|
|
Hey kitty, would you like to have a drink with me?
Cat cafes are the current rage in Japan |
|
|
For three euros per half hour you are free to go in escorted by your sweet cute little kitten |
|
|
|
In Japan, there are teenagers who do not go out and socialize but stay day and night shut away in their rooms, they only connect with the outside world through the web. However, also in Japan, they’re opening cafes to pet your cat. That’s the Japanese way.
The 'invention' is 'made in Taiwan' and imported to Osaka by a Japanese four years ago; although it’s only now –after a feature article released by the Spanish news agency EFE– when curiosity has stricken, and it seems that an infectious proliferation of these premises is taking place in Japan: in Tokyo alone there are twenty.
It works like this: for three euros per half hour (one extra euro every other ten minutes) you are free to go in escorted by your sweet cute little kitten, or your big cat, mingle with cats and sip tea or enjoy any other drink (coffee, juices, bear, sodas… but no food), just like in any other regular cafe.
Put like that, it might sound something like the Red District in Amsterdam. What regular customers –all ages and genres– say is that they can make the most of it, even exchanging impressions or solving doubts about pets, ‘cause they can not take their feline pets out for a walk in the park as you do with your dog.
The owner of one of the most successful cat cafes, Neko JaLaLa, states as well that many flats in Tokyo do not allow to have pets and moreover, they help getting rid of stress and solitude.
The news agency talks about a third of Japanese residents living on their own, the birth rate being one of the lowest in the world, and a deep feeling of loneliness is in the air. Maybe not all that third does like cats.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
(1 Sep 2008)
(1 Sep 2008)
(1 Sep 2008)
(1 Sep 2008)
(1 Sep 2008)
|
|
|
|
|
|