Before my Hiroshima correspondent, ironically enough, suffered an infelicity at the lens-end of a camera, I was acquainted with Maneki Neko, the white "beckoning cat" whose porcelain likeness is said to invite fortune to Japanese business establishments. The pet of a temple curate, goes the legend, saved the life of a nobleman in such a miraculous way that the lord bowed to the gods and granted, for the impoverished priest, a generous boon.
Belief in the significance of Maneki Neko pervades. It was indirectly confirmed to me that a walk through a commercial district will yield several sightings of a thickset, white feline cordially raising one or both paws. Left up, patrons are welcomed; right up, earnings and profit are embraced. When both front legs are up in the air, a request for protection is submitted. The snowman built up on a Tokyo street might have been a petition for less wintry weather, though possibly for more. This is superstition: either way the season turns, there sits Maneki Neko in the middle of timely happenstance.