There are some questions a lot of us don't think to ask until we're either faced with the situation ourselves or our minds decide to keep us awake for a night.
And before the tale of one very unfortunate dolphin came to light, one of those questions was "what happens when an aquarium closes down?"
Although many of us might just assume that the animals get shipped off to different ones when all is said and done, one sad scenario shows that this isn't always the case.
According to Reuters, this didn't mean that the animals inside would just end up abandoned. Employees would continue to feed them.
However, Reuters also reported that Inubosaki's management would not return any calls from media representatives, advocacy groups, or even local officials.
"I get feelings of danger and doubt from the fact that they are so silent about this,” they told Reuters.
As one observer told Dolphin Project, "For two hours, Honey floated alone in a corner of her shallow, shadeless tank."
“One car was in the parking lot, and only one person was seen, likely a trainer."
This desolate reality has disturbed nearly all that have heard about it.
As Akiko Mitsunobu from Animal Rights Center told Reuters, "When we went to check on the facility, she was showing signs of stress, putting her head weakly in and out of the water."
She came to Inubosaki in 2005 via Taiji, a port town known for a controversial hunting practice where hundreds of dolphin are funneled into a cove, where some are put up for sale to marine parks and others are killed for meat.
But unfortunately for Honey, she wound up in the aquarium.
Forty-six penguins were also seen covered in dust while perching on a decaying structure. Also included are "hundreds" of fish and reptiles.
This only feeds into the criticism surrounding the facility.
A common question concerned how Honey and the other animals can be left to languish at Inubosaki when an organization called Crystal World and Prehistoric Journeys was able to rescue an already-dead shark named Rosie from an abandoned aquarium.
But Honey is a living, breathing dolphin, thus people have been prompted to ask — where is her rescue?
As the Dolphin Project reported, another company expressed interest in buying Inubosaki from its current owner, only to back out when they discovered that their offer of "a few hundred million yen" was comparable to the debts the park's management had racked up.
