The wildlife trade is one of the most lucrative sectors of illegal business, right after the trade in drugs and guns. Greed, indifference, but also ignorance of humans can lead many species to extinction. We will take a look back to Indonesia, to the local wildlife markets. Now I will pass the markets where wild animals are sold for meat and I will speak about those where wild animals are sold as pets. I have repeatedly visited several large markets in Jakarta, Yogyakarta, Medan and other smaller ones in Indonesia. Each marketplace is differently large, focusing on slightly different species of animals, but there was something in common for all these places. The animals are kept in very poor conditions, without access to water, on dusty noisy streets and in addition to common unprotected species, you will also find threatened and protected ones here. However, they are often hidden under a blanket somewhere in the back, or you can only get to them after you gain the trust of a local seller. Recently, in 2014, slow lorises or Bengal cats, for example, were commonly seen in the markets, but an orangutan would be found only after a closer inspection. Since this year, however, there have been several seizures of animals and punishment of traders, so they are more afraid to show their “specimens” publicly. However, this doesn’t mean that the trade in these species has stopped, it’s rather more hidden. The fact that much of this trafficking has moved to social networks, where it is harder to find traffickers and punish them, also contributes to this. But let's go back to the marketplace. As you walk through the market with animals around you, you will see a mix of domestic species with wild animals caught in the wild. As for primates, the most common ones are the young of pig-tailed and long-tailed macaques whose mother was killed and they have been caught for sale as pets. Very popular are also civets, flying squirrels or treeshrews, which are repainted to white to make them more beautiful and to increase the interest of buyers in them. As for birds, in Jakarta you will find a large building with several floors, full of birds only. In addition to the foreign ones, you will find countless local species, and you can pay up to several hundreds USD for a bird that can sing nicely and is trained for singing competitions. Crowded owl cages are no exception either. There are also countless reptiles, from iguanas to various species of snakes. However, many traders have begun to focus on domestic animals, which is a good news, as these are domesticated and reared individuals, but if we look at the care and welfare of these animals, we will find malnourished, sick individuals on the verge of death, which are still “trapped” in cages for sale. And such a skinny cat with infected eyes will probably live there to her death. In the “black” alleys of such a marketplace, you will find corpses of various species or piles of still-dying individuals on a pile. Documenting these practices often doesn’t go without pushing, swearing, and trying to avoid photography by the seller. Other sellers will be happy to pull the animals out of the cage and show them to you. I don't want to throw all sellers into one bag – if they have aquariums with fishes in their shop which you can find in a regular pet shops anywhere in the world, then we can hardly condemn them. However, they sell here also animals captured from the wild whose mothers or whole families have been drastically killed in order to obtain the young, and they, if they survive at all, are then sold in poor conditions in local markets. A significant percentage also includes protected species that are at immediate risk of extinction. Moreover, how these wild animals then end up in people’s homes is another question.