Worse than a monkey on the loose in Shibuya station is Catman on the loose with his bag of cats. Catman wanders the station’s underground aisles dropping kittens on various statues wherever he goes. He lingers long enough to watch the crowds descend in an orgy of cell-phone cameras and cries of ‘kawaii!’ (cute!). He watches with a gap-toothed grin as school-girls and office-ladies and silly-quiffed hosts alike giggle with pleasure. Then he picks the kittens up and drops them back in his bag. The crowds disperse. Catman becomes a blue mist, an invisible man, until he finds the next statue and strikes again.
Kitten on an owl at Ikebukuro East gate.
Catman and his bag of cats.
A cat in a bag.
The kitteh bows, the crowd goes wild!!
As to whether there was any cruelty being done to the cats- it’s hard to tell. The guy seemed good-natured. Putting cats on statues to delight passersby is a pretty harmless way to get your kicks, I think. He was watching the crowd from behind, clearly delighted they were delighted. Putting cats in a bag- I don’t think that’s any worse really than putting a dog in a bag. Probably it’s not ideal use of animals, but I’m not sure it would constitute abuse. Either way, who knows really.