Uchujin, aka Adrian Storey, a British photographer and filmmaker based in Tokyo, drolly explains his rather unusual business moniker: "I'd rather be an alien than an outsider."

Patrick Newell, 47, founder of Tokyo International School, calls himself a “learning activist,” a zealot on the frontlines of learning.

Katsura Sunshine wants to spread the world of rakugo (traditional comic storytelling) to people all over the world, including his home country Canada, by delivering English-translated versions. The 42-year-old Slovenian-Canadian, who was given the stage name from his master, Katsura Bunshi, after three years ...

Yoshiko Wada, textile artist and scholar, believes the word “sustainable” in foods and fashion shares the same philosophical taste. “Both are a holistic approach, about health, environment, and the community that supports it. We must recapture and rethink how we are going to sustain ...

Santa Claus, Moomin, contemporary design and saunas may be the things that come to mind when Japanese think of Finland. What may be less widely known is that the two countries have been strengthening cultural and educational ties in recent years. More and more ...

Rogier Uitenboogaart, who has been charmed by the world of washi (traditional Japanese paper) for the past three decades — especially its deep relationship with nature and people’s everyday lives — is trying to help preserve both nature and the traditional craft in this ...

For Jane Joritz-Nakagawa, her sociopolitical outlook colors all aspects of her life, as a writer, educator or activist. “Activism runs through what I read and what I write and what I’m teaching; It’s all one big thing, as the same mindset invades all those ...

Sitting at a wooden table in the glass-enclosed sun room of the miraculously preserved 95-year-old Yasuda House, Sumiko Enbutsu, a very youthful 78, radiates enthusiasm. The house, a superb example of Taisho Era architecture and construction techniques, is now owned by the Japan National ...

To serve as the United States ambassador to Japan is obviously not an easy task — not by any stretch of the imagination. That’s the position John Roos was assigned in August 2009 even though he didn’t have previous diplomatic experience or hold a ...

Alex Bennett was 18 years old when he first read the wisdom — “From one thing, know 10,000″ — in Miyamoto Musashi’s “The Book of Five Rings.” Now living this maxim, Bennett is a scholar, teacher, translator, writer, coach and active competitor in the ...