Search - life

 
 
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Jan 23, 2014

Searching for hidden meaning in a Kubrick classic

I'm old enough — barely — to have seen Stanley Kubrick's horror masterpiece "The Shining" when it opened in the theaters back in 1980. My strongest memory of this tale of writer's block meets cabin-fever insanity is that my girlfriend's drink wound up in my lap the first time the twins appeared....
Japan Times
Events / Events Outside Tokyo
Jan 23, 2014

Don't flap about when it comes to ensuring a year of good luck

This weekend, Osaka Tenmangu, a shrine in Osaka's Kita Ward, is hosting its annual festival where visitors can trade bullfinch shaped good-luck charms to bring about future prosperity.
JAPAN / DAVOS SPECIAL 2014
Jan 23, 2014

Japan's economy strong enough to weather tax hike storm

Last year Japan's economy finally refound some backbone, with strong growth, better company earnings, falling unemployment and the key stock index soaring by a half to a six-year high, thanks mainly to Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's economic measures, the so-called "Abenomics."
Japan Times
JAPAN / DAVOS SPECIAL 2014
Jan 23, 2014

Young entrepreneur out to change education

The Global Shapers are highly motivated young people between the ages of 20 and 30 with the potential to be society's future leaders, according to the World Economic Forum, which selects them based on several factors, such as their initiative, commitment and potential to "make a difference."
Japan Times
JAPAN / DAVOS SPECIAL 2014
Jan 23, 2014

Japan's traditional washoku cuisine feeds body and soul

Whenever I am away from my homeland for too long, there is one meal that fills my dreams. At the center is a bowl of plain steamed rice, white and glistening. On the side, a steaming bowl of fragrant miso soup. There's fish, perhaps sanma (Pacific saury), so hot from the grill that its skin sizzles when...
EDITORIALS
Jan 22, 2014

Tobacco's red flag turns 50

It was 50 years ago that a landmark study by the U.S. Surgeon General identified the links between tobacco use, cancer and death. The number of tobacco-related illnesses and fatalities remains too high.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Jan 22, 2014

Hiraki Sawa’s dream world: Worth the pause for thought

Sometimes it can be irritating visiting an exhibition of video-based art. You come in halfway through one of the videos or near the end of another, and you feel that you've missed something and wonder if you should stick around to watch it from the start.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Voices / VIEWS FROM THE STREET
Jan 22, 2014

Tokyo: Is there any food you won't eat in Japan?

Natto, seaweed, squid, octopus, shiitake: While Japan's culinary treats are a major draw for new residents and visitors alike, everyone has their limits, vox pops in Tokyo reveal.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Stage
Jan 22, 2014

Komanosuke Takemoto: a rare voice of tradition

The traditional performing art of bunraku (ningyō jōruri) involves three puppeteers together operating a cast of single puppets, with a gidayū bushi to the side comprising a story-teller (tayū) and a shamisen player (shamisen- hiki) seated on a round platform (yuka).
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Jan 22, 2014

Encounters with the modern that both frustrated and inspired Japanese artists

When Japanese audiences turn their attention to modern art they tend to favor the 'original' works from the West, while foreign viewers all too often find Japan's foray into oil painting too similar to the Western model.
Japan Times
MORE SPORTS
Jan 22, 2014

Huddle Bowl, Make-A-Wish of Japan team up for winning cause

Touch, flag or tackle?
JAPAN
Jan 22, 2014

Old LDP nemesis rides comeback trail to Tokyo

Morihiro Hosokawa, the former prime minister who rocked and transformed Japanese politics in the early 1990s, is back, this time as a leading candidate for Tokyo governor, running as an anti-nuclear crusader seeking the abolishment of all atomic power plants.
COMMENTARY
Jan 21, 2014

A Dutch cure for the Dutch disease

When a country like the Netherlands, which built one of the world's most expansive welfare states in the 1960s and '70s, reverses course to reduce welfare dependency and to restore work incentives, it is worth noting.
COMMENTARY
Jan 21, 2014

Obama's still spying on you, no matter what he says

If you're worried that the government has already collected enough phone-call metadata to map out the details of your life at the click of a button, then President Barack Obama's much-hyped speech recently on intelligence gathering will probably do little to allay your concerns.
Japan Times
LIFE / Lifestyle
Jan 20, 2014

Lego could help girls build their future careers

Writer Rachel Cooke believes that if more girls were encouraged to play with building toys such as Lego, then there may be more female architects and engineers.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Issues
Jan 20, 2014

My niece, the drug smuggler

Imagine two New York Jewish women groomed among the stylish and well-educated on opposite shores of Long Island. They meet up in Tokyo for the first time. In a strange twist of fate, they are not sipping tea from fine bone china, as they might have back home. Instead they find themselves seated on opposite...
Japan Times
LIFE / Language / BILINGUAL
Jan 19, 2014

Marketers succeed by generating hitto products

Japanese consumers and marketers alike certainly love their ヒット商品 (hitto shōhin, hit products). To understand how this term came about, we need to look back to the decade following World War II. When living standards gradually began to improve from the early 1950s, Japanese consumers eagerly...
Japan Times
JAPAN / Politics
Jan 19, 2014

Abe: 'Numbers do not lie'

Prime Minister Abe plays up fiscal consolidation and across-the-board prosperity as he returns to his “Abenomics” script for the Liberal Democratic Party convention.
Japan Times
WORLD
Jan 19, 2014

'Damning' Savile review expected to reveal up to 1,000 cases of child abuse

The BBC will be plunged into fresh crisis with the publication of a damning review, expected next month, that will reveal its staff turned a blind eye to the rape and sexual assault of up to 1,000 girls and boys by Jimmy Savile in the corporation's changing rooms and studios.
WORLD
Jan 19, 2014

'Living suicide bomb' returns to wage jihad

Ahmed al-Shayea was known as the "living suicide bomb" — the young Saudi driver of a fuel tanker bomb in Iraq who survived to renounce violence and warn his countrymen of the dangers of jihad.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Jan 18, 2014

How a yoga school became a doomsday cult

Aum Shinrikyo's criminal activities began in the late 1980s and culminated in the 1995 nerve-gas attacks on Tokyo's subway system. The group was founded in 1984 by Shoko Asahara, the babbling, half-blind guru whose real name is Chizuo Matsumoto.
Japan Times
WORLD / Science & Health
Jan 18, 2014

Meditation may reduce anxiety, depression

Meditation may offer the same relief as antidepressants for people with symptoms of anxiety and depression, according to an analysis of previous findings on the practice.
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel
Jan 18, 2014

Exploring the realm of Lewchew

When I told the Japanese woman with whom I'd struck up a conversation in central Tokyo's very handy Haneda airport that I was flying to Lewchew, she looked puzzled.
ENVIRONMENT
Jan 18, 2014

Will Japan prepared mean nature ruined?

"Resilience" is a hot topic these days — not in self-help books, but among policymakers worldwide. As governments become convinced that climate change is a real threat, they are taking steps to ensure communities can bounce back from the increasing impact of floods, storms, fires and droughts they...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Books
Jan 18, 2014

A True Novel

Like all artists, novelists find the impetus to begin in various places. Some inspire themselves with a formal challenge. Georges Perec, for example, asked himself what would happen if he tried to write a novel entirely bereft of the letter "e." Others, in their doodling and false starts, stumble upon...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Books / ESSENTIAL READING FOR JAPANOPHILES
Jan 18, 2014

The Setting Sun

Career nihilist Osamu Dazai had already attempted suicide four times when he published his most famous novel in 1947. "The Setting Sun" quickly became a byword for the decline of Japan's aristocracy in the wake of World War II, but its portrait of a country adrift from its spiritual moorings would resonate...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / TELLING LIVES
Jan 17, 2014

Coach serves up support for Japan's budding tennis stars

Arriving in Japan in 1986, Colombia-born coach and player Rodrigo Hernandez brought with him a wealth of experience and expertise gained from working with and competing against some of the greats of world tennis. Expecting to stay only a year, he's been coaching here ever since.
WORLD / Science & Health
Jan 16, 2014

Study dispels 'obesity paradox' idea for diabetics

The "obesity paradox" — the controversial notion that being overweight might actually be healthier for some people with diabetes — seems to be a myth, researchers report. A major study finds there is no survival advantage to being large, and a disadvantage to being very large.
EDITORIALS
Jan 16, 2014

Election spotlight on nuclear power

Expect the question of whether Japan should rely on nuclear power generation in the future to be a main theme of the Feb. 9 Tokyo gubernatorial election after former Prime Minister Morihiro Hosokawa announced his candidacy.

Longform

An illustration features the Japanese signs for "ganbare" (good luck) and the Deaflympics, which will be held between Nov. 15 and 26.
A century of Deaf sport finds its moment in Tokyo