraiser as well

+ Travel expenses (eg: for site scouting)

+ Launching an ad campaign for awareness on social media (if budget allows)

Please do note that while this is an ambitious fundraiser, any amount you can donate will definitely go a long way in our cause. We will not wait until we raise the complete amount to begin work on this; we will begin exploring our options right away.

I do envision a day in the future when we lay the bricks of this shelter and I can hopefully invite some of you donors over for a tour. As a veterinarian, my ethos has always been the following: saving one animal will not change the world, but it will change the world for that one animal.

I am not a fortune teller and I cannot see the future. I cannot predict how far this project will go and how much of a difference we can make. However, I do know that we can collectively try our best and hope this goes over well.

I thank you in advance for any contributions you make towards this cause and I will keep you updated on any progress we make towards this. And as always, please do leave suggestions for a pet shelter name!