Our Dog Rescue Team
Lesley Mapstone
Lesley founded Temple Dog in 2018 while living nearby Kathmandu’s famous temple, the Swoyambhunath Stupa. She rescued her first two dogs from streets around the temple, and nursed them back to health, then brought them home to live in Canada. Over the years while living in Kathmandu, she spent much of her time feeding, befriending, and observing street dogs in and around the temple and in remote Himalayan villages. She nursed sick and injured dogs to health and found homes for them in Canada, when they could no longer live on the street.
Lesley channeled the plight and misery of street dogs, desiring to help them heal. Following one after another rescue story, Temple Dog became an international brand with loyal members, who have helped Lesley on her mission to rescue, rehabilitate and home dogs suffering from some of Nepal’s worst cases of sickness, neglect and cruelty.
Lesley is a Canadian and British photographer and filmmaker when she is not helping animals.
Monica Larrieu
Always an avid animal lover, Monica’s particular love of dogs grew exponentially during her four years of living in Kathmandu, Nepal.
Since 2018, when Monica and her family moved to Kathmandu, she became actively involved in rescuing and fostering Nepali street dogs. However, when the global COVID pandemic brought a total lockdown in Nepal for almost a year, Monica shifted gears to become immersed in helping street dogs in her locality. This included feeding, treating, nursing and arranging sterilizations. Many of her fosters spent several months in the safety of her home to heal both physically and spiritually, preparing them for local adoption or to fly fly them out to wonderful new lives through rescue groups like Temple Dog Rescue.
When not rescuing and fostering dogs, Monica is an independent consultant and public health specialist that has worked with various international organizations over the past 25 years. She and her husband have lived all over the world with their two children - now teenagers - who seem to have inherited their mother’s love of dogs.
Prakash Tamang
Prakash is a mountain guide who has been involved in Temple Dog’s most daring rescue adventures, from fleeing the mountains on motorbikes in the dark with an injured dog, to catching a dog with broken ribs that everyone else was afraid to catch, and negotiating with Ghurka army officials to let a maimed dog pass. Prakash has been with Temple Dog Rescue since the beginning. He is an expert at problem solving rescues in high risk situations, he navigates local customs and interprets language.
Prakash knows how to get around Nepal the local way and has been essential to the rescue of many injured and sick dogs that are in warm and comfortable homes today.