Tanuki and Raccoon

A picture I've been meaning to draw for quite some time now. Many people confuse the tanuki (asian raccoon-dog) with regular raccoons. Wanting to cut down on some of this confusion AND illustrate a scene from my Houshi Buri story, I put these two side by side. The girl is a tanuki named Kita and the boy is a raccoon from a foreign country (we'll just say he's from Europe for now).<br />
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As for this pertaining to my Houshi Buri story, here goes: Along their travels, the group passes through a port in Nagasaki. Being one of the ports opened to foreign trade, foreign ships, traders, and goods of all shapes and sizes are all about. In all the excitement, Kita is separated from the group and runs into raccoon boy her own age. Upon first glance at one another they are puzzled by each other's appearance, each calling the other the strangest tanuki/raccoon that they have ever seen. The two become friends and play all over the harbor while a very worried Koburi (Kita's older brother) and the raccoon boy's father search high and low for them. This part of the story is to illustrate the wonder of differences between the two diverse cultures.