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Reader Mail
Oct 19, 2008

The burden of bad choices

This past summer the campaign against smoking became a hot topic, and a recent article mentioned proposals to raise cigarette taxes in Japan. The average price for a pack of cigarettes is ¥300, but there is a movement to raise that to ¥1,000 yen. The reasoning behind this is that if tobacco were expensive,...
CULTURE / Books
Oct 19, 2008

Paul Theroux backtracks through the world

GHOST TRAIN TO THE EASTERN STAR: On the Tracks of the Great Railway Bazaar, by Paul Theroux. Hamish Hamilton, 2008, 496 pp., £20 (cloth) Books about traveling in other people's footsteps are commonplace. We have Lesley Downer's "On the Road to the Deep North" and Patrick Symmes' motorbike journey through...
Japan Times
JAPAN
Oct 17, 2008

Temps: Product of a broken labor system

Natsumi Maeda, a 26-year-old day laborer, says she worked at more than 50 companies in the last year and a half.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Oct 17, 2008

Truth but still no comfort, 63 years on

There were no Korean subtitles during the screening of "63 Years On" at the Pusan International Film Festival on Oct. 4, which was strange since the 60-minute documentary about the Japanese Imperial Army's sex-slave policy during World War II is a Korean production.
COMMENTARY / World
Oct 15, 2008

Pirates of starvation putting Somalis at risk

NEW YORK — Time is running out for Somalia. As many as 3 million people — one-third of the country — live under threat of starvation. Their lifeline is the sea, from which food, medical supplies, and other aid arrives. And there lies the problem.
COMMENTARY
Oct 13, 2008

Charge up to the fast lane

During a recent visit to China's Zhejiang University, which honored me with the title of visiting professor, I was surprised to learn that faculty members drive their own cars, many of them expensive models by my standard. A professor in his late 40s was driving a ¥10 million Audi; a 30-year-old instructor...
Reader Mail
Oct 12, 2008

Keeping public parks safe

Regarding the Oct. 9 letter "Kids don't feel right in park," B.K. Cottle says his daughter has told him she doesn't enjoy the park because of "these people" -- who, according to Cottle, are "the prostitutes, their clients, the drunks, smokers and pedophiles." While the drunks might be obvious, I previously...
Reader Mail
Oct 12, 2008

Enjoying Japan under any name

Regarding Yu Sato's Sept. 28 letter, "No offense intended to 'gaijin' ": I have been to Japan only once (I am going again in November), and I can honestly say that I have never been treated with more courtesy by anyone. The word "gaijin" (foreigner) doesn't bother me. I've been called worse by my own...
SOCCER / PREMIER REPORT
Oct 11, 2008

Racist abuse continues to poison beautiful game

LONDON — Rio Ferdinand this week hit out at the inadequate punishment that one of world football's most respected authorities handed out for racist behavior.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film / SHORT TAKES
Oct 10, 2008

"Ikigami"

"Ikigami"
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Oct 9, 2008

Narcissism on the march for beauty

If there is any doubt that New York-based artist Terence Koh has perfected the art of winsome provocateurship, it was put to rest upon reaching the terrace of his Shibuya penthouse hotel room, where a plastic, spermatoza-shaped chalice, filled with milky white liquid, lay innocuously on the artist's...
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Oct 9, 2008

Nomura to lose 60% of Lehman Japan equity employees

Nomura Holdings Inc., Japan's largest investment bank, will lose roughly 60 percent of the Japanese equity employees acquired when it purchased the Asia-Pacific business of bankrupt Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc., three sources said.
EDITORIALS
Oct 7, 2008

Pressures on health system

The introduction in April of the health insurance system for people age 75 or over is exerting so much financial pressure on health insurance societies that some of them have dissolved themselves. As the graying of the population progresses, the government must reconstruct and set the nation's medical...
Japan Times
JAPAN
Oct 7, 2008

Yes, we have no bananas, as dieters peel away stocks

Dieting appears to be a nationwide trend. Spurred on by TV shows, people have taken various approaches, including upping their intake of "natto" fermented soybeans, which later proved fruitless, to adding agar to food.
Japan Times
JAPAN / EXPLAINER
Oct 7, 2008

Survival now arcades' most pressing game

Once viewed as dens of delinquency, game center arcades are diversifying their entertainment fare, and in the process, attracting not only youths but families, high school girls, couples and video game fans.
EDITORIALS
Oct 4, 2008

Fire at a video parlor

The fire at a Nanba video parlor in Osaka's Naniwa Ward, which killed 15 customers and injured 10 other people, highlights a potential danger at similar facilities with small private rooms. It is outrageous that a customer is suspected of deliberately starting the fire — on the very day that a revision...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY
Oct 4, 2008

Music firm goes to seed for a rockin' good future

Last year, all too aware that sales of CDs were dropping, Douglas Allsopp of Buffalo Records went along to the annual fair of promotional goods at Tokyo's Big Sight to look for a possible additional venture.
Japan Times
BUSINESS / CABINET INTERVIEW
Oct 3, 2008

Kaneko to review visa rules

Visa-issuing policies must be reviewed to attract more foreign tourists, according to newly appointed transport minister Kazuyoshi Kaneko.
JAPAN
Oct 3, 2008

Aso sorry for past gaffes, pushes budget passage

Outspoken new Prime Minister Taro Aso, known for his slips of the tongue, faced Upper House lawmakers Thursday and apologized for his past verbal gaffes.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Oct 3, 2008

Classical maverick tackles pop music

"In about 20 years, we will rarely hear Brahms in the concert hall; we will mostly hear contemporary music." A bold prediction, particularly as dwindling audiences for classical music have most orchestras keeping to the tried and true, with only the occasional token nod to the obscure or challenging,...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Oct 2, 2008

Seeking photographic destinies

His figures cut through the sky, crisply suspended, on their way into the water. Sometimes they are immersed, or watching from a shore, but most often they hang in the air, about to split the drink in two. For Lithuanian photographer Vidas Biveinis, water represents a changing emotion, expressive of...
Japan Times
Reference / SO WHAT THE HECK IS THAT
Sep 30, 2008

Jitensha odantai

Dear Alice,
JAPAN
Sep 30, 2008

Aso goes on attack in Diet policy speech

Prime Minister Taro Aso kicked off an extraordinary Diet session Monday with a policy speech in which he challenged the Democratic Party of Japan to a political debate, consciously highlighting the ruling camp's rivalry with the largest opposition force.
COMMENTARY
Sep 28, 2008

Bush will go away as a true friend to China

HONG KONG — As the world prepares to bid farewell to U.S. President George W. Bush in a few months, his foreign policy lies in tatters. Wars continue in Iraq and Afghanistan, a crisis looms in Iran, relations with Russia are badly strained, and now North Korea is threatening to restart its nuclear-weapons...

Longform

Sumadori Bar on Shibuya Ward's main Center Gai street targets young customers who prefer low-alcohol drinks or abstain altogether.
Rethinking that second drink: Japan’s Gen Z gets ‘sober curious’