Yoko Hani - The Japan Times

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Yoko Hani

For Yoko Hani's latest contributions to The Japan Times, see below:

Japan Times

LIFE / Lifestyle / WORDS TO LIVE BY

Oct 24, 2006

Kumiko Taguchi, 59, is deputy manager of Junkudo book shop in Ikebukuro in Tokyo, which boasts the largest floor space (nine-stories) of any bookstore in Japan. Before moving to Junkudo in 1997, she worked at another bookselling giant, Libro, located opposite Junkudo. After a long career in the industry that has earned her a reputation as a "charisma bookseller," Taguchi organizes lectures and spends a lot of time thinking about the importance of books. Recently, she published one of her own, titled "Shoten Hanjyo-ki (A Story of a Prosperous Book Shop)," a humorous depiction of booksellers' hectic lives.

Japan Times

LIFE / WEEK 3

Oct 15, 2006

Top trimmer styles two leaders in a row

Japan's new prime minister, Shinzo Abe, has declared he will continue his predecessor's reform policies. That's hardly a surprise, as Abe was Chief Cabinet Secretary under former leader Junichiro Koizumi, and before that was secretary general of the Liberal Democratic Party when Koizumi was its president.

Japan Times

LIFE / WEEK 3

Sep 17, 2006

Heartbreak heaven for staff

It's 9 o'clock on a Monday morning. A phone rings in an office and the boss picks it up. At the other end she hears the fragile voice of one of her staff telling her she broke up with her boyfriend the day before. "I would like to take a shitsuren kyuka," the staffer says. Unperturbed, the boss replies: "No problem. Take care of yourself." And with that the conversation ends.

Japan Times

COMMUNITY / Our Lives / CLOSE-UP

Oct 2, 2005

Harumi Kurihara: Homing in on success

As a cook and lifestyle guru, Harumi Kurihara has often been dubbed Japan's answer to America's Martha Stewart or Britain's Delia Smith. But in February this year, she scaled new heights when the English-language edition of her book "Harumi no Japanese Cooking" -- titled "Harumi's Japanese Cooking" -- was judged Best Cookbook of 2004 -- the highest honor bestowed at the 10th Gourmand World Cookbook Awards in Orebro, Sweden. In scooping what's known in the culinary world as the "Cookbook Oscar," Kurihara not only outshone 5,000 entries from 67 countries, but she also became the first Asian to be awarded the honor.

Features / WEEK 3

Aug 21, 2005

Hot ice tops massif menu

In Nagoya City, so I heard, there's a mountain that is really tough to conquer. But as Nagoya is on the lowland Nobi Plain straddling Aichi and Gifu prefectures, how could that be, this trained observer wondered?

Japan Times

Features

Aug 14, 2005

Author's 'sense of mission' shines on through the flames

At age 13, in total despair after losing her parents and two sisters, Toshiko Takagi tried to kill herself. But now, 60 years later, she stresses she never consciously tried to commit suicide.

Japan Times

Features

Jul 31, 2005

Fare to love -- or loathe

If you plan on visiting Expo 2005 Aichi, you may find you have to join long, long lines and brave the summer heat to get into the most popular pavillions. And should you go through Nagoya on your way back home, don't be surprised to see more long lines in the city center. But these long waits are nothing to do with the Expo, they're for the chance to sample some of Nagoya's most famous foodstuffs which are the focus of a great deal of civic pride.

Japan Times

Features

Jul 31, 2005

Speaking up for a 'right-size' city

In their search for the soul of Nagoya -- a city some dub "Japan's best kept secret" -- staff writers Setsuko Kamiya and Yoko Hani met up with five long-term foreign residents. All five happened to be American, and all have been in business there for between five and 10 years. Settling down for a chilled-out chat, these insiders with an outsider's perspective eagerly discussed their love of Nagoya, and in doing so offered a frank and fascinating insight into just what it is that's so special about Nagoya -- and what makes the city tick.

Japan Times

Features

Jul 31, 2005

'Secret' city basks in its low-profile limelight

It's at the geographic center of Japan and has in the past been at the hub of its history. It's also the nation's fourth-largest city, with a population of 2.2 million. But despite these, and many more, claims to fame and prominence, Nagoya City in Aichi Prefecture has always been outstanding for its low profile.

