The scruffy little terrier was left for dead on a busy street in Thessaloniki, Greece's second largest city.

He had been struck by a car and the driver did stop, long enough to pick the dog’s limp body off the pavement and toss it in a garbage can. 

But a bystander, unconvinced the little dog was dead, called a local animal rescue mission. For three days a veterinarian cared for the unconscious dog until it opened its eyes and began struggling to move. X-rays would later reveal a spinal cord injury, which meant it would probably never use its hind legs again.

While the dog lay there, motionless, the managers of the shelter leapt into action.

That’s when Dianne Aldan received an email at her home in Toronto.  Aldan is a 65-year-old financial consultant who runs Tails from Greece Rescue, a group that helps stray cats and dogs in Greece - sometimes bringing them here to start a new life. 

Aldan immediately began making arrangements to bring the dog, now named Turbo, to Canada. She knew it needed a doggie wheelchair, or dogcart, because it couldn’t use its back legs. She set up temporary foster care and began looking for a permanent home.

Once it was well enough, Turbo was driven to Athens, then flown to Amsterdam for a connecting flight to Toronto. The terrier arrived April 9, six weeks after the accident.

Aldan estimates it costs about 1,000 euros (about $1,400) to bring a dog from Greece, excluding veterinary checks and microchipping. Although most are already adopted before they arrive and do not have severe medical issues, she has helped a few three-legged and three blind dogs.

Aldan began her rescue work after visiting Greece on her honeymoon in 1984. The country has a culturally accepted disregard for the welfare of cats and dogs - there are no formalized spaying or neutering programs, so the stray population is out of control, she explains.  When dogs become ill or injured, owners often abandon them.

Aldan joined a small but dedicated network of people who support private rescue missions. She began by raising money, at first standing outside St. Lawrence Market with a few leaflets and a tin can.  "I just talked to people and asked for a small donation to help the strays in Greece," she says.  Aldan would bring pet food on her frequent trips there, but it never seemed enough.

Eventually she applied for charitable status but she brought her first dog to Canada back in 2001. So far she has found homes for over 200 dogs and six cats — all strays that once wandered the streets in Greece.

Turbo still has raw wounds on his knees.  The unstoppable mutt wore the fur off his legs as they dragged behind him, says Keiley Abbat, who agreed to foster the dog until Aldan could find a permanent home. Abbat, the owner of Small Wonders Pets on Danforth Ave., in the heart of the city’s Greek neighbourhood, takes him to work with her. And it was Abbat who gave the dog his name. From the moment he was rigged into his dogcart, he took off. “He was turbo charged.”

Turbo may always need wheels to remain mobile, Abbat says. But she sees the little dog get stronger by the day. His injuries have also affected his bladder, and she has to manually empty it twice a day, squeezing on the bladder until the pressure is relieved.

Because of his affectionate and trusting nature, Abbat isn’t sure Turbo was ever a street dog. “He may have been someone’s pet,” she says. “But in Greece even family pets are rarely allowed inside the home.”

Turbo also has severely damaged vocal cords. Abbat guesses they may have been “burned with battery acid to stop him from barking,” a common way to quiet noisy dogs.  Now, like a deflated squeaky toy, he can only manage sharp bursts of air.

That’s the muffled sound Turbo makes as he races through the aisles of his foster home, a downtown pet store in a neighbourhood saturated with the smells of freshly made souvlaki, spanakopita and moussaka - the breathless woof of a dog that’s found his way home.

None of this has dampened the enthusiasm of prospective owners offering to give Turbo a permanent home. One couple has already filled out an application, prepared for the joys and the challenges of owning a good natured but physically disabled dog.  Abbat says Turbo, between two and four years old, is scheduled to be neutered this week.