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April 29, 2024
 

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Chris Bamforth
For Chris Bamforth's latest contributions to The Japan Times, see below:
COMMUNITY
Aug 15, 2004
Serendipty with suds
Forget that Kanto has a GDP bigger than Italy's. What really fills me with a sense of civic pride is the knowledge that my Tokyo is home to the only museum in the world dedicated to laundry.
Features
Aug 15, 2004
Serendipity with suds
Forget that Kanto has a GDP bigger than Italy's. What really fills me with a sense of civic pride is the knowledge that my Tokyo is home to the only museum in the world dedicated to laundry.
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel
Jul 30, 2004
The kids are all right at these spots
The heat is most definitely on. And with the mercury so high, so are the expectations among the wee ones that you haul them off somewhere that little bit different. Here are a few ideas for Tokyo places where you and they might find some respite during the dog days.
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel
Jul 23, 2004
Do the Dogashima
Less than an hour by shinkansen from Tokyo, touristy Atami is no one's idea of a quiet little getaway. From there down to the tip, Shimoda -- of Black Ship Festival fame -- this eastern side of the Izu Peninsula is the busy, developed one. This is where you go to check out such cultural hot spots as Atagawa's Banana and Crocodile Park, which, if you're talking fruit-and-reptile theme parks, is in a class of its own.
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel
Jun 25, 2004
The heartbeat of Aomori
Remoteness is not without its attractions, especially in crowded Japan. And on the main island of Honshu, you would be hard pressed to find a place of human habitation further from the baying crowds than Aomori Prefecture. Curled like a pincer around Honshu's northern tip, Aomori, the capital, is a characterless town, without a great deal to recommend it -- except the road out of it to Hirosaki. Some places you find yourself liking from the outset, and Hirosaki falls, for me, into that happy category.
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel
May 28, 2004
Ancient port of quiet delights
By the time footsore travelers on the old Tokaido Highway made it to Otsu, the town must have been no unwelcome sight. Many of them would just have trudged some 500 km from Edo (present-day Tokyo), and Otsu was the last of the 53 official way-stations strung out along the great thoroughfare. Just 10 km or so beyond the final hill on the road lay the journey's end of Kyoto.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / How-tos
Apr 30, 2004
When your kids are cooperating, but the weather isn't
Special to The Japan Times You're ready to spend some quality time with the kids. It's raining cats and dogs. Here are 10 places to drag the little ones to when the weather isn't cooperating:
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel
Apr 23, 2004
Overlooked -- and undervalued
If there is one major spot in Japan that visitors somehow tend not to make a beeline for, it is Nagoya.
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel
Mar 26, 2004
Town of grisly times past
As the unfortunate home to one-tenth of the world's active volcanoes, Japan lacks no variety in these ill-tempered peaks.
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel
Feb 27, 2004
Savor the spirit of ancient Japan
In a far-off age -- long before they were savoring the busy touristic delight of gadding around a dozen European cities in as many days -- the Japanese were a fairly untraveled lot.
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel
Jan 16, 2004
Lost Nambu citadel of the North
With Morioka, you know where you stand from the outset. As the title to the official English guide declares, Morioka is "the castle town of northern Japan."
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel
Dec 12, 2003
'Land of Fire' with history burning in its mokkosu heart
Few things puff up local pride like a local hero. Sendai dotes on its "One-Eyed Dragon," warrior Date Masamune. Kagoshima loves its plump 19th-century rebel Saigo Takamori. And Kumamoto adores its old daimyo lord Kato Kiyomasa.
LIFE / Travel / ON THE ARCHIPELA-GO
Oct 24, 2003
Where time flows slowly
Some places really do have the image thing sorted out. Mention of the name Kurashiki generally conjures up a warm picture of traditional Japan, a town where life trundles along at a gentler pace than elsewhere. What tends not to be conjured up is that Kurashiki is a city of 450,000 people living right next to the unlovely sprawl of one of the country's biggest petrochemical complexes.
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel
Sep 5, 2003
The little town with a big name
You've hauled your bags off the conveyor belt onto the cart, you've skulked through Customs and you're staring blankly at an electronic board, trying to fathom which Limousine Bus is going where. You've heard that there is another Narita apart from this one dedicated to air travel, but somehow you've never had time to see it.
LIFE / Travel / ON THE ARCHIPELA-GO
Aug 3, 2003
Where the crowds head to cool off
With the rainy season coming to a close, Japan starts to slide into its dog days. As thermometer and hygrometer levels nudge to swelteringly high levels, many Tokyoites feel the burning need to escape the busy, cramped shopping streets of the city and find relief and peace of mind . . . in the busy, cramped shopping streets of the country.
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel
Jun 22, 2003
To the sacred temple-city in the clouds
KOYA-SAN, Wakayama Pref. -- If there is one all-round good guy to emerge from the pages of Japanese history, someone for whom nobody seems to have a bad word, it is Kobo Daishi (A.D. 774-835). Buddhist saint, scholar, spiritual healer, calligrapher, poet, sculptor, engineer, supposed originator of the kana syllabary -- what this popular polymath didn't get up to wasn't worth bothering about.
Number of homeless in Japan hits record low
Homeless people sleep on the street in Tokyo's Shinjuku Ward in August 2021.
Raising kids in Japan as a single parent? It takes a village.
Making things work as a foreign, single mother in Japan isn't easy, but these tips and tricks can help you through the hardest parts.
JAL cancels international flight after captain gets drunk at Dallas hotel
A Japan Airlines' flight from Dallas to Tokyo was canceled last week after its captain got drunk at a local hotel.
In Japan, regional revitalization fails to halt population decline
Sakiyama elementary school in Tamba, Hyogo Prefecture, in March .Over the past decade, the government has directed efforts toward policies designed to give young people incentives to base themselves in rural areas.
Putin’s war will soon reach Russians’ tax bills
Russian President Vladimir Putin speaks during a meeting in St. Petersburg on Friday.
Japan wants you to spend more with ‘luxury tourism’
Performers play a traditional drum unique to Wajima, Ishikawa Prefecture, in the prefectural capital of Kanazawa on March 16 to mark the extension of the Hokuriku Shinkansen line to Tsuruga Station in Fukui Prefecture.
Theaster Gates’ ambitious ‘Afro-Mingei’ brings Black Chicago to Tokyo
Theaster Gates' “A Heavenly Chord” lines up church pews before seven speakers and a Hammond B3 organ, a type of electric organ prevalent in Black American churches.
Casa del Cibo: A thriving jewel born from Tohoku’s harsh past
When chef Ryohei Ikemi moved to Hachinohe, Aomori Prefecture, and opened Casa del Cibo in 2011, it was the first proper Italian restaurant in the city.
Town to block view of Mount Fuji in response to overtourism
The town government of Fujikawaguchiko, Yamanashi Prefecture, decided to set up a 2.5-meter-high screen to prevent tourists from taking pictures of Mount Fuji looming behind a convenience store.
Kyotographie's strong 12th edition shines light into the margins
Yassine Alaoui Ismaili, who goes by Yoriyas, turned to photography, shooting motion while in motion himself, after an injury forced him to give up his career as a professional breakdancer.

Podcast

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

Longform

When trying to trace your lineage in Japan, the "koseki" is the most important form of document you'll encounter.
Climbing the branches of a Japanese family tree
By Alex K.T. Martin

SUSTAINABLE JAPAN

Leading Japan’s sustainability from Tokyo
Leading Japan’s sustainability from Tokyo

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