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Minami Funakoshi
For Minami Funakoshi's latest contributions to The Japan Times, see below:
Japan Times
JAPAN
Sep 28, 2017
Minamata disease victims' voices dim with age but still cry for recognition
Shinobu Sakamoto was just 15 when she left home in the Kumamoto Prefecture fishing village of Minamata to go to Stockholm and tell the world of the horrors of mercury poisoning.
Japan Times
LIFE / Lifestyle
Sep 17, 2017
Dancing to the tune of humanity
Penniless and subsisting on only water for three weeks, Tokyo street-dweller Tokuchika Nishi thought he had come to the end of his life.
Japan Times
LIFE / Style & Design
Sep 3, 2017
Meet Lulu Hashimoto, she's quite the doll
Meet Lulu Hashimoto, Japan's first "living doll" fashion model.
Japan Times
JAPAN / Society
Mar 27, 2017
Vietnamese killed himself in immigration center, community leader says
A Vietnamese man held in a solitary cell at an immigration detention center in Japan committed suicide, a Vietnamese community leader said, raising fresh questions over conditions in the country's detention facilities.
Japan Times
JAPAN / Society
Mar 10, 2017
Six years on, Fukushima child evacuees face menace of school bullies
"Radiation! Bang bang!"
Japan Times
JAPAN / Society
Nov 24, 2016
Japan-born son, Thai mom split by heartbreak legal deal
On a morning in mid-September, Utinan Won hugged his mother and then watched as she passed through departures at Tokyo's Narita airport on her way to Bangkok.
Japan Times
JAPAN / Society
Nov 24, 2016
Japan leaves unapproved asylum seekers and kids born in-country with dire choices
Visa please fall on deaf ears as justice ministry insists on executing deportation orders.
Japan Times
JAPAN / Society
Nov 3, 2016
Solitary confinement in Tokyo not silencing Nigerian asylum activist, or her advocates
A prominent Nigerian asylum seeker and activist is being held in solitary confinement at a Tokyo detention center, a case that has highlighted a growing crackdown on foreign nationals living in Japan without visas, prompting demands for her release.
Japan Times
JAPAN / Society
Aug 9, 2016
Refugee reluctance clashes with labor realities as asylum seekers, banned from working, build Japan's roads
Mazlum Balibay paves Japan's roads, digs its sewers and lays its water pipes — all for a country that doesn't want him.
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Jul 21, 2016
Do-it-yourself pensions take hold in Japan as state payouts expected to dry up
When Saori Ito went on maternity leave last year and stopped getting a regular paycheck from her cosmetics company, she became worried about her future — and wondered if this kind of anxiety is what awaits her after retirement.
Japan Times
JAPAN / Society / FOCUS
Mar 9, 2016
Japan detention center deaths cast doubt on 'appropriate medical steps'
Niculas Fernando died at a Tokyo immigration detention center sometime between 9:33 a.m. and 10:44 a.m. on Nov. 22, 2014, according to the coroner.
Japan Times
JAPAN
Aug 28, 2014
Corporate blowback builds from Minamata treaty
The Japanese government lobbied hard for a global pact that limits mercury use and to name the resulting treaty after Minamata, the site of a homegrown industrial disaster from the 1950s when the toxic metal poured into a river, poisoning thousands.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Entertainment news
Aug 21, 2014
Pachinko parlors bet on tidiness to reverse decline
The once-booming pachinko industry, grappling with a graying customer base and the threat of new competition from casinos, is adopting a softer touch and smoke-free zones to lure a new generation of players, particularly women.
Japan Times
JAPAN
Aug 19, 2014
Kewpie adapts its menu to feed a graying nation
Back in 1960, Kewpie Corp. began selling canned baby food, sensing a chance to catch a wave of young families raising kids in an economy roaring back to growth after the devastation of World War II.
Japan Times
JAPAN / Society
Jul 1, 2014
Whaling town preserves tradition
The whaling season opened with a public carve-up and barbecue in the coastal town of Minamiboso, Chiba Prefecture, where workers last Thursday sliced a whale before a crowd of elementary school students and residents. Onlookers later received pieces of fried whale meat.

Longform

A statue of "Dragon Ball" character Goku stands outside the offices of Bandai Namco in Tokyo. The figure is now as recognizable as such characters as Mickey Mouse and Spider-Man.
Akira Toriyama's gift to the world