Left Paw or Right? White or Golden? Decode the Lucky Waving Cat
Where the waving cat was born: While many may associate those famous "waving cats" with Chinese businesses, their origins lie in Tokyo's Gotokuji Temple. Photo: CNN
Walking on the streets of China, you won't miss this beckoning cat with one of its paws raised residing in literally every business establishment you can find. Sometimes they appear in different colors or holding different objects carving with different characters. What are they doing there?
It's called maneki-neko and it goes by many names such as the waving cat, the lucky cat, the beckoning cat. Despite its popularity in China, the origin actually resides in Japan.
The maneki-neko's origins
Nestled in the quiet neighborhood, you'll find the temple is swarming with the smiling ceramic kittens when you travel here.
According to local lore, when the temple was a mere hut in the 1400s, the monk who overlooked it struggled to live on his meager income. Despite this, he had a cat he loved so much he even shared his meals with it. One day he asked the cat to bring good fortune.
A short time later several samurai arrived during a rainstorm, explaining the cat waved them in from the road. The monk served them tea and shared his teachings. The samurais were so delighted and one announced himself as Naotaka Li, lord of Hikone, Koshu prefecture.
Having his eyes opened by the monk's words, and considering it the will of Buddha, the lord donated rice fields and croplands to the temple, making it the grand shrine it is today.
Years later, when the cat passed away it was enshrined as a god called Shobyo Kannon, the Goddess of Mercy, and a monument was established on the grounds for the animal.
Today visitors to Gotokuji leave the tailed talismans as a gesture of gratitude for wishes that have been fulfilled. The uniform maneki-nekos arrange to form a veritable kitty army, numbering into the thousands. Even more are available to purchase at the temple, ranging in sizes from just 3 centimeters to a foot tall to leave as an offering or take home as a good luck souvenir.
A veritable meow mix
While the feline figurines at Gotokuji Temple are uniformly white, different colors denote different meanings. The meanings can vary from region to region within Japan, and some meanings have changed over time, but here is a general summary:
Tri-color Cat: modeled after the Japanese bob-tail breed, this is a popular & traditional color for lucky cats, beckoning general good luck, wealth, prosperity
White Cat: purity, happiness
Black Cat: safety, wards off evil and stalkers
Golden Cat: wealth and prosperity
Red Cat: protection from evil & illness (especially illness in children)
Pink Cat (a more modern color): love, relationships and romance
Green Cat (also a modern color): educations/studies
Right Paw raised: invites money and good fortune (usually to businesses)
Left Paw raised: invites customers or people
Some suggest the right & left paws both invite business-related prosperity, but that the left paw is for businesses of the night, such as bars, geisha houses & restaurants. Use of lucky cats in homes is more recent
Both Paws raised: invites protection of home or business
Coin: wealth and material abundance
Bib and Bell: may relate to protection, as well as wealth and material abundance (showing respect and veneration for the cat, caring for the cat and keeping it warm, displaying wealth, gold bell as a symbol of treasure -either material or non-material)
While the Beckoning Cat originates in Japan, it has also become a popular good luck figure in Chinese businesses. Among these businesses, gold beckoning cats seem to be particularly popular (gold being associated with the desired wealth and prosperity of the business).
Chinese also add their own auspicious writings, although Japanese kanji is based on Chinese writing, and the meaning of the writing on Japanese lucky cat coins is similar.
Photo: luckymanekineko.wordpress.com
The picture above, on the cat’s right paw is a typical Chinese phrase of hope for good fortune (something like “the source of money spreads widely”). The middle is billion in simplified Chinese and the character on the right (under the left paw) means “open fate/destiny”.