This would be easy enough. On July 4th I would fly twelve and a half hours from Los Angeles to Shenyang, China, have a 3 hour layover, then board the two hour flight from Shenyang to Beijing, where I would spend the night in a hotel by the airport, get up the next morning, meet the dogs at airport check in, and deliver them all to San Francisco. It was a good plan. …Except that’s not how it went at all.

This trip wasn’t about sightseeing. While China has many spectacular sights, sounds, and tastes, I was here to help feed, medicate and clean up after over one hundred dogs saved from the meat trade and currently being housed at a safe house.