I found this news on WEB today.
The news said it's a very famous video so maybe you have watched.
It's very cute!! This is;


And another news is here.
It's "Year of the Tiger" this year, so in HongKong, the cats agility contest was held.

Looks like very robust!

Last time I wrote that there is only one shrine that worships cats in Japan, but it was not true.
I read this news today, it says "The stones statues of Cat God were found in the northern part of Japan."
This is the photo on the news site.

A long time ago, silk raising industry was very popular in this area.
So people used to worship cats, because cats attack mice, which is the enemy of silkworm.
People made cat shaped stone statues and put them in the shrines or individuals' houses.

Silk raising industry used to develop here and there in Japan, so I think the similar statues could be found other areas.
Then, I searched "Cat God" by google and found there are many shrines and temples related to faith of "Cat God".

Then, I bought this book at Amazon, named "Pathway of Cat God".

We have many many Cat God all of Japan!

We have a custom to worship cats.
"MANEKINEKO", (happy cats or welcoming cats?) is representative one.
It is a ceramic ornament which shapes cat, that raises one hand to invite people, money and happy.

This is the MANEKINEKO I found at the porch of a Japanese sweets shop.

And these were at the porch of a Chineese noodle shop.

Today I read a news about the only shrine in Japan which enshrine Cat as God.
The shrine is at Tokushima prefecture and named "OMATSU DAIGONGEN", which derives from the story of "BAKENEKO" or a monster cat.
"OMATSU" was a name of woman whose husband was a village mayor.
He borrowed money from a marchant and died soon after payed back money.
But the marchant didn't recognize that he payed back, and OMATSU claimed to the Lord but he  didn't listen to her either, finally OMATSU was put to death.

After that, a monster cat appeared on the house of the marchant and the Lord, and many terrible things happened.So people built a shrine to appease the soul of OMATSU.

Now a lot of test-takers for entrance exam visit this shrine, because this God is supposed to back up to pass the exam.

The last news is about a cat of Jesus Christ
What do you think with this? ;-)

My job started from Jan. 4th, as every year.
Our New Year's Holidays begin from Dec.28th to Jan.3rd, but this year 4th is Monday, so we have to work on full weekdays from Monday after a week of holidays.

It's on Wednesday yet...it seems to be veeeery long this week...

By the way, I found a funny news today.
"Tama", maybe the most famous cat in Japan who works as a stationmaster at the local railway station, became an executive at the railway company!

The original news is here.

Actually "Tama" is a popular name of cat here in Japan.
In the animation "Sazaesan", heroine's family has a white cat named "Tama".

Our cat is "Tamasaburo", named after the famous KABUKI actor, but we also wanted to include "tama" in his name.
But we call him "Sabu", not "Tama".
He won't work at all unlike another "Tama", he sleeps in front of the stove all day long!

In Tokyo, I went to watch a movie after the meeting, which name was "Dog, Cat, and Human".
This movie shows the current situations about dogs and cats in Japan.

The movie starts from the scene that an old woman visited the director and asked him to film the movie about the situations around dogs and cats, animal control and animal welfare in Japan.
She had worked with rescue of stray and abandoned cats for more than 40 years, but she was old and she knew she wouldn't continue that work, so she decided to appeal people about poor dogs and cats here by making a movie.
Then, the director started the work, but he had not been interested in animals ever before and he didn't have any ideas about the problem of dogs and cats, so it took 4 years to research and make the film.

Though he knew the very sad and poor facts here and there, but he doesn't focus on the poor side, doesn't emphasize the terribly conditions, he only showed the facts in detached tone and he never said who or what was bad.
That's why I liked this movie.

I'm an official worker in charge of animal control in the municipal government.
So I know these situations the movie showed very well, and I know how hard it is to accept dogs and cats only to destroy them like some of the official workers in this movie do.

The reason why I started to help TNR is not only for cats, but also for my job.
I don't want to accept kittens next year, so I catch the cats and bring to the vet clinics 100km from my home almost every week (it's cheaper anyway).

A woman in the movie said in anger "why Japanese people throw away their dogs and cats in the mountains or river sides easily?", but it's because they know the animals will be destroyed when they were brought to the animal control offices, so people choose the chance in a million that they could survive instead of apparently death, though it's quite wrong ideas in fact.
They should know their acts are only to avoid their responsibility and to suffer abandoned animals longer until terrible death, without food, attacked by crows, or hit by car,etc.

I don't know what impressions people who watched this movie had, but if someone wanted to help abandoned cats or spay/neuter their cats after watching the movie, it's great!
Anyway, I believe the situations are getting better a little by little every year.

Maybe you know, Feb.24th is the Spay Day International.
Our cat rescue group also attended this canpaign, and did a small event.



We passed out fliers to people at the JR Hikone station and MinamiHikone station.
Because it was on Sunday, there were not so many people walked by.
But it was "The Cat's Day" in Japan , though we didn't know, some people thought it was a Cat's Day Event! ;-P





A Newspaper writer came and meet us, hearing how spay/neuter is necessary for pets, for thier health and welfare.





This is me that in a cat suits!
I have been looking forward to this day because I could wear the cat costume.
I was veeerrry happy to wear it.



These are our members.Now we are very small but next year, we want to gather more volunteers and make this event bigger, so that spay/neuter would be spread in our district.

I was just looking a news program on TV but one news shocked me..
That was GAZA.It was so terribly...I can't express well...
Some people say that Japanese people have been complacent about the current peace situations, but why is that so bad?
I DO hope people should learn from cats all over the world.
This is the symbole of peace!

I found this interesting news today...
If I trained my cats, would he be able to use comb to make clean his hair?
Now only he can do is watching us cleaning our room!

The news is here : Clever Critters: 8 Best Non-Human Tool Users