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COMMENTARY / World
Aug 20, 2012

Why do American junk food giants feel the urge to force-feed us tidbit sermons on social issues?

Since when does serving up junk food give someone a license to preach?
JAPAN / Media / BIG IN JAPAN
Aug 19, 2012

Yakuza face new battles within and without

The nation's largest underworld syndicate, the Kobe-based Yamaguchi-gumi, is 97 years old.
CULTURE / Books
Aug 19, 2012

Nursery rhymes that fly high with sound and color

JAPANESE NURSERY RHYMES: Carp Streamers, Falling Rain, and other Traditional Favorites, by Danielle Wright and illustrated by Helen Acraman. Tuttle Publishing, 2012, 32 pp., $16.95 (hardcover) With its many onomatopoeic words, the Japanese language booms and trills, echoing with musical lingo. Usually...
COMMENTARY / COUNTERPOINT
Aug 19, 2012

Monster parents make matters worse for their children and teachers

In the West they hover and swoop. In Japan they stalk and are known to strike. We all have them and some of us have been them. And in recent years the media, both social and antisocial, have put them under the magnifying glass of criticism.
EDITORIALS
Aug 19, 2012

Japanese heat wave

This summer has been one of the hottest on record. In Japan, the number of heatstroke victims hit record levels. The Fire and Disaster Management Agency reported July had the highest number of people taken to hospitals by ambulances for heatstroke ever, more than 21,000 people.
COMMENTARY / World
Aug 18, 2012

U.S. religious liberty feeling the weight of so many faiths

In the United States, Muslim women trying to maintain modesty should get female-only hours at the public pool, right?
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Aug 18, 2012

Japan's career fairies — they're ready to help you

One job that exists in Japan that doesn't in my country is that of the career fairy. These are people, usually women, who work at places like the central post office or the bank and are on hand to help customers as they walk in the door. And as a customer, of course you need help.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Aug 17, 2012

'Dogtooth'

Dogtooth" shows the kind of stark, nightmarish images that assail the senses during a fretful summer nap, when the body soaks the sheets and you're disoriented for a while afterward. What just happened here? It's not easy to say, except that the long procession of bizarre scenes evoke the distinct sensation...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Aug 17, 2012

'Shokuzai (Penance)'

How much will they miss you when you're gone? Directors typically keep putting off the answer to that question as long as possible, working until they drop. Kiyoshi Kurosawa, whose 2008 dysfunctional family drama "Tokyo Sonata" won the Jury Prize in the Un Certain Regard section of the Cannes Film Festival,...
JAPAN
Aug 16, 2012

Two Cabinet ministers visit Yasukuni

Marking the 67th anniversary of the end of World War II, two Cabinet ministers on Wednesday paid what they said was a private visit to war-related Yasukuni Shrine, the first by such high-ranking politicians since the Democratic Party of Japan took power in 2009.
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....

Longform

Bear attacks have dominated Japanese news headlines in recent months, with 13 people so far having been killed by the animals.
Japan’s bears have been on their killing spree for more than 100 years