Hounds and Goldfish

The incredibly suave goldfish vendor parks
his scooter-trailer on Luxiying exactly once
a moon. He likes to cross his legs and smoke
cigarettes and look really, really cool.

In Nanjing, leashes are unheard of, except for cats, oddly enough.

Dogs trot down the sidewalks without any owner in sight, cats dart in and out of bushes by the road side, and on a stroll down any side street you can buy yourself a turtle on a string, a goldfish from a man on a scooter, a rabbit in-a-cage-on-a-stick or a small kitten in a plastic bag (though I think that one was for free).

Earlier tonight, I saw a weasel or a ferret or something slinky like that dash into some bushes, and even as I write this, I can hear at least three cats fighting or mating or both.

The Magic Turtle Man and His Turtle. I met this wizard
one smoggy day in November while I was walking to work,
thinking about ways to quit my job without actually seeming like
I was quitting. The Magic Turtle Man made me realize that
I could quit anytime I wanted and sell turtles instead. 

The turtle crawled toward me and hissed as I approached. It seemed to me like a great, prehistoric reptilian predator was trapped inside that little soft-shelled turtle body. Just look at those eyes...

This is the Hound of Luxiying, named so because I've only seen it on my street, Luxiying Lu, but
where he lives or who his owners are still remains a mystery.
Some kind of shaggy-haired Italian Race Hound, he can be seen running down Luxiying
faster than any electric scooter known to man. I often see him bounding down the street from a distance
and think that there is some kind of prehistoric, siberian mega-fauna-alpha-predator
on the loose. But then I realize its just the Luxiying Hound, one of the friendliest dogs I've met. 

Have you ever seen a cat on a leash? This is the third or fourth cat
I know that is regularly kept on a leash in Nanjing. I'm not sure if this qualifies as
abuse or not, but it seems like a pretty normal practice
and I'm sure its owners wouldn't tie him up
if they didn't love him. A metaphor for all relationships, I suppose.
(I.E. "The Chain" by Fleetwood Mac.)

And of course, the numerous strays around Xuanwu lake, included here to
round off this visual menagerie.