Life in Japan has changed dramatically over the past 100 years. In the span of a few generations, millions of Japanese left the countryside and moved into urban and suburban sprawl. For city kids like mine, the connection to rural farm life is tenuous ...

A small community in Miyagi Prefecture is struggling to continue making one of its most-famous craft exports — Shiroishi handmade paper and paper clothes

The sweaty months of July through September in Tokyo can evoke a sense of climatic dread among visitors and residents alike, not to mention palpitation-inducing budgetary concerns. There’s a widespread misconception that summer in the metropolis either translates to woeful binge-watching of TV series ...

Classical Japanese poetry on playing cards — in English? It seems like an odd mix. But when you add tales of love and betrayal and brilliant translation, you get a heart-thumping card game like no other.“It’s a world’s first,” says Peter MacMillan, translator and ...

As Takaratomy's popular toy celebrates its 50th birthday, we examine how it has evolved over the past five decades to reflect the times.

Little information remains about the personal life of the artisan Kojiro Shimizu. His personality and interests, his passions and motivations — all are shrouded in mystery. What we know is that he worked in Kyoto in the late 19th and early 20th century and ...

“I love red wine, it’s my favorite thing!” These are perhaps not the words that a mother particularly likes to hear from her young daughter — especially when she is only 4 years old.But this was precisely what my daughter told me when we ...

Among the millions of items that were registered with Tokyo’s lost and found center last year was an urn containing someone’s ashes.And yet this should perhaps not surprise you — urns are handed in to lost and found centers more regularly than you might ...

A Tokyo-based startup is offering a range of services to help people keep track of their belongings.Mamorio Inc. has created a small electronic tag that can be inserted in a wallet or attached to a keyring and other personal items, and used to track ...

On the fourth anniversary of Uenoshita's demolition, we revisit how its last residents left it.

My two daughters rub the backs of their ears to retrieve some magic dust, which they then use to summon a pile of pizza and ice cream, before tucking into the newly created feast with arm-waving gusto.This sounds like the stuff of dreams for ...

On the afternoon of Jan. 26, 1948, a man claiming to be a public health official walked into a branch of Teikoku Ginko (Imperial Bank) in Tokyo’s Shiinamachi district and told all 16 people present that dysentery had broken out in the neighborhood.After handing ...