Our home is lying at the intersection of city and wilderness, but sometimes when I look out the window I feel like we must be living in the middle of the forest. Last week I twice saw a snake slithering its way down the road in front of the house, and one morning a monkey was crossing the same. Previously I have seen boars quite a few times from the house, as well as badgers and weasels. I had heard about monkey being seen in the neighborhood before, but this was the first time I came across one myself and it made me strangely happy to see from the window a real life monkey roaming around.
Then the other day when walking to catch the kindergarten bus in the morning, my son and I came across som fresh and very beautifully made five-toe-footprints in the rice paddy that we always look at on our way to the bus. At first I thought it might the monkey who had come down here to find something to eat, but with the toes evenly spread, I decided I had to consult Google to find out what animal had made these prints. So I uploaded a closeup of the paw-print to the Google AI, telling it I had seen this print in Japan, wondering what animal has made this. And the answer that came back made me laugh. The footprint in the image appears to be a Godzilla footprint,… Of course, it was Godzilla, probably baby Godzilla, one month old or so – I should have known!
But not quite trusting the answer I took it upon myself to research Godzilla and I found out that Godzilla seems to have only four toes, so I needed to continue my search. I uploaded another photo and asked again, and this time Google came back with a more plausible answer for this particular animal in this particular rice paddy – a raccoon. Now that I have seen a monkey, the raccoon is on top my list in want to see animals. So with little luck there might be a raccoon post in the future as well.