Dying Lives in 50 years: A Brief History of Taiwan's stray animals. (Foreword 2-1) Have you ever seen a stray cat or dog while walking outdoors? Or have you looked into its eyes unguardedly? It might escape as a slash, or be on a heightened state of alert while it most likely goes toward you slowly, wags its tail or meow, wishes that you give it some food, love, and a home, just like its missing master. Because of my past experiences of encountering them on streets, I came upon the issue of stray animals. In the 1990s, I attended primary school on the outskirts of Taipei. My school was near the mountains. There were many stray dogs around my school, my community, and on the way to school. Discussing them in our daily life was normal. Once on a cold morning, I saw a dead frozen dog, it was stuffed in a cracked bucket with only its body exposed above in a spiral. Another memory I have is that of a rainy day; I saw a dead cat under a street light, and I hardly picked it up, as it was hundreds or thousands kilograms. My charitable neighbor adopted four or five stray dogs. She often took other stray animals to be ligatured, helped them find homes, and dealt with the dead stray animals that were maltreated by humans. At that time, I usually wondered how stray dogs come about? Why are there so many stray animals on streets? Where were their master? Why has this situation become a problem for me? People like me or my charitable neighbor, who felt anguish over the suffering are labeled "insane" in our compassion for the animals. We are really weird to people who live in the fast-paced city. After all, most people think it is a normal thing for stray animals to be on streets, alive or dead; it is unimportant to them. When people come across stray animals, they often have the "Do not trouble me, or I will call animal patrol" attitude. (To be continued…)