ROLE MODEL

ENDANGERED

SPECIES

Dr. Hollis Ann Stewart once stole a dog. “I saw him locked in a car in the heat without water for hours. I called the authorities and the humane society, and they didn’t think it was urgent. So I just took him and found him another home!” Guerilla activism isn’t typically her style, but Stewart admits, “Basic animal abuse will get me every time.”

Earlier this year, 70-hour works weeks at Animal Care and Control of New York were beginning to take their toll. “It was very stressful,” Stewart recalls. “I felt like I was doing good, honest work, but you see so much abuse, I was starting to have nightmares; it was just really emotionally draining.”

Instead of laboring on in life that wasn’t right for her, Stewart made a big change. Wanderlust had always been a driving force in her life, whether fulfilling her Jane Goodall fantasies in Uganda or doing research in the Peruvian rainforest, so she left her job, sold off her things, found an apartment, and was road tripping down to Waialua with her dogs just a month later. “I used to always be like, ‘I wish I could live here,’ and then one day I was just like, ‘Well, why can’t I live here?’”

Just like that, her entire life changed. Now she’s making YouTube videos about Hawaiian wildlife, picking up trash on the beach, printing up pamphlets to educate her neighbors, and standing up to big burly men and friends alike when she sees spots animal abuse.

Life in paradise isn’t always easy. She’s still waiting to get her license to practice veterinary medicine in Hawaii. “I love the pace of life here,” Stewart says, “but things get done when they get done. Which can be frustrating for the New Yorker in me.” Once the red tape is out of the way, she plans to get a spaying and neutering van there to deal with the stray cat problem, and then start tackling people’s attitudes. “People are trying to be greener here, but they don’t get that they need to take that extra step. I want to show them how.”

-Neha Gandhi