In the late 1980s, a king penguin named Lala found himself far from home — not in the cold Antarctic, but on a fishing boat off Japan’s coast. A fisherman had found him tangled in a net, with an injured wing and beak.

The fisherman brought him aboard his boat, and when he returned, handed him over to a friend of his, Yukio Nishimoto, a construction manager who lived in Shibushi, Japan, with his wife and two kids. They were locally known as the Nishimoto family.

The family nursed Lala back to health. Despite recovery, the penguin never wanted to leave. His attachment led the Nishimotos to make him a permanent home. They built a special and powerful, air-conditioned room under their house — a nod to his cold-climate needs.

Once settled, Lala became more than a rescued animal. He turned into a local oddity — a penguin walking the town streets with a tiny penguin-shaped backpack. On many days, he waddled to the nearby fish market, bought fresh fish (like sardines or mackerel), after having been trained by the family to buy fish all by himself, and shuffled back home with his purchase.

Neighbors and market vendors knew him so well. “Sardines and mackerel are his favorites. He loves to eat them. He’s adorable.” says a lady, who would first stuff one fish into his mouth and put the other one in his backpack. On going back, some neighbors would cool him off with water from a hose, to help him deal with the heat.

Sadly, Lala passed away in 1996 when he was only 10 years old.

A vintage video from the 1990s captures some of these moments of Lala leaving home, walking down to the market, getting fish, and later wandering around the neighborhood. The footage helped spread his story far beyond his town.