Search - life

 
 
EDITORIALS
Aug 15, 2012

The minimum wage dilemma

The number of people receiving livelihood assistance known as seikatsu hogo (literally, livelihood protection), Japan's final social safety net, increased for nine consecutive months and reached a record 2,108,096 as of March 2012.
SPORTS / ODDS AND EVENS
Aug 14, 2012

Japan exceeded expectations during London Games

Sixteen action-packed days of competition — plus a few days of soccer that began before the Opening Ceremony on July 27 — delivered a better-than-expected performance for Japan at the 2012 London Olympics.
OLYMPICS
Aug 14, 2012

London bids farewell to Olympics

The closing ceremony on Sunday night was a lot of things — boring wasn't one of them.
BASEBALL / BASEBALL BULLET-IN
Aug 12, 2012

Close call for Aizawa brings phrase into question

The Japanese translation of HBP, where a batter gets hit by a pitch, is "dead ball." I wish they would change that, eliminate the word "dead" and adopt the English phrase "hit by pitch."
LIFE
Aug 12, 2012

Japan's Paralympians overcome adversity by leaps, bounds and innovative design

When Oscar Pistorius made his dramatic debut in the men's 400-meter race in London last Saturday — becoming the first double amputee to compete alongside able-bodied athletes in Olympics history — some people might have wondered if the South African's artificial legs gave him a competitive edge over...
COMMENTARY / COUNTERPOINT
Aug 12, 2012

New breed of single fathers should be a model for men across Japan

He is a much maligned creature at home and abroad. Some call him good for nothing; others say he is good for only one thing: bringing home the bacon ... and, in recent years, a most lean bacon it has become. On the weekends his primary pastime is gorone, to wit, snoozing in his clothes during daytime...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives
Aug 11, 2012

Import club caters to need for home comfort

The blonde man in shorts and a baseball cap, sporting a lopsided grin and a dangling backpack and parking a rusty bicycle, looked less like a captain of industry than a superannuated college student. Yet American Chuck Grafft, 50, is founder and CEO of Foreign Buyers Club, one of the largest importers...
OLYMPICS
Aug 11, 2012

Bolt completes historic sweep with 200 victory

Jamaica had a run for the ages on Thursday.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WHEN EAST MARRIES WEST
Aug 11, 2012

The race to be at rest

"Japanese are supposed to be polite. It's a defining part of the national character."
BUSINESS / YEN FOR LIVING
Aug 10, 2012

Summertime blues: no place to go or no money to spend?

Fewer people are getting away this summer, probably because they can't afford it.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Aug 10, 2012

'Kirishima, Bukatsu Yamerutteyo (The Kirishima Thing)'

High schools are mercilessly hierarchical societies. At mine in rural Pennsylvania varsity basketball players occupied the summit. (Football players didn't because we didn't have a football team.) For a mere honor student to absent-mindedly sit in the "reserved" seat of one of these titans in the lunch...
EDITORIALS
Aug 10, 2012

Confusing political games

A confused state of affairs developed in the Diet this week. On Tuesday night, the Liberal Democratic Party decided to submit a no-confidence motion against the Noda Cabinet to the Lower House and a censure motion against Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda to the Upper House, despite the fact that the LPD,...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Aug 10, 2012

'Win Win'

The last time I saw Paul Giamatti in a lead role was in "Sideways" (2004), when he played a middle-aged guy who stole money from his aging mother to winery-hop in Napa Valley. Now Giamatti resembles a trusty musical instrument, fine-tuned to the exact specifications of what can only be described as Giamatti-ness....
EDITORIALS
Aug 10, 2012

Ruling that feeds discrimination

The Osaka District Court, in a lay judge trial on July 30, sentenced a 42-year-old man suffering from development disorder to 20 years' imprisonment, four years longer than demanded by the prosecution, for killing his elder sister.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Aug 10, 2012

'Total Recall'

This is going to sound crazy, but I have this memory ... It's faded, like so many from the acid-house era, but I can clearly see Arnold Schwarzenegger playing this blue-collar kinda guy who comes home one day and finds his loving and beautiful wife, played by Sharon Stone, suddenly trying to kill him....
BUSINESS
Aug 10, 2012

BOJ stays course at pair's first Policy Board meeting

The Bank of Japan refrained from loosening monetary policy at the first meeting attended by its two new board members, despite the effect on the economy of the appreciating yen and Europe's debt woes.
Japan Times
OLYMPICS / LONDON POSTCARD
Aug 9, 2012

Grenada's James provides Olympics with feel-good story

Some events are worth repeating in print shortly after the story originally appears, moments that highlight the best of the human spirit.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Aug 9, 2012

"Junkichi Mukai: The Time for Conversation"

When Junkichi Mukai (1901-1995) was young, he visited France and saw classic masterpieces at the Louvre Museum in Paris. That Western inspiration greatly contributed to the development of his realistic painting style, which he used to depict traditional Japanese houses.
EDITORIALS
Aug 9, 2012

Diplomacy dead in Damascus

Mr. Kofi Annan, the distinguished diplomat, has resigned as peace envoy to Syria. Upon leaving, he issued a blistering broadside that blamed divisions among the permanent five members of the United Nations Security Council as much as the combatants in that troubled country for the sad state of affairs....
COMMENTARY
Aug 8, 2012

The reasons for America's Generation Squeezed

I worry about the future — not mine but that of my three children, all in their 20s. It is an axiom of American folklore that every generation should live better than its predecessors. But this is not a constitutional right or even an entitlement, and I am skeptical that today's young will do so. Nor...
JAPAN
Aug 8, 2012

LDP pulls threat, will vote on bill for tax hike

In an apparent about-face Tuesday, the Liberal Democratic Party agreed to vote in favor of the contentious tax hike and social security legislation in the Upper House on Wednesday.
EDITORIALS
Aug 8, 2012

The darkness in India

Twice in one week, Indians were forced to endure the worst blackouts in their nation's history. Two consecutive incidents, for reasons as yet undetermined, left hundreds of millions of people without power.
BUSINESS / YEN FOR LIVING
Aug 7, 2012

Electronics makers lead the way in killing off lifetime employment system

If you want guaranteed employment for life, don't get a job with a home electronics maker.

Longform

Koichi Tagawa’s diary entry from Aug. 9, 1945, describes the day of the atomic bombing of Nagasaki.
The horrors of Nagasaki, in first person