Hubby and I love the local Japanese steak house, Kabuto. We go there once or twice a month.
The last time we were there, we noticed this weird little golden cat, with its fist pumping up and down. Neither of us knew what this was about. Hubby asks me, “Why does the manager have a cat on his desk that looks like, ‘Fight the power!’?” He then made the same gesture as the cat, leaned over to me and whispered, “Meow, motherf**ker!”
Once I was back in control of myself (I probably laughed for a full ten minutes – I couldn’t help it. Hubby doesn’t normally talk like that, and it just killed me), I asked the manager what the cat was about. He said something in Japanese that I didn’t understand. I thanked him and let it go.
But I couldn’t let it go. So I spent some time looking into this cat phenomenon. (Once I noticed the first one, they began to pop up everywhere. Well, not really everywhere, but I eat sushi a lot and they’re in every sushi place I go to.)
They’re called Maneki Neko (beckoning cat), and they seem to be very popular.
The gold color is to attract wealth; the fact that it’s the left paw beckoning is to attract customers. The reason it looks like a fist is that Japanese beckon with their palm showing, as opposed to Americans and most other westerners, who beckon palm-in.
They’re available in all kinds of colors and styles, and the colors mean different things (red keeps away evil spirits, for example).
Now I think I have to run out and buy one of these things. I’m fascinated.
Who knew you could learn so much by web-searching for ‘Japanese steak house cat’?
Plenipotentiary 
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Okay, this just killed me. Not only because it’s a samurai cat, not even for hubby’s comments (which had me CRACKING UP, by the way, as the thought and visual picture of those words coming out of his mouth was HYSTERICAL!!). No, the reason that it was so great was because only you, my dear beloved Cam, would not only become obsessed over a trinket, but google ‘Japanese steak house cat’, write a blog entry about it, and then fascinated enough that you would want to buy one for yourself. Thus fully illustrating the complete all-obsessing levels of the mind of Cam! (So where do you get one, anyway?)
Obsesive? Really? Me? Nah!
Yes, well, ummm… *cough*
You can buy the little buggers on eBay – the one in the pic above is probably about $15.00 or so.
It was our first ‘bobble-paw’ episode…I’m such a senti-mental fool.
I love my family. Y’all are so cute.
This is very hot information. I’ll share it on Twitter.
Im the same as her..i became fascinated by the cats as well, and like her i did extensive research on them…i clicked on the picture of a cat that looks like mine ( which i got for 8.00 by the way ). Mine came with a red piece of paper with Chinese/Japenese symbols on it…the piece of paper is sectioned off into tiny flags where you cut them out and attach them to the cats paw so that he beckons whatever the flag stands for….the problem is…IM NOT CHINESE and i have no clue what any of it means !…LOL If you find out anything id be glad to hear from you.
Oi . Sou português mas estou vivendo no Brasil há alguns anos e fiquei sabendo
do seu site por causa de um amigo que mora fora :
) . adorei seus posts e sempre que possível estarei
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