Well away from their natural environment, giraffes stand on the snow-covered ground in Kanazawa, ready to dig.
Who makes the decision to create such things, I wonder? A group of marketing people? A suited bureaucrat?
Japan is full of such cute animal-themed stuff – like this and this. But who decides?
(click images to enlarge)
Anyone walking around streets in Japan will very quickly notice many plastic bottles filled with water have been placed up against houses and walls, between flower pots, lining fences and walls, tucked into corners and so on. This behaviour was imported from the West and is believed to repel street animals.
Various people believe the tradition originated from places as far afield as Hawaii, Greece, Albania and New Zealand but nobody seems to have a definitive answer.
The trend exploded overseas as far back as the 1980s in Europe and America where it was primarily directed at dogs and bottles are often scattered on lawns, but as street dogs don’t really exist in Japan, here it’s focussed on keeping cats at bay.
And of course it’s done in a uniquely Japanese way.
It’s simply an engineering marvel, and unquestionably one of the most awe-inspiring wonder spots of Japan.
It has been described as “the concrete junkie’s equivalent to a dropper of heroin”.
And it lies hidden underneath the outskirts of metropolitan Tokyo.
