Meet Nitama, the new cat stationmaster at Japan’s Kishi station

                   Nitama the feline stationmaster     (C)ToruYamanaka/GettyImages

Hard work indeed pays off. Nitama was said to have started as a receptionist cat before being promoted to a stationmaster cat. The calico cat is the successor to Tama, the famous feline stationmaster who saved the Wakayama Electric Railway from financial ruin. Tama served as stationmaster for about eight years before she died in June at the age of 16. You can read the story here. Following the feline stationmaster’s death, a traditional 50-day mourning period was observed before a successor was named.

                    Nitama being sworn into office                    (C)CNN/Twitter

 The railway’s president, Mitsunobu Kojima announced the new appointment and said in a statement that Nitama, who like her predecessor is also a calico cat, had clinched the new role after successfully graduating from the “Training school for Cat Stationmaster”, The Huffington Post reports.
He added that the main requirements for the role are the ability to “feel comfortable with people at the workplace” and a willingness to wear a hat.
“The reason I appointed Nitama as a successor to Tama is that she had teaching experiences from Tama directly,” said Kojima. “Tama was very mild and she seldom got angry, though she was strict with her subordinate Nitama.”

                                                                                   (C)Twitter

Nitama is only 5 years old, but she's already had quite the career.
The railway's president said that he expects similarly great things from Tama's successor.