President Barack Obama takes the most specific steps of his administration in an attempt to ensure the election of a Democratic-controlled Congress in two years.
It’s a dangerous, unpredictable world. Twice in January Chugoku no gunkan (中国の軍艦, Chinese warships) in the Higashi Shina Kai (東シナ海, East China Sea) challenged Japan’s Kaijo Jieitai (海上自衛隊, Maritime Self Defense Forces, MSDF) patrols in a manner deemed kyōiteki (脅威的, threatening). And on Feb. ...
Here's an open secret: Japanese men have a bad international reputation on the romance front.
SELLING WOMEN: Prostitution, Markets and the Household in Early Modern Japan, by Amy Stanley. University of California Press, 2012, 282 pp., $49.95 (hardcover) In the vast cultural landscape, Japan fascinates the mainstream with manga and anime, the martial arts, Zen and kimono. Of course, ...
Kenta Maeda shook off worries about his form with five shutout innings as Japan beat China 5-2 in first-round Pool A of the World Baseball Classic on Sunday at Fukuoka Dome. Japan improved to 2-0 following a tough win over Brazil in Saturday evening’s ...
It’s so small that it could easily be mistaken for a small pack of mints. In fact, if you actually have a packet of Frisk on you hang on to it, it’ll come in handy. Pocket Geiger, one of many gadgets on display at ...
Lake Kasumigaura in Ibaraki Prefecture is facing an environmental threat that has essentially turned it into a time bomb ticking away 60 km northeast of Tokyo. Experts warn that Japan’s second largest lake with a surface area of 220 sq. km is quietly but ...
A soon-to-be-demolished school building might sound too spooky to be a venue for an art show, but that’s precisely where Trans Arts Tokyo is being held. The 17 above-ground floors and two basement floors that used to belong to Tokyo Denki University in the ...
Many young artists experience a make-or-break moment in their careers. For 24-year-old noh actor Motoi Imai, his debut as the shite (lead) character in the production of “Tsunemasa” could be that moment. Imai is the grandson of Yasuo Imai, a revered noh actor who ...
“Never fight a war with Chinese people, because we would lose,” Yoshiko Tatsumi sternly warned, “with absolute certainty,” a 40-strong group of mostly middle-aged women gathered recently in her spacious three-story residence set in gardens in Kamakura, Kanagawa Prefecture. “What we eat today is ...
Though it’s hardly talked about in public, cosmetic surgery appears to be an increasingly popular option in Japan for people trying to enhance their looks and defy the signs of aging. According to statistics released last December by the International Society of Plastic Surgeons, ...
At the end of March 2011, a few weeks after the Great East Japan Earthquake, 20 rice farmers affiliated to J-Rap, an agricultural distribution company in Sukagawa, central Fukushima Prefecture, got together to assess the situation. With no one seeming to have much idea ...
Nanohana Seikyo — a Chiba Prefecture food distribution cooperative with about 11,500 members — made headlines last month when it took on the role of David by suing the corporate Goliath that is Tokyo Electric Power Co. for losses in sales incurred as a ...
Cool evening breezes are a sign that autumn is here. For five days beginning Friday, Sankeien, a Japanese garden in Yokohama is encouraging visitors to engage in a seasonal pastime: tsukimi (moon-viewing). The 175,000-sq. meter garden, created in the 1920s by Yokohama silk businessman ...
The CD player is switched on and a mellow male voice singing a pop tune fills the hot and humid school gymnasium, seeming to soften its ambience like a breath of fresh air. On stage, a woman in an oversize T-shirt and baggy pants ...
