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November 08, 2025
 

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History
Hisako Aihara looks at a photo of central Sendai taken by the U.S. military before the July 1945 air raid on the city, at Sendai's War Reconstruction Memorial Hall.
JAPAN / History / Regional Voices: Tohoku
How a family in Sendai narrowly escaped a U.S. air raid in 1945
While the city was reduced to ashes, Hisako Aihara and her family managed to evacuate in time thanks to a tipoff from a worker at a military facility.
JAPAN / History
Japan-supported Grand Egyptian Museum fully opens
The GEM is a major national project whose concept began about 30 years ago, and Japan has played a significant role in its development.
JAPAN / History / Japan Times Gone By
Japan Times 1950: Negotiations under way to bring TV to Japan
In November 1950, British and French officials were offering their broadcasting technology to help Japan launch its first television channel, pending a permit from the government.
Mamoru Iwai, stationmaster of Keisei Ueno Station, says that, other than earthquake-proofing, the former Hakubutsukan-Dobutsuen (Museum-Zoo) Station has remained untouched.
JAPAN / History / Longform
Oct 27, 2025
Inside Tokyo's 'phantom' stations — and the stories they tell
By Alex K.T. Martin
A sealed 1930s subway platform beneath Shimbashi Station still holds traces of what the capital looked like before the war.
A print by Utagawa Kuniyasu (1794-1832) depicts a bustling scene at a fish market in Nihonbashi.
JAPAN / History / The Living Past
Oct 18, 2025
Of sound and silence in old Japan
By Michael Hoffman
While haiku poets like Basho extolled the virtues of tranquility, premodern Japan was likely a noisier affair than most people imagine.
Legal scholar Shigeto Hozumi conducted some 250 lecture sessions for Empress Nagako, posthumously known as Empress Kojun, between 1924 and 1950.
JAPAN / History
Oct 9, 2025
Late Empress Kojun received lectures on World War II from experts, records show
In a lecture in February 1942, after Japan went to war with the United States, one scholar explained to Empress Kojun speeches delivered to parliament by the then prime minister.
Empress Nagako, posthumously known as Empress Kojun, fixes the hair of Emperor Hirohito, known posthumously as Emperor Showa, at the Nasu Imperial Villa in Tochigi Prefecture in August 1947.
JAPAN / History
Oct 9, 2025
Official records of late Empress Kojun's life include her experiences in World War II
The empress spent Aug. 15, 1945, when Emperor Showa declared Japan's surrender in World War II, inside a bunker facility that had served as her home, the records state.
Hideki Shirakawa, a professor emeritus at the University of Tsukuba, became the second Japanese person to receive the Nobel Prize in chemistry in October 2000.
JAPAN / History / Japan Times Gone By
Oct 1, 2025
Japan Times 2000: Japanese professor wins Nobel Prize in chemistry
Hideki Shirakawa received the Nobel Prize in October 2000 along with two American scientists for their revolutionary work on conductive polymers.
Hisao Ito, a former resident of Tinian in the Mariana Islands, points to himself in a family photo taken when he was a child.
JAPAN / History
Sep 24, 2025
World War II survivor bears witness to family tragedy in Tinian mass suicide
Eighty-one years after the mass suicide, the memory of his father killing two of his sisters remains lodged in the survivor's mind, yet he holds no grudge against his father.
In the “Kojiki,” the origins of the Japanese archipelago are attributed to the coupling of Izanagi and Izanami, two kami from the Plain of High Heaven.
JAPAN / History / The Living Past
Sep 20, 2025
Humanity's tales of creation, cataclysm and kami
By Michael Hoffman
Cultures the world over have invented their own distinctive creation myths since antiquity. In Japan, the “Kojiki” offers insight into premodern perspectives on the nation.

The Toyota buyout is a major test for Japan’s reforms
Akio Toyoda, chairman of Toyota Motor, speaks during a media preview at the Japan Mobility Show in Tokyo on Oct. 29. Minority investors are challenging the carmaker's bid to take affiliate Toyota Industries Corp. private.
From France to Mali, a deportee's struggle far from home
Moussa Sacko, a Malian deported from France — where he had lived since he was a young child — stands on a street in Bamako, Mali, in December. Compared with his home in France, Bamako feels like a different planet, Sacko said.
New satellite images suggest 'mass graves' in Sudan's El-Fasher
A general view of a berm construction in Kinin Village near El-Fasher.
High-speed rail is expensive and difficult, but seen as a key to growth
Achal Khare, former managing director at India’s National High Speed Rail Corporation, gives a presentation during the IHRA Forum 2025 in Tokyo on Oct. 23.
SoftBank is said to have explored potential takeover of Marvell
SoftBank explored a potential takeover of U.S. chipmaker Marvell Technology earlier this year, in what would have been the semiconductor industry's largest-ever deal.
These are the hottest lower-division rikishi to watch right now
Fukazaki (right) grapples with Enho at the IG Arena in Nagoya on July 13.
Across borders and screens, Tokyo film festival finds humanity in migration
“Mother Bhumi” takes place in a multiethnic rice-farming community where Chinese, Thai and Malay lineages intertwine.
Takaichi’s balancing act: Supporting Taiwan and stabilizing China ties
Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi shakes hands with Lin Hsin-i, Taiwan’s presidential adviser, on the sidelines of an Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit meeting in Gyeongju, South Korea, on Saturday in this image posted to Takaichi's official X account.
From 1973 to 2025: A Japanese American skater’s long ride to recognition
Judi Oyama at Winchester Skatepark in San Jose, California, in January 1979. The Skateboarding Hall of Fame inductee and Guinness World Record holder still skates and hopes to inspire older women.
More Japanese universities pushing toward teaching in English
Waseda University in Tokyo

Podcast

One of the many entrances to the Kabukicho neighborhood in Tokyo’s Shinjuku Ward.
Kabukicho: Tokyo’s ‘stadium of desire’

Longform

Once smoky, male-dominated spaces, today's net cafes, like Kaikatsu Club, are working to make their operations more attractive to women customers.
The second life of Japan's net cafes
By Alex K.T. Martin

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