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Bolo is a 10-year-old golden retriever with a sad history, but one who has pulled through with a love of people that is, in its purity, almost heart-wrenching to see. Like some of the other animals featured here in the past, Bolo has special needs. These needs make him less likely to be adopted, even though he has a heart of gold and a personality to match. When Bolo was first rescued and brought to ARK, he was little more than skin and bone. The years of malnourishment caused him to develop a skin condition that still requires steroids and weekly bathing to keep in check. Still, though 10, Bolo is truly a puppy at heart. He loves to play with toys and run and tumble with people and there is no greater joy for him than being petted and having his tummy tickled. There is no greater joy perhaps other than finding someone to cherish him, someone to cherish him with a love that is more than skin deep.
(Photo by Kentaro Washi)
Interested in Adopting Bolo?
Please email ARK at tokyoark[at]arkbark.net or call 080-6146-3889 (English) or 080-6517-8913 (Japanese). Tokyo ARK is a nonprofit organization founded by Brit Elizabeth Oliver. It is dedicated to rescuing and rehoming abandoned animals. All animals are vaccinated, neutered, and microchipped. Prospective new owners undergo a screening process.
The Japan Times supports stray and abandoned animals by editing and printing this photo box every Saturday in the Weekend/People section of the paper.
See also: Other potential pets who have been featured on the Angels with Fur site
The Japan Times and Tokyo ARK have given Angels with Fur kind permission to reprint notices regarding pet adoptions (see: potential pets who have been featured on the Angels with Fur site). In addition to requests for adoption, they also publish success stories about pets who find new homes. Here is the latest success story.
Lime, a wire-haired dachsund, was initially featured on March 3. It was to prove to be her lucky day, the day Jean Kawabe returned to Japan from the U.S. Staying at a Tokyo hotel, she picked up the paper. ‘‘There was something in her eyes,’’ Kawabe says of Lime. The Fukuoka resident called immediately to inquire about Lime, went to her foster home the next day and the adoption was settled. Lime is now happily ensconced in her new home, where she enjoys walks in the huge yard and basks in the luxury of baths. Lime has many friends, including Kawabe’s other dog and the housekeeper, with whom she has fallen in love. Unfortunately, Lime was not in the best of health. She had been forced by the breeder to produce continuous litters of puppies. Her heart was weakened and she had arthritis and other health concerns. Thanks to Kawabe, however, who is also president of the Ohori Lions Club and the Fukuoka chapter of Ikebana International, Lime has receieved the best possible care and her vet says she will live to a ripe old age. From The Japan Times and ARK, may we extend our heartfelt gratitude to Jean Kawabe. Thank you so much for taking dear Lime into your loving home.
(Photo by Minako Sasaki)
Interested in Adopting a Pet?
Please email ARK at tokyoark[at]arkbark.net or call 080-6146-3889 (English) or 080-6517-8913 (Japanese). Tokyo ARK is a nonprofit organization founded by Brit Elizabeth Oliver. It is dedicated to rescuing and rehoming abandoned animals. All animals are vaccinated, neutered, and microchipped. Prospective new owners undergo a screening process.
The Japan Times supports stray and abandoned animals by editing and printing this photo box every Saturday in the Weekend/People section of the paper.
See also: Other potential pets who have been featured on the Angels with Fur site
Yuu’s story before he came to ARK eight months ago was not, to put it mildly, a pleasant one. Rescued from nothing less than a living hell at a breeder in Tokyo’s Itabashi, Yuu spent the first eight months of his life shut tightly in a wire cage. He was given food and water on occasion, not every day, and was surrounded by hunger-crazed dogs kept in conditions truly too horrid to describe here. Many of the dogs starved to death. Despite media attention and the local authorities’ awareness of the situation, it took eight years to remove the animals, so ineffective are Japan’s animal welfare laws. Yuu, now 18 months old, was among the few animals finally rescued, but the experience left its marks. His legs, deformed from the cage, were operated on successfully and he is able to walk. Incredibly timid, Yuu is nonetheless a gentle and fun-loving dog, but he is often terrified to go for walks. Ideally, a prospective owner would have a big garden where he could exercise and play. Yuu, the size of a very small German shepherd, is house-trained, patient and very quiet in the house. He needs someone to love and accept him as he is, someone who can help him quiet the demons of his past.
