東京的暖萌辦公室：喵星人陪你工作

When you live in a cramped city like Tokyo, owning a pet is a luxury many people cannot afford. Apartments usually come with strict no-pets policies, and the only way Tokyo dwellers have been able to get their pet-fix is by visiting cat cafes. Sure, it’s nice to sip on a delicious drink while petting a purring kitty, but you can’t stay there forever. What are you supposed to do during those other, horrible cat-less hours of the day?

居住在東京這樣擁擠的城市，擁有寵物對許多人來說成了消受不起的奢侈。東京的公寓通常嚴禁飼養寵物，居民們與寵物親密接觸的唯一方法就是去貓咪咖啡館。一邊喝着可口的飲料一邊愛撫咕嚕咕嚕的貓咪的確很美好，但你總不能永遠呆在那裏。在那些缺少貓咪陪伴的悲劇時間裏你該怎麼辦呢？

One company in Japan has come up with a solution. They’re bringing the soothing cat cafe experience to the office by filling their workplace with adorable cats.

日本的一家公司想出了辦法，他們將治癒系的貓咪咖啡館的體驗引入辦公室，使辦公空間充滿可愛的貓咪。

The cat-populated workplace is the brainchild of Ferray Corporation, an internet solutions business which mainly deals with webpage construction, application development, and other IT work. The company own nine loveable rescue cats that are allowed to roam the office on a daily basis, sleeping, causing adorable trouble as cats will, and just generally being cute little balls of stress-relief.

讓喵星人入駐辦公室是Ferray公司的創意，這是一家主要解決網頁製作、應用開發等信息技術問題的互聯網解決方案提供商。公司收養了九隻可愛的貓咪，它們可以每天在辦公室漫步、睡覺、跟普通貓咪一樣製造可愛的麻煩，總的來說，它們是可愛的減壓萌物。

Here’s all nine of the cats.

以下是九隻萌貓。

Of course, the cats can be little pranksters sometimes too. Apparently they accidentally switch off computers, chew on LAN cables, scratch the walls, tear up papers, and of course mess up code by walking across keyboards. When clients come over, the cats have a bad habit of exploring their bags by falling inside them, and sleeping right on top of meeting tables.

當然，這些貓咪有時也很頑皮，它們有時會不小心關掉電腦，啃咬網線，撓牆、撕紙，有時在鍵盤上走來走去將代碼弄亂。當有客戶來時，這些貓咪還有鑽進他們的揹包並翻找一番的壞習慣，還會明目張膽地在會議桌上睡覺。

Still, the employees have said that despite some minor annoyances, the cats have been an enormous net positive. Officecommunication has increased dramatically, since the cats are a topic that brings employees together, and also lower everyone’s stress. It’s basically just impossible to be upset when there’s a cat just hanging out nearby you, chewing on a toy or chasing a laser.

不過，公司員工表示，儘管有時會帶來一些小困擾，這些貓咪的作用還是非常積極的，辦公室中的交流大幅增加了，貓咪這個話題將員工凝聚在一起，減輕了大家的壓力。當貓咪在你身邊閒晃、咀嚼玩具或是追趕激光時，大家幾乎不會感到情緒低落。

And the company’s pro-pet policies don’t just end with the nine cats. Every day is Bring Your Pet to Work Day, as employees are encouraged to bring their own pets with them to the office. If they don’t have a pet of their own, then the company pays out a 5,000 yen (US$42) per month “cat bonus” to anyone who adopts a cat in need of a home.

而這家公司寵物爲上的政策可不止於此。每天都是“帶寵物上班日”，公司鼓勵員工將自己的寵物帶到公司。如果他們沒有自己的寵物，公司還會每月提供5000日元（42美元）“貓咪津貼”給那些收養貓咪的員工。

As crazy as it may sound, Ferray isn’t alone in its pet policies. Another company that specializes in pet supplies, Mars Japan Limited, also encourages its employees to bring their pets to work. Other companies offer benefits such as treating the death of employees’ pets the same as the death of a family member, giving them time off, condolence pay, and covering funeral services.

這聽起來相當瘋狂，但Ferray並不是唯一一家實行這種寵物政策的公司，有一家專門研究寵物用品的公司，火星日本有限公司也鼓勵員工帶寵物來上班。一些其他公司在員工的寵物死亡時，會給員工休假、發送慰問金並負擔殯葬服務費，跟家人去世的待遇如出一轍。

Vocabulary

cramped: 擁擠的，促狹的

afford: 承擔得起

dwellers: 居住者

brainchild: 智慧結晶，(屬於個人或集體的)創見

roam: 閒逛，漫遊

prankster: 搞惡作劇者，頑皮的人

scratch: 撓，抓

condolence pay: 慰問金

funeral service: 殯葬服務