Maggie has kept cats and dogs with her family since she was small. 20 years ago, her beloved doggie passed away when she was living alone. She was devastated and one of her friends who was very worried about her suggested her to join the SPCA’s Foster Parent Programme, hoping that she could recover from her grief by taking care of abandoned animals who are sick or injured, as well as new born kittens and puppies, in order to let them integrate into the family and regain the trust towards humans. Maggie thought it would be a really meaningful job, so she immediately signed up for the programme. Until now, she has fostered over 300 animals.

Fostering animals might seem easy, but it actually requires a tremendous amount of effort. According to Maggie, the cats and dogs she has fostered are often aggressive as they don’t really trust humans. Since they are not used to living in a home environment, the noise from electrical appliances like vacuum cleaner and television could really stress them out, so she would always turn down the volume of the television and speaker, so the animals would find it easier to adapt to living with humans. “Only if they can get used to living in a home environment, it will be easier for them to be adopted later on,” Maggie says.

In addition to fostering, Maggie has adopted 5 cats and 2 dogs – they are all good ‘actors’ and ‘actresses’ in a way. She recalls some of them actually faked in order to stay in Maggie’s home forever after the foster period. Jai Jai the British short hair is one of the ‘actors’ – he was rescued after falling from a building in Shatin. He was sent to Maggie’s place for fostering due to a fracture of his leg. “He could walk properly after the recovery at my home. But when he was sent back to the SPCA, he started to limp, so I took him back to my home. After travelling back and forth between the centre and my home for several times, I decided to simply adopt him,” Maggie says. Buddy the Siamese cat is also an ‘actor’. He was sent back to the SPCA for 3 times – every time he just couldn’t stop sneezing or coughing. But he recovered right away when he stepped into Maggie’s home, and later he was adopted by her.

As an animal enthusiast, Maggie sometimes brings the stray cats or dogs back to her home to take care of them, including “Meow B” the Persian cat. When she discovered Meow B, not only there were cockroaches and cigarette butts in his fur, his tail was also stabbed by a pencil and his front leg was severely injured. Maggie then brought him to a veterinary clinic to receive an amputation surgery. He became a three-legged cat and is leading a happy life with Maggie now. Another family member is Bebe the Shih Tzu dog, who was surrendered by his previous owner in a veterinary clinic due to cataract and heartworms. Bebe was lucky enough to be discovered by Maggie.

She will continue to take care of the poor animals in the future. “There is so much joy in being a foster parent, which is priceless for me,” Maggie states. She hopes that more people are willing to join the Foster Parent Programme, especially for those who intend to keep a pet to take to see if they can get along with animals or not.