Dozens of new laws and amendments take effect in Japan every year, but only a few open up new worlds for people.
One such exception was a law that took partial effect in 2002 requiring government facilities and public transportation to accept vision-impaired people with guide dogs, motion-impaired people with service dogs and hearing-impaired people with hearing-assistance dogs.
Since Oct. 1, the law makes it mandatory for public places such as hotels and supermarkets to allow people accompanied by such helper dogs to use their facilities.