It's one of those fleeting parenting moments when my normally nonstop high-volume children are awake, but silent. The reason for this? They are studiously poring over a table covered with a neatly aligned assortment of wood cutouts — a cat, a witch, a star, a moon, a pumpkin — and, ...
It's a trick-or-treating tradition: Dump the night's candy haul onto the living room floor to pick out the gems, or do some horse trading with siblings or friends. The excitement — and sugar rush — may leave humans unaware that all that candy might just ...
At a cafe near the University of Tokyo, clerks with hearing impairment are communicating with customers through writing and sign language — and their work is being welcomed and appreciated by a steady stream of customers. "It serves nice food and is very comfortable," says ...
Oct. 1 marks the start of the annual Pink Ribbon campaign to raise awareness about breast cancer. Pretty in pink: Tokyo Skytree is illuminated in pink on Oct. 1 last year to mark the beginning of breast cancer awareness month. | COURTESY OF ESTEE ...
Ariel is a devoted labrador. Named after the title character in Disney's "The Little Mermaid," Ariel can’t get enough of her user, 37-year-old Kanako Suzuki. Ariel rolls on her back, begging to be petted, and when Suzuki joins her on the floor, the animal ...
Penniless and subsisting on only water for three weeks, Tokyo street-dweller Tokuchika Nishi thought he had come to the end of his life. "My money ran out and I thought it would be fine to just die a dog's death," says Nishi, 38, who had ...
As New York City's bar owners and mixologists strive for the perfect drinking experience, Shintaro Okamoto encourages them to consider an often-overlooked detail — the quality of the ice. Okamoto, 43, founded his namesake ice studio in 2003 while still in graduate school for fine ...
What's the best thing about exploring Japan with kids? For us, it may be the eating. With two kids born in Tokyo, I can say without doubt that one of our favorite things to do together is cook, eat and talk about Japanese food. ...
A scenic western Japan port city has gone to the dark side in a bid to attract visitors — offering them an array of black-colored foods and other items, the same color as the water of the local onsen hot-spring spa. After the ...
My 5-year-old daughter has something precious in her hands. It's perfectly square, with a bright orange body, a black lens, a neck strap, a distinct red dot logo — and it's making me nervous. The object in question is an instant camera by Leica, the ...
Where else but Japan could you buy a miniature version of Edvard Munch's "The Scream" figure crouching over a squat toilet, horror-struck? It's one of thousands of ingeniously designed trinkets you can buy for a pittance from toy machines across the nation. They're subversive, ...
After very successful runs in Rome and London, "The Japanese House: Architecture and Life after 1945," an exhibition of maquettes, photographs, plans and drawings, is now in the National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo. For providing an extensive look at varied and eclectic forms that ...
Ever since the release of Marie Kondo's 2011 bible on the Japanese art of decluttering, much of the developed world has been somewhat fixated on tidying up. Kondo's "The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up" has been so influential over the past six years or so ...
