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Thomas Dillon
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WHEN EAST MARRIES WEST
Jan 25, 2003
Joy for the standing man: Densha Don's seat secrets
In riding the iron ponies hither and thither across the urban plains of Japan, I'm one railroad cowboy who would just love to experience the singular pain of a real-life horsemen.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WHEN EAST MARRIES WEST
Jan 11, 2003
The 'risutora' blues: Music that won't go away
I have been "restored."
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WHEN EAST MARRIES WEST
Dec 28, 2002
Waiting for the ultimate exchange gift
Perhaps the first disappointment most kids experience while growing up is discovering the truth regarding Santa Claus. For me, it was the same.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WHEN EAST MARRIES WEST
Dec 14, 2002
Ducky tale of a high-flying family
To paraphrase F. Scott Fitzgerald, "The very rich are different from you and me."
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WHEN EAST MARRIES WEST
Nov 30, 2002
Japanese made funny by 'gaijin' gaffes
Some people collect rocks. Others stamps. Still others beer cans.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WHEN EAST MARRIES WEST
Nov 16, 2002
A whole lot of shaking going on in my mind
Earthquakes are not laughable affairs. The breadth of the destruction and depth of the human tragedy demand only a solemn response.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WHEN EAST MARRIES WEST
Oct 13, 2002
School festivals of fun in the name of sport
Autumn in Japan means much more than cooler temperatures and colorful leaves. It means . . . sports!
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WHEN EAST MARRIES WEST
Sep 1, 2002
How can we be No. 3?
In a revelation no less stunning than if Mount Everest was suddenly surpassed as the world's tallest mountain or the Nile outstretched as the world's longest river, a July news report announced that Tokyo is no longer the world's most expensive city.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WHEN EAST MARRIES WEST
Aug 18, 2002
What a pair they are
If you are a viewer of Japanese television, you have no doubt seen a pair of celebrities known as the Kano sisters. Single-handedly -- or perhaps double-handedly is more appropriate -- these two have lent new meaning to the term "boob tube."
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WHEN EAST MARRIES WEST
Aug 4, 2002
The world according to a certified oddball
Once you finally know them, most people are . . . nice. A rosy sentiment paraphrased from Atticus Finch in the fiction classic "To Kill a Mockingbird." Words I now twist to match my own barbed view of life in Japan.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WHEN EAST MARRIES WEST
Jul 21, 2002
Things you can't tell just by looking at her
I have a friend who is a man of only one conviction.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WHEN EAST MARRIES WEST
Jul 7, 2002
Are you calling me a diphthong?
I have a friend who became an English teacher mainly because of his fondness for phonetics.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WHEN EAST MARRIES WEST
Jun 23, 2002
Chew-well cuisine is the stuff of saucy dreams
Let's call him "Taro."
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WHEN EAST MARRIES WEST
Jun 9, 2002
The walls that connect us
"Good fences make good neighbors." Which means -- if we extrapolate this bit of Robert Frost wisdom a little further -- Japan should have some of the best neighbors in the world.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WHEN EAST MARRIES WEST
May 26, 2002
Waxing monstrously about the first Japanese I ever got to know
The first Japanese I fell in love with was a little taller than my wife.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WHEN EAST MARRIES WEST
May 12, 2002
Chewing the cud with cheap shots at soccer
Here's a confession for you -- a self-insight I discovered just the other night:
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WHEN EAST MARRIES WEST
Apr 21, 2002
Reality bytes across the Digital Divide
The latest fad in worldwide rifts is not East/West, North/South, Rich/Poor -- nor even Love Britney/Hate Britney. Rather it is the "Digital Divide" -- the gap between those who are prepared to live in our brave new world of information technology and those who are not.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WHEN EAST MARRIES WEST
Apr 7, 2002
Behold that golden glow
It's almost here . . . my favorite week.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WHEN EAST MARRIES WEST
Mar 24, 2002
Some gaijin pitfalls into which few have not plunged
I heard once that art is 2 percent creativity and the rest "derivativity."
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WHEN EAST MARRIES WEST
Mar 10, 2002
Hey, thank you for the delicious feast, baby
"If I should meet thee, After long years, How should I greet thee?"

Longform

Dul Saroth (left) and Soeum Samrach, deminers with the Cambodian Mine Action and Victim Assistance Authority, practice using the Advanced Landmine Imaging System in Cambodia’s Siem Reap province in August.
The Japanese tech that could one day make Southeast Asia landmine-free