(Photo by Kyoko Harada)
Interested in Adopting Yuu?
Please email ARK at tokyoark[at]arkbark.net or call 080-6146-3889 (English) or 080-6517-8913 (Japanese). Tokyo ARK is a nonprofit organization founded by Brit Elizabeth Oliver. It is dedicated to rescuing and rehoming abandoned animals. All animals are vaccinated, neutered, and microchipped. Prospective new owners undergo a screening process.
The Japan Times supports stray and abandoned animals by editing and printing this photo box every Saturday in the Weekend/People section of the paper.
See also: Other potential pets who have been featured on the Angels with Fur site
The Japan Times and Tokyo ARK have given Angels with Fur kind permission to reprint notices regarding pet adoptions (see: potential pets who have been featured on the Angels with Fur site). In addition to requests for adoption, they also publish success stories about pets who find new homes. Here is the latest success story.
Former ARK resident Haru, a wire-haired dachshund, was first featured in the Japan Times on December 29. He used to suffer from separation anxiety while at the shelter, but his anxious days are over now that he has found a boisterous and busy family — the Srirams in Tokyo. Above, Haru gets a double embrace by Gita Sriram and daughter Khushi, 7. Family helper Tutik looks on, while the youngest Sriram, 3-year-old Karishma, sizes up the photographer. It is Karishma who insists on bringing the wonderfully patient Haru to bed with her every night. “It’s hilarious to see their two heads on a pillow, sleeping nose to nose,” says Gita. Khushi “loves to carry him around like a baby and he doesn’t seem to mind.” Every day, Haru walks to Karishma’s school, where he receives lots of hugs and kisses from her classmates. The message from Gita: “Thank you so much for bringing him into our lives. He has been a fabulous addition to our family.” From ARK and the Japan Times with deepest gratitude: Thank you!
(Photo by Kyoko Harada)
Interested in Adopting a Pet?
Please email ARK at tokyoark[at]arkbark.net or call 080-6146-3889 (English) or 080-6517-8913 (Japanese). Tokyo ARK is a nonprofit organization founded by Brit Elizabeth Oliver. It is dedicated to rescuing and rehoming abandoned animals. All animals are vaccinated, neutered, and microchipped. Prospective new owners undergo a screening process.
The Japan Times supports stray and abandoned animals by editing and printing this photo box every Saturday in the Weekend/People section of the paper.
See also: Other potential pets who have been featured on the Angels with Fur site
Boo us another of the ARK old-timers. He is 13 and has been at ARK for a very long time. There is a sadness about him. Naturally, he is cared for at the shelter but there is no joy in his life. For Boo, the greatest joy, even more than food or walks, is having his own person — something the shelter cannot give him. Boo’s original owner was a homeless person who had to give Boo and his siblings up. All but Boo found a home. A strong, healthy dog, Boo doesn’t pull on the leash and would be a perfect companion to an older person who loves to stroll but needs a gentle, older dog. Boo is fluffy like a teddy bear and needs his fur cut regularly, but he has an excellent reputation with the trimmers and is quite a handsome fellow. No innocent to life’s hardships, all Boo yearns for is one true friend to call his own.
(Photo by Kentaro Washi)
Interested in Adopting Boo?
Please email ARK at tokyoark[at]arkbark.net or call 080-6146-3889 (English) or 080-6517-8913 (Japanese). Tokyo ARK is a nonprofit organization founded by Brit Elizabeth Oliver. It is dedicated to rescuing and rehoming abandoned animals. All animals are vaccinated, neutered, and microchipped. Prospective new owners undergo a screening process.
The Japan Times supports stray and abandoned animals by editing and printing this photo box every Saturday in the Weekend/People section of the paper.
See also: Other potential pets who have been featured on the Angels with Fur site
Lime is a 9-year-old purebred wire-haired dachshund. Currently in a foster home in Tokyo, she is the mother of Haru featured earlier this year and now in a new home. When Lime first arrived at ARK, she had the habit of biting her back foot. She and her puppies had been kept in pens without walks and, though friendly, were suffering from a great deal of stress. Lime is a tiny dog. She doesn’t bark and is good with other dogs, but she does get tired and needs a space to simply go and rest sometimes. She still bites her foot occasionally when she gets tired or stressed but she never bites people or other dogs. The ARK staff members are hoping for a quiet home for Lime, one where this tired mother can just relax.
Interested in Adopting Lime
Please email ARK at tokyoark[at]arkbark.net or call 080-6146-3889 (English) or 080-6517-8913 (Japanese). Tokyo ARK is a nonprofit organization founded by Brit Elizabeth Oliver (read a Japan Times profile of Elizabeth). It is dedicated to rescuing and rehoming abandoned animals. All animals are vaccinated, neutered, and microchipped. Prospective new owners undergo a screening process.
The Japan Times supports stray and abandoned animals by editing and printing this photo box every Saturday in the Weekend/People section of the paper. (Photo by Kyoko Harada)
See also: Other potential pets who have been featured on the Angels with Fur site
There is a new movie out in Japan called 「犬と私の１０の約束」 (roughly translated as Ten Promises Between Me and My Dog). The movie is based on the Ten Commandments of Dog Ownership, which are as follows.
1. My life is likely to last 10-15 years. Regular separation from you will be painful and can even cause depression. Think before you buy me.
2. Give me time to understand what you want from me don’t be impatient, short-tempered or irritable.
3. Place your trust in me and I will always trust you back, respect is earned not given as some sort of inalienable right.
4. Don’t be angry with me for long, and don’t lock me up as punishment. I am not capable of understanding why I am being locked up. I only know I have been rejected. You have your work, entertainment and friends. I only have you.
5. Talk to me sometimes. Even if I don’t understand your words, I do understand your tone. “You only have to look at my tail” to know that.
6. Be aware that however you treat me, I will never forget, if that treatment is unjust or bad, it may spoil the special bond between us.
7. Please do not hit me. I cannot hit back, but I can bite and scratch and I don’t ever want to feel the need to do that.
8. Before you tell me off me for being uncooperative, obstinate, or lazy, ask yourself if something might be wrong with me. Perhaps I’m not getting the right food or I’ve been out in the sun too long, maybe my heart is getting old and weak, or maybe I’m just dog-tired.
9. Take care of me when I get old. You too will grow old and will also want care, love, and affection.
10. Go with me on difficult journeys. Never say, “I can’t bear to watch” or “Let it happen in my absence”. Everything is easier for me if you are there. Remember, Irrespective of what you do I will always love you.
The movie, in 40 words or less: Fourteen-year-old Akari, who lives in Hokkaido, gets a dog and names him Socks. Akari’s mother tells her about the ten commandments of owning a dog. Akari and Socks grow up together.
Very interesting feature on the “Beyond Tomorrow” show on Discovery Channel. Lots more information, but the basics are these…
A woman had a what appeared to be a normal mole on her leg. Her dog kept sniffing and then licking it with some urgency. She finally went to the doctor and it was found she had bladder cancer, for which she was treated.
In studies since then, dogs were trained to sniff out the urine samples donated by bladder cancer patients from among healthy urine samples. Their success rate was 42% — threefold compared to a simple guess rate of 14%.
After one dog repeatedly selected a sample that was thought to be healthy, it was found that its donor in fact had kidney cancer. The patient received surgery in time and survived.
One of the Aw/F members brought this to our attention recently:
Thanks to my new ipod, I recently discovered a program called Pet Life Radio. The programs are quite interesting and cover a wide variety of topics.
Anyway, tonight on the “vet” program there was a story about a company called Allerca making hypoallergenic cats. I personally, found the whole thing rather bizarre. The “top of the line” cat is not only hypoallergenic but is a mix of two exotic breeds. It only costs $28,000. He said many of the
cats, including the cheaper ones, are “sold out.” And dog lovers don’t worry. Apparently they are “making” hypoallergenic dogs for 2009.
New Year Dog Party, a festive treat for canines and canine-lovers, will be held at Tokyo Big Sight on Jan. 12 and 13.
The “party” consists of various events, including a fashion show of dogs and their owners like those held annually in New York since 2006 as “Pet Fashion Week NY.” This is the first time such an event will have been staged in Japan.
Yesterday, we posted an article about how a dog had kept a lost, elderly woman warm throughout the night. The link to the article on the Japan Today site included a number of readers’ comments which were, on the whole, dismaying, as many of them seemed to be more interested in trying to make cynical jokes (thus revealing their age, or rather, lack of it).
That’s really ironic, if you look at the etymology of “cynic.” (I’m an incurable etymologist!) Webster’s says: “a person who believes that only selfishness motivates human actions and who disbelieves in or minimizes selfless acts or disinterested points of view.”
The American Heritage dictionary adds: “A person whose outlook is scornfully and often habitually negative.” (In my observation this is a style that often starts in the teenage years (especially with boys) as an attempt at building individuality. Unfortunately some people never grow out of it.)
The word “cynic” derives from the name of a fourth-century B.C.E. sect of Greek philosophers, the Cynics. They believed, according to Webster’s, “that virtue is the only good, that the essence of virtue is self-control, and that surrender to any external influence is beneath human dignity.” This sounds fairly reasonable (though the third principle sounds like it could verge on raw egotism; more about that later).
So how did “cynical” get its present meaning of “faultfinder”? That’s even more ironic, if a little obscure. The dictionary says that the Greek word kunikos, from which cynic comes, was originally an adjective meaning “doglike,” from kun, “dog.”
What’s the connection with dogs?? Apparently a well-known member was so disdainful of deferring to others’ views on personal behavior that he won a reputation of “acting like a dog” — and the nickname of “Dog” — by doing such things as barking in public, urinating on a table leg, and so on! (At least with real dogs that’s natural and has no ulterior meaning…)
The connotation of “faultfinder”, then, apparently came from the behavior of Cynics, who — naturally believing their _own_ actions virtuous — never hesitated to point out what they considered the faults of others.
So it’s ironic that these self-styled _cynics_ disdain this article about a virtuous _dog_ saving an old woman.
Another aspect of the dog’s role in this style of expression is found in the word “sarcasm”. It also derives from the Greek. (There used to be a saying, “The Greeks had a word for it,” and it seems they really did create a remarkable vocabulary that has persisted for millennia. How different the world would be now, if they’d had TV, iPods, and video games…)
“Sarcasm” is defined as “a cutting, often ironic remark intended to wound or make its victim the butt of contempt or ridicule.” (Note that many Japanese speakers — and others — use “cynical” when they really mean “ironic”. “Cynical” focuses on considering all [others'] actions to be selfishly motivated; “ironic” refers to incongruity between expected and actual; and “sarcastic” focuses on the desire to hurt others.)
In a dictionary I consulted many years ago, the root of “sarcasm” is the Greek “sarkazein”, which means “to tear the skin off in strips, like a dog.” So here we could say that by using sarcasm, the negative commenters on this article are themselves acting like dogs (the dark side of dogdom, that is).
One last note… Contributor “beelzebub” comments “that’s how Three Dog Night got their name.” I think he’s right (and possibly Australian; the two are not mutually exclusive [just kidding!]).
A couple of decades ago I went on a spree of reading books about “indigenous Australians” (formerly: “Aborigines”). Originally nomadic, these people kept dogs for hunting and as companions. Cold winter nights were described in terms of how many dogs you needed to have sleeping with you in order to keep warm; the highest number was three. (Evidently that night in Ibaraki was just a “one-dog night” — but cold enough, nonetheless.)
Researching this on the Internet, I found confirmation at the Wikipedia page devoted to the Los Angeles-based rock group Three Dog Night (maybe claiming to be “the coolest?). Their heyday was 1968-1975 but they are still touring, even this year. And from there, another link mentioned that Eskimos — or rather, Inuit peoples — also use this same index. All of which supports the idea of letting pets sleep on your bed.
And now it’s time to end this dogged pursuit of cynics and canines, and go feed Momo. Though only one cat, as “my futon ferret” she wriggles under the covers, doing her best to insulate against the winter chill.
Here is a heartwarming story, if ever there was one! A 73-year-old Japanese woman who went missing from her home in Ibaraki Prefecture made it through a freezing cold night with the help of a lost dog.
She is believed to have stayed outside overnight with the dog. “Her life was probably saved by the body heat of the dog,” a police officer said, pointing out that she was wearing only a thin sweater and a jacket. According to a local meteorological observatory, the lowest temperature Wednesday night around the area plunged into the sub-zero level. The male dog does not belong to the woman but seemed very attached to her, police said.
>>Read the rest of the article.
The dog, whose name is “Ushi” — which means “cow” in Japanese — has since been reunited with his owners. (See a picture of Ushi in this Japanese article.)
Many cities and towns in Japan have a policy of subsidizing the costs of having cats and dogs spayed or neutered. The city often sets aside a certain amount of money for this sort of subsidization per year and then when the money runs out, they stop providing the subsidies. If your pet needs this kind of operation, be sure to contact your city government to find out if it offers something like this. Also, you might want to do it earlier in the fiscal year (in the months following April) rather than later so that you have a chance of benefiting from the subsidy.
Here is an example of one such program in Adachi-ku, Tokyo. (It is the latest post on the page, so it is currently right at the bottom. If you can’t find it, use the “search” function in your browser to find occurrences of “Adachi-ku”.)
I know that Tsukuba, Ibaraki also offers this kind of subsidy, but I recently read that the funding is running out for this year, so if you want to take advantage of this program, contact the City Hall soon!
Facebook is a social networking site where you can get in touch (and stay in touch — this being the key) with your friends. I have been amazed at how many long-lost friends I have found through Facebook. People from my elementary school whom I haven’t thought of in over 20 years — but remember fondly nonetheless — are getting in touch with me and letting me know how they turned out. It’s really fun.
Catbook is a Facebook application that lets you enter a profile for your pet and then let him or her make friends with other pets and humans. (Yes, there is also a Dogbook.)
This article explains the application and its history: Facebook with Whiskers
I showed Catbook to my own little feline friend but I confess that she has not shown any interest in the application just yet. Perhaps my explanation was somehow deficient.
I found this video about the funniest Japanese pets of 2004 when I was searching for something else. Japanese TV has all sorts of ranking shows, so I might be able to find other examples of this kind of thing if I dig around some more. It seems like this segment might be from a New Year’s special or something. (I tried to embed the video in this post, but it didn’t work, so please click on the above link to watch it.)
Here are the winners.
5. Tape Dog
4. Big Stick Dog
3. Sit-up Walrus
2. Dancing Cat
1. Floating Dog
Fuji TV (known in Japanese as “Fuji Terebi”) has a short segment every morning introducing “Today’s Doggie” (kyou no wanko). The segment starts at 7:54am on weekdays and only lasts about one minute. They usually show the dog at home with its owners and tell you something special about the pet. Sometimes the stories are so touching they bring tears to your eyes, while others are quite funny.
On the website for the show, you can see today’s doggie and go back to see pictures and an introduction of doggies from past months.
Have you heard about lolcats and the i can has cheezburger website? If you are looking for a way to waste a few minutes (or hours if you find that you like this kind of humour), hop on over to the site and browse a few days’ worth of pictures.
A “lolcat” is a picture of a cat with a caption on it saying what the cat is thinking or describing what is happening in the picture. (”LOL” is internet slang for “laughing out loud”.) The icanhascheezburger website is a place where you can share such pictures. You can read more about the genesis of this idea on their about page.
The cats use a special language in the pictures that has its own syntax. It might take a while for you to follow what is being said and find common patterns (e.g. ur = your, incorrect conjugation of verbs, etc.). If you like computer programming, you might find lolcode funny too.
(And if you like lolcats, you might want to try dogslol too!)
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