Richard and Joan Bowell, who left everything they had ever known, put a hold on their careers and sold their home in Denmark in order to establish a cat sanctuary on the Greek island of Syros, see their mission as a calling to help heal the world, one feline at a time. The name of the sanctuary, “God’s Little People,” emanates from the Bowells’ desire to show that animals are an important part of creation and that how we treat them not only has worth in itself but shows the measure of our civilization as a society. Going to Greece originally on a trip that mixed work with pleasure, the Bowells attended a seminar in the same house where they live now. They later bought the property, thinking that it might one day become a center where writers such as Richard would gather. Asked by Greek Reporter in an exclusive interview about their first impressions of the conditions cats were living in at that time on Syros, Richard says “When we moved here, we were aware there was a problem, but we didn’t immediately see the depth of it. There are fifteen thousand cats on the island, they estimate, and there are thousands that haven’t been neutered.
“There are many people on the island that are trying to do something and I would say the improvement in the lives of the cats has been enormous,” he stated. “We’re hoping through these stories to further raise the consciousness about these animals.” However, he took pains to point out that “we don’t want the Greek people to think we’re criticizing them. The younger Greeks are really trying to do something. There’s a lot of effort here now, it’s becoming more unified,” he says.
