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LIFE / Food & Drink / DESSERT WATCH
Jun 10, 2014

A chocolate ice cream dessert you may never forget

Eating Avalanche (¥1,350) at the Marunouchi Ozao branch of Belgian patisserie Debailleul is like falling in love. You can't get the treat off your mind and the silly grin off your face. As bitter hot chocolate is poured onto it, the spherical chocolate shell melts and crumbles away like an avalanche,...
Japan Times
JAPAN / Science & Health / ADVANCES IN PROGRESS
Jun 9, 2014

Algae underfunded in energy hunt

Could algae power your car? In the search for new energy sources, scientists are turning the green goo into oil.
Japan Times
LIFE / Style & Design
Jun 9, 2014

Be-Japon recycles traditional culture to survive modernity

Perhaps it's a case of, "Be careful what you wish for."
Japan Times
BUSINESS / Companies
Jun 8, 2014

Sony urges vigorous FIFA probe of Qatar World Cup 'bribes'

Sony Corp. became the first World Cup sponsor to call for a thorough investigation into accusations bribes were paid to secure the 2022 tournament for Qatar, raising pressure on soccer chiefs who have threatened to move the event if the allegations are proved true.
Japan Times
JAPAN / Media / BIG IN JAPAN
Jun 7, 2014

Japan's salarymen are bored to tears

It seems odd to be talking about boredom in such interesting times. Are you bored? Almost certainly you are, if Spa! magazine's insights are reliable. Polling 2,052 mid-career (age 35-45), moderately prosperous (annual income ¥4 million-¥6 million) businessmen (sic, men only), it found no fewer than...
COMMENTARY / Japan / COUNTERPOINT
Jun 7, 2014

Abe touts immigration, but refugees get shunned

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe may be considering letting down the drawbridges for 200,000 immigrants a year in order to offset Japan's declining population and boost the economy. At this year's Davos World Economic Forum, Abe stated that Japan needs more foreigners, but accepting enough to make a difference...
EDITORIALS
Jun 7, 2014

Global obesity: a growing crisis

A new global study showing that one-third of the world is now overweight shows that a global health crisis is imminent unless urgent steps are taken. For what it's worth, Japanese adults are the least obese among the industrialized countries.
Japan Times
WORLD / Crime & Legal
Jun 7, 2014

U.S. federal judge strikes down Wisconsin ban on gay marriage

A federal judge deemed Wisconsin's ban on same-sex marriage unconstitutional on Friday to the delight of gay couples who immediately began rushing to county offices to wed as word of the ruling spread.
JAPAN
Jun 6, 2014

Couple consider split after tiff over 'Frozen'

A Japanese businessman draws support after his wife threatens to divorce him because he didn't fall head over heels for the movie 'Frozen.'
Japan Times
BUSINESS / Markets
Jun 6, 2014

Zombie firms pressured to act

The government is targeting stagnant companies that lack the will to grow and has drafted a plan to help institutional investors pressure them into pursuing growth more aggressively.
COMMENTARY / World
Jun 6, 2014

U.S.-Taliban deal raises six intertwined issues

What should have been a joyous American family reunion, a chance to welcome home an army sergeant held by the Taliban for five years and a photo-op for a beleaguered U.S. administration is instead morphing into multilayered debate about Barack Obama's common sense when it comes to foreign policy.
EDITORIALS
Jun 6, 2014

Public pension reforms

A new labor and welfare ministry report highlights the possible need to extend the period during which workers pay premiums into national pension plans so that the benefits paid out to retirees can help sustain retirees' livelihoods at the levels promised.
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Jun 5, 2014

Top retailers reach crossroads in labor shortage shakeout

Don Quijote and Uniqlo, two of the nation's best-known mass-market retailers, aren't waiting for the government's new growth policies due later this month before implementing their own labor reforms.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Jun 5, 2014

'Sad Tea'

Ensemble dramas about the ups and downs of love, and its various substitutes, are popular now — at least with indie filmmakers. (A contrast to Japan's commercial romantic dramas, which still focus on star-crossed couples, one of whom is usually dead by the closing credits.)
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Jun 5, 2014

'Balancing Act'

It's a sad, anxious world when a hard-working dad has no choice but to sleep in his car and eat at a soup kitchen. Such is the fate of 40-year-old Giulio (Valerio Mastandrea), whose act of infidelity (sex with a colleague in the archives room of the Rome city office where he works) causes a deep, irreparable...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Jun 5, 2014

'The Grand Budapest Hotel'

Wes Anderson has always been a bit of a mystery to me. His films are remarkably consistent in their approach and stylistic idiosyncrasies, yet they seem equally capable of leaving me rapturous ("Moonrise Kingdom") or cold ("The Darjeeling Limited"). I'm not alone here: Check out any fan's list of Anderson...
COMMENTARY / World
Jun 5, 2014

Forget self-driving cars, make me a cyborg

A finance professor and sci-fi fan thinks that the next big technology is 'cyborg technology' but that the press is ignoring it. It will include a number of health care technologies involving the integration of living tissue with engineered machinery.
JAPAN / FOCUS
Jun 4, 2014

Atop Pacific 'Ring of Fire,' debate flares over volcanic risk to Japan's nuclear plants

In the three years since the Fukushima disaster, Japan's utilities have pledged $15 billion to harden their nuclear plants against earthquakes, tsunamis, tornadoes and terrorist attacks.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Issues / JUST BE CAUSE
Jun 4, 2014

Humanize the dry debate about immigration

Lost in the immigration narrative in Japan is the idea that when we import labor, we import people. With lives. And needs. And voices to be heard.
Japan Times
MORE SPORTS / MAN ABOUT SPORTS
Jun 3, 2014

'Million Dollar Arm' details search for Indian prospects

Exiting the theater after viewing "Million Dollar Arm," MAS had a strange urge to break out in song — in this case, "It's a Small World," the melody they play on the Disneyland kiddie ride of the same name.
Japan Times
WORLD / Politics
Jun 3, 2014

Once near defeat, Assad reasserts himself

It was not so long ago that Bashar Assad's enemies thought he was finished.
Japan Times
JAPAN / EMBASSY AVENUE
Jun 3, 2014

New educational facility funded by Qatar opens in Iwaki

A new educational facility recently opened in Iwaki, Fukushima Prefecture, with the help of a grant from the Qatar Friendship Fund (QFF).
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Jun 3, 2014

Especia takes a road less traveled by idol acts

The eldest member of six-member idol unit Especia was born in 1989, so when I ask them about life during Japan's early '90s bubble era they can only imagine what it was like.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Jun 3, 2014

Kenta Koie and Crossfaith earn some rock cred overseas

In February, Osaka electro-infused metalcore act Crossfaith toured Britain with Limp Bizkit. Sharing stages and hanging out with the 1990s rap-metal act and its celebrity frontman Fred Durst reinforced the importance of not letting success go to their heads.
COMMENTARY / World
Jun 3, 2014

The Tank Man's defiance

Chinese Communist authorities largely spared the student protesters of Tiananmen Square 25 years ago, though many leaders went to prison. It was ordinary citizens like the famous man who stood down the tank — along the streets to the square — who suffered the most.
BASEBALL / Japanese Baseball / HIT AND RUN
Jun 2, 2014

Bowker relishing second chance

John Bowker’s second chance presented itself one morning in late April. Bowker was just sitting down for breakfast at his apartment in Campeche, a port city on Mexico’s Yucatan Peninsula, when his telephone rang.

Longform

Members of the nonprofit group Japan Youth Memorial Association search for the remains of dead soldiers in a cave in Okinawa Prefecture in February.
The long search for Japan’s lost soldiers