Thrift Store Find: Cute or Creepy Vase?

I love going to the thrift store as you never know what you are going to find.  

On a recent trip, I spotted the above vase.   As first I thought it was cute, with innocent little toddlers, one drinking out of what looks like an old milk bottle while the other two are feeding a cat in a grassy patch with a village, then a city in the background and thought it was kind of cute.

I then thought, why are they naked?  Maybe a hot day in a poor country?  If so, then why is the one feeding the cat wearing what looks like a sock cap on a hot day? I picked it up and looked at the bottom to see if I could find any additional information.  All it indicated was "Made In Japan" and the number 49 (pic below),

I flipped it back over and got a more creepy, sinister impression, that it was a Hell with the brown being flames and it is the underworld world below the narrow part with the city above.  The former toddler drinking out a bottle now a horn-tooting harbinger of doom and the other toddler and cat ar attacking the boy in the sock cap.  The darker green became dark spirits circling in to capture the soul of the boy.

I put it back immediately on the shelf and once again it seemed cute again.  Perhaps it is the genius of the artist to see both, or myself having had watched too many horror movies and consumed too much caffeine that day.  

What is your impression of the vase?  

Made in Japan