Dogs in Japan

In 2005 I remember passing by a dog store in Bell Mall here in Utsunomiya where the display dogs were wearing a tuxedo and a wedding dress. Now if that is not ridiculous, just wait to hear what I found out tonight.

I went to dinner with my roommate Yoichi and afterwards he turned on the evening news. They had a special on dog accessories. I will work my way up from the not so amazing to the 'you have to be kidding me' items.

1) The dog stores in Japan have clothing for there dogs to wear, which is not uncommon since America has started the same trend. They also have specialty food items for dogs that cost $20-30 for one dish of food. I might as well go buy a steak from the grocery store and let my dog eat it.

2) There are dog restaurants in Japan. People actually take their dogs into the restaurant, sit them in a chair next to them and the person orders food for both of them. So imagine a very nice and clean restaurant where half of the customers are dogs.

3) Birthday parties for dogs. There are also restaurants where you can invite other peoples dogs and the people sit there and let the dogs eat Birthday cakes and they sing happy birthday to the dog. If you ask me, it seems that dogs are starting to replace children.

4) The most amazing thing I saw tonight was contact lenses. That's right. Contact lenses for dogs. They go in to an optometrists and get there eyes examined, somehow, and the optometrists then puts contacts on the dogs and gives the owner replacements. Only in Japan and probably soon in the US.