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CULTURE / Books
Jan 13, 2013

Americanized Buddhism

ZEN QUESTIONS: Zazen, Dogen, and the Spirit of Creative Inquiry, by Taigen Dan Leighton. Wisdom Publications, 2011, 312 pp., $17.95 (paperback) These essays and Dharma talks are meant to guide practitioners of Soto Zen meditation. The author is in the lineage of Shunryu Suzuki Roshi, author of "Zen Mind,...
Reader Mail
Jan 13, 2013

Another arrest bites the dust

Regarding the Jan. 8/9 AFP article "Cyber harasser's trail of riddles leads cops to memory card on cat collar": So, once again, lazy cops pulled in four "suspects" off the street and extracted bogus "confessions" (related to sending threatening messages) before finding out that the four actually had...
JAPAN / Media / BIG IN JAPAN
Jan 13, 2013

Magazines struggle to maintain relevance

The print edition of venerable U.S. weekly news magazine Newsweek is no more. From the Jan. 4 issue it relaunched as a digital-only publication.
Reader Mail
Jan 13, 2013

Inequality in Christian nations

Kevin Rafferty's Jan. 7 article, "Christianity vs. secularism," is a disjointed and mostly aimless sermon in disguise. He laments the absence of Christ in Christmas, but unfairly points to holiday festivities in Hong Kong as an example. Why should the Nativity story be taken seriously in a historically...
BUSINESS / Economy
Jan 12, 2013

Cabinet OKs ¥20 trillion stimulus plan

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's Cabinet on Friday approved a mammoth ¥20.2 trillion economic stimulus package, hoping to kick-start a recovery through public works spending, monetary easing and new growth strategies.
MULTIMEDIA
Jan 12, 2013

Nomad writer and photographer keeps his passions fueled by travel

Fiction can work like a cheap flight; a good novel takes off, jetting readers to new worlds. Writers and photographers triple the distance traveled. Sean Lotman, 37, an avid reader, writer, photographer and nomad, has logged thousands of kilometers around the world.
BUSINESS / Companies
Jan 12, 2013

Softbank dangles ¥1 million carrot for employees who join TOEIC '900 club'

Softbank Corp. said Friday it will pay a ¥1 million bonus to any of its employees who score 900 points or more in the TOEIC English-language proficiency test, starting this month.
BUSINESS / Tech
Jan 12, 2013

WeVibe creates a buzz at tech fair

Las Vegas AFP-JIJI
LIFE / Food & Drink
Jan 11, 2013

Overseas restaurants set up shop in Japan

Call it the Pancake Revolution.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / KANPAI CULTURE
Jan 11, 2013

Japan's latest wine trend is only natural

It's official: Natural wines are entering mainstream consciousness in Japan. I know this not simply because sections devoted to organic, "bio" (biodynamic), or shizen-ha (natural) wines have become fixtures in many retail shops, or even because sales of natural wines have risen around the world. The...
Reader Mail
Jan 10, 2013

Enough fossil-fuel nonsense

Regarding the Jan. 3 editorial "New fossil fuel resources": We already have access to vastly more fossil fuels than is reasonable to use. To sink money into developing new types is economic and environmental nonsense (except perhaps in the very short term).
Reader Mail
Jan 10, 2013

Uphill slog for female politicians

I'm glad to see editorials like "Women for decision making" (Jan. 7). Just wanted to add a couple of comments. The goal of increasing the number of women in "decision-making roles" to 30 percent by 2020 was made earlier than 2005. It was made official in the 1999 basic law for a gender-equal society...
Reader Mail
Jan 10, 2013

Jet scramble all huff and puff

Regarding the Jan. 6 article "Japan scrambles F-15 fighter jets after Chinese aircraft spotted near Senkakus": The interesting question for me is, what would those F-15s have done if the Chinese airplane had completely encroached on Japanese territory, did loops and rolls, and even dived in a simulated...
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 10, 2013

At last, Russia wins the seal of French approval

President Vladimir Putin has finally done it. Russia has been vying for the West's esteem for centuries, with approval by the French — a sought-after prize since the time of Peter the Great — coveted the most. But, despite the defeat of Napoleon and the World War I alliance, Russia could never get...
Reader Mail
Jan 10, 2013

Risk of losing food autonomy

Kudos to Philip Brasor for his illuminating Jan. 6 Media Mix article, "Japan's farming could be going to seed." Too often Japan's Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) dilemma is made out to simply be an industry versus agriculture problem, with the former to gain much and the latter to possibly lose something....
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Jan 10, 2013

Looking out for the sound of art

In Titian's "Bacchus and Ariadne," the riotous clash of cymbals and blowing of trumpets in the hands of the revelers can almost be heard. In similar ways, artists from at least the Renaissance onward, have attempted to suggest the presence of music in their paintings. By the modern period, many artists...
Reader Mail
Jan 10, 2013

A late-night model for safety

The inhuman, unforgivable rape and murder of the young woman in India recently shows a clear difference between the respect accorded women in Japan and their treatment in what are emerging but still Third World cultures.
Reader Mail
Jan 10, 2013

Sexual privacy on/off the pitch

I do not accept that in the age of the Internet and social media privacy is an atavistic fantasy. Claims to the contrary are, politely speaking, stupid. Therefore, the loathsome things about New Zealand gay rights advocates calling on a suspected, anonymous homosexual member of the All Blacks rugby club...
Japan Times
JAPAN
Jan 9, 2013

Foreign nurse success story has message for Japan: Open up

The success story of Dewi Rachmawati may hold the key to coping with Japan's declining population and quickly aging society. The struggles the Indonesian nurse has endured during her four years living in the country are what the government must rapidly remedy.
Japan Times
BUSINESS / Tech
Jan 9, 2013

Cheap 3-D printers to transform our lives

FOCUS
ASIA PACIFIC
Jan 9, 2013

In North Korea, a leader rises while brothers fade

Kim Jong Un is portrayed in North Korea's official state media as a leader without comparison, blessed with a supreme bloodline, flanked by a supportive wife and endowed with the "brilliant" ability to revamp the economy, command an army and guide the space program.
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 9, 2013

India's rapid rise puts women at risk

For two decades, the West has been cheering India's rise. But the nation's economic and political changes have caused new cultural conflicts, a dynamic that has become all too obvious after the brutal, and eventually