You can get a milk snake to go with your iced coffee and cake at Tokyo Snake Center, a new animal cafe in the young fashion district of Harajuku, Tokyo, that opened in August 2015.

As you enter, you'll find a dozen colorful snakes in clear Perspex cases at the door. These are the "attendant" snakes and you get to choose one snake in a box to have as your table companion. The waiter then gives you a quick lesson in snake etiquette and cafe rules (available in Japanese and English), and leads you to your table.

We chose a beautiful milk snake with alternating bands of red, black and yellow. A nonvenomous variety of king snake, it proved an entertaining companion, feverishly digging under the plastic grass in its box like a plucky RAF officer trying to escape from Stalag 13.

The cafe interior is very swish with clinical white walls and gleaming metal surfaces, glossy fashion-mag posters of snakes and expensive-looking snakeskin bags and accessories. Even the pipes are clad in snakeskin-patterned wallpaper. It's more like a luxury-brand store than animal cafe.

See more photos and details at Animal Cafes.com.