Japan Times

Features / WEEK 3

Jul 17, 2005

Dining where no solo woman dared

Reiko Yuyama believes that adventures are there to be had in daily life without having to go out into the wilderness. In that sense, she says she might be "more of an adventurer than Christopher Columbus or Naomi Uemura," the late, great Japanese explorer and climber who disappeared on Mount McKinley in Alaska in 1984.

Japan Times

CULTURE / Music

Jun 22, 2005

Teaching the world to sing in perfect harmony

When Kazufumi Miyazawa, vocalist of the Japanese rock band The Boom wrote the song titled "Shima-uta" about 15 years ago, no one imagined the path it would take, starting as a huge domestic hit and then gaining a life of its own abroad.

Japan Times

CULTURE / Music

Jun 22, 2005

Shima-uta singer takes listeners on sonic journey

Yasukatsu Oshima, a native of the Yaeyama Islands, southwest of Okinawa's main island, is a stubborn man. Since emerging as a solo artist in the early 1990s, he has recorded and performed only songs known as shima-uta (island folk songs). However, Oshima is not a tradition-bound purist. His latest album, titled "Island Journey," which was released in April, showcases not only his talents as an inheritor of the centuries-old shima-uta tradition, but also as a creator of contemporary shima-uta.

Japan Times

Features

Jun 12, 2005

When sumo elder Futagoyama, the father of former grand champions Takanohana and Wakanohana, died of cancer two weeks ago, many sumo fans were deeply saddened at the loss of the charismatic, 55-year-old former ozeki. Many people prominent in varied walks of life expressed their sadness, as did members of the shotengai (mom and pop retailers' street) in Nakano Ward in Tokyo, where the Futagoyama family has its sumo stable.

Japan Times

LIFE / Lifestyle

May 22, 2005

Seeds of employment

There, in the heart of the concrete jungle that is Tokyo's Otemachi financial district, in the second-floor basement abyss of a 27-story building, is nothing less than . . . a farm.

Japan Times

Features

May 22, 2005

Retirees lead the way back to nature

Yoshishige Nagayama started farming when he retired nine years ago at age 60.

Japan Times

Features

May 1, 2005

Heading for the stars on high

KONA, Hawaii -- The big white 4WD driven by Yasuhiro Nishida left the hotel in Kohala Coast at 2:50 p.m. with 13 people on board. It was another windy afternoon on the west coast of the island of Hawaii -- "the Big Island," as this, the largest and youngest in the Hawaiian chain, is known.

Japan Times

Features / WEEK 3

Mar 20, 2005

Can machines can care

Whether selling Scarab beetles for kids or punctuating the path up Mount Fuji, vending machines are one of Japan's most idiosyncratic features. Although some question the "waste" of energy involved in the ubiquitous mechanized retail outlets -- about 2.6 million alone are hawking beverages -- their onward march and multiplication seems to know no bounds.

Japan Times

Features

Mar 6, 2005

Issey Ogata: Comic chameleon

Issey Ogata is nothing if not versatile. Alone on an empty stage, he has audiences in fits as he performs his seriously funny one-man shows portraying characters as diverse as a classic sarariman (office worker) and a folk-song diva -- one after another.

Features / WEEK 3

Feb 20, 2005

Operation Evacuation

Not only are they a biodiversity disaster, but the millions of sugi (cedars) planted as official policy in the postwar years to yield cheap timber -- but which are now more expensive to harvest than the cost of imports -- have become a serious health hazard across Japan.

Japan Times

Features

Jan 30, 2005

Counselor counters the blues through chanson and jazz

Junko Umihara turned up a bit late for our interview at a cafe in Tokyo's Hiroo district one afternoon recently. She had been with a patient at her Umihara Mental Clinic in nearby Minato Ward, she said, "and counseling took a bit longer than scheduled."

From easily navigable train stations to the helpfulness of its municipal staff, Tokyo has earned high praise for its commitment to accessibility for disabled travelers.

[Rebroadcast] Japan is doing better on accessibility than you may think

Later this month, author Shogo Imamura will open Honmaru, a bookstore that allows other businesses to rent its shelves. It's part of a wave of ideas Japanese booksellers are trying to compete with online spaces.

The story isn't over for Japan's bookstores

By Alex K.T. Martin

SUSTAINABLE JAPAN

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