Emiliano, the 9-Year-Old Animal Superhero!

By Katia Rodríguez, Mexico Campaigns and Spanish Media Coordinator

My coworker—Emmanuel Márquez, VO’s Mexico Outreach Coordinator—and I have been traveling together since August. We’ve leafleted in seven different states throughout Mexico, visited several campuses, and have met a lot of young people willing to change their diet for animals.

We’ve handed out over 82,000 leaflets so far, and we’re very grateful because we’ve had some really amazing volunteers join us as we go into different cities. Some of them were experienced volunteers that support us every time we visit their city, and others were new volunteers that ended up loving the experience.

One very special volunteer we met along the way was a 9-year-old boy named Emiliano.

Before getting into all of the details about Emiliano, I would like to talk about his incredible parents. Emiliano’s parents went vegan after hosting Emmanuel in 2015 when he visited Xalapa, Veracruz to do campus outreach. They are loving and supportive parents that teach respect and compassion to their children.

After talking with Emiliano, we became more and more amazed by his compassion and empathy.

A good example of this was when Emiliano visited an animal sanctuary in another state and met two dogs that were siblings. He fell in love with one of the dogs, but told his parents that he wouldn’t be able to adopt just one of the pair. Emiliano could see how much these dogs loved each other and didn’t want to separate them.

His parents decided to let Emiliano adopt both dogs.

When Emiliano heard what Vegan Outreach does, and how many animals a person can save by leafleting, he was very curious about the activity. Emmanuel and I invited him to leaflet with us and he immediately said yes! We gave him a Vegan Outreach t-shirt and he could hardly hold back his tears.

After giving him some quick tips on how to leaflet, he was leafleting like a pro! This 9-year-old superhero handed out 400 leaflets in a single day!

After leafleting, we invited him to go to a restaurant with us where he could enjoy a vegan hot dog!

Emiliano’s parents thanked us for inspiring him, but, honestly, he inspired us. He wants to change the life for millions of animals and he’s off to a great start!