Search - category

 
 
Events / Events Outside Tokyo
Jan 4, 2008

Top tango couples dance into a city near you

The world's top tango dancers will put on a spectacular show throughout Japan in Tango Dance Premium from Jan. 20-Mar. 31. With no fewer than 55 performances at 45 venues, the five winning couples of the annual Tango Dance World Championship will indulge audiences across the country with a rare opportunity...
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 1, 2008

Peace, prosperity come at a price

It is self-evident that international peace is the foremost prerequisite for national security and prosperity. This is the common recognition of all advanced nations, but Japan, with regard to national interests.
Japan Times
JAPAN
Dec 29, 2007

Michelin Tokyo takes Japan by storm

A new book released last month has created a sensation and is selling like hotcakes in Japan, with bookstores being picked clean of the initial stock of 120,000 copies in only three days.
BASKETBALL
Dec 28, 2007

Apache guard Aoki continues climb to stardom

There are times this season when Cohey Aoki is the best offensive player on the basketball court.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE ZEIT GIST
Dec 18, 2007

The myopic state we're in

We all notice it eventually: how nice individual Japanese people are, yet how cold — even discriminatory — officialdom is toward non-Japanese (NJ). This dichotomy is often passed off as something "cultural" (a category people tend to assign anything they can't understand), but recent events have...
EDITORIALS
Dec 13, 2007

Spotlight on troubled cities

The internal affairs ministry has introduced four indicators to gauge the financial health of local governments based on a law enacted in June to prevent bankruptcy of local governments. In view of financial problems at local governments, like the bankruptcy of the city of Yubari in Hokkaido, the new...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WORDS TO LIVE BY
Dec 11, 2007

Tamegoro Sudo

Tamegoro Sudo, 50, is a movie producer and actor whose many friends in Tokyo's downtown Asakusa area provide him with the hilarious characters and plots in his movies. His five "Dekotora no Shu (Shu, the Dekotora Man)" movies star his favorite decorated trucks and his buddies, actors Sho Aikawa and Shingo...
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WHEN EAST MARRIES WEST
Dec 8, 2007

Yes — I have a cell phone

"Hate" is a powerful word, and one that I would never toss around lightly, not even to such potentially worthy targets as the Tokyo Giants, Fox News and eggplant (blech!). But having said that, let me further say this:
BASKETBALL / BJ-LEAGUE NOTEBOOK
Dec 7, 2007

Rizing Fukuoka finds wings

The Rizing Fukuoka have quietly put together a solid stretch of games and now find themselves in the thick of things in the bj-league's Western Conference.
COMMENTARY / World
Dec 3, 2007

Setting the record straight on Indonesia

BALI, Indonesia — Japan and India stand as beacons for democracy that surely inspire many of their Asian neighbors. For its part, Indonesia has been struggling with its own experiment with democracy that has enormous implications for the region and the rest of the world.
COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM NEW YORK
Nov 26, 2007

Plenty wrong with U.S. agricultural policy

NEW YORK — The U.S. farm bill — a blanket term for all measures related to agriculture, some barely so — appears doomed this year. The House version passed at the end of July, but the Senate version has been stalled in such a way that there's even talk that its enactment may not occur until after...
JAPAN / EXPLAINER
Nov 20, 2007

World's suicide capital — tough image to shake

Japan has attained a reputation as the suicide capital of the world. A 2007 international comparison of suicide rates (per 100,000 people) by the World Health Organization ranked Japan sixth for females, at 12.8, behind Sri Lanka, South Korea and Lithuania, and 11th for males, at 35.6, well below Lithuania,...
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / TOKYO FOOD FILE
Nov 16, 2007

N_1155: Naka-Meguro goes organic

Who'd have thought it? Vegetables have become hip. Forget those premium cuts of chu-toro tuna and gourmet meals of beer-pampered wagyu beef: The really happening restaurants these days are those that can offer bespoke produce shipped straight from the farm.
Reader Mail
Nov 15, 2007

Exemptions not based on nationality

In his Nov 11 letter, Donald Seekins wonders "Why exempt Korean residents (from biometric screening at ports of entry)?" The short answer is that "Korean residents" are not< /I> exempt. There is no such category in Japanese law, and Special Permanent Residents (SPRs) are not defined by nationality. ...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Nov 15, 2007

Ullens gets the private party started in Beijing

"Rarely has there been such an extravagant press tour," commented one of the 40-plus foreign journalists invited earlier this month to witness the opening of the Ullens Center for Contemporary Art (UCCA), Beijing's newest and, for the moment, most important contemporary-art venue.
BASKETBALL / NBA / NBA REPORT
Nov 14, 2007

Isiah shows confidence in Curry

NEW YORK — The more I'm around Eddy Curry, the more I like his honesty and off-court jesting. He smiles easily, good humoredly messes with teammates and is quick to poke fun at himself.
COMMENTARY / World / SENTAKU MAGAZINE
Nov 13, 2007

Murakami's Nobel leanings

The news that 88-year-old Doris Lessing received the 2007 Nobel Prize in literature was not greeted by the Japanese media with as much fanfare as former U.S. Vice President Al Gore's winning the Nobel Peace Prize. This perhaps was because Japanese literary circles were more interested in whether Haruki...
Reader Mail
Nov 13, 2007

Too old to pose a threat

Has Japan's immigration department gone mad? I am 80 years old, have lived in Japan for 46 years and am a card-carrying resident. Martyrdom (as sought by Islamic terrorists) is not in the cards for me unless there is a category for nonbelievers, and in any case, I would not be interested in even 30...
MORE SPORTS
Nov 11, 2007

Suguri perseveres as rivals grow younger

Sometimes in life we tend to take things that endure for granted.
CULTURE / Film
Nov 9, 2007

Tokyo's FILMeX: small but tasty

Now in its eighth year, Tokyo FILMeX (Nov. 17-25) continues to prove that good things come in small packages. With the sprawling Tokyo International Film Festival over, think of FILMeX as the more interesting, more memorable nijikai (after party) following TIFF's pomp and circumstance. FILMeX's devoted...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Nov 9, 2007

'Ten Ten'

Some directors are like fashion brands, churning out immediately identifiable product the same way again and again. Others are more like a hot stock: a spectacular rise, followed by an equally spectacular fall. There are also those who are like an underperforming athlete who suddenly changes into a worldbeater....
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Nov 4, 2007

Rural living of an old man who does as he pleases

Late Poems Of Lu You, The Old Man Who Does As He Pleases: New Translations by Burton Watson. Burlington, Ontario: Ahadada Books, 2007, 74 pp., $12, ¥2,000 (paper) Lu You (Yu) (1125-1210), often referred to by his literary name of Lu Fangweng ("The Old Man Who Does as He Pleases"), is one of China's...
BASEBALL / Japanese Baseball
Nov 3, 2007

Hillman bids farewell to Fighters

NAGOYA — The Hokkaido Nippon Ham Fighters have hired a proven winner in Masataka Nashida to manage the team next year. That's good because the Trey Hillman era will be a tough act to follow.
JAPAN / Q&A
Nov 3, 2007

Nova failure: Can teachers recoup lost pay, keep jobs?

When Japan's largest employer of foreigners effectively went bankrupt last week, thousands of instructors at the foreign-language school giant were left without jobs. Many now face complicated legal problems in a language not their own.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Nov 1, 2007

Curios spice commercial fare

Tokyo International Film Festival remains an ambitious also-ran on the circuit, even if its regional-movie showings give cheer
BASKETBALL
Oct 30, 2007

Mighty Osaka Evessa in the mood for a three-peat

The Osaka Evessa are a proud, confident basketball team. And they've clearly earned this distinction.

Longform

Rock group The Yellow Monkey played K-Arena Yokohama in June as part of a nationwide tour. Concerts are increasingly popular in the age of social media as users value in-person experiences.
Inside Japan’s arena boom: Sports, sound and city-building