Big dogs with lots of hair and saliva

CHINA'S latest must-have luxury for the ultra-rich, to go with mansions and sports cars, is a large, slobbery dog with massive amounts of hair best known for herding sheep in Tibet. Once banned by the Communist Party as bourgeois, pet ownership is booming in China, and the Tibetan mastiff is the dog of the moment for those who want to spread their wealth beyond stocks and real estate. I used to invest in German shepherds, but Tibetan mastiffs are what's hot right now,'' said Sui Huizheng, a business owner who has about 20 of them and attended the sixth annual China Tibetan mastiff expo at the weekend. Hundreds of the dogs were on hand, and owners and handlers marched the most expensive ones on catwalks as though they were fashion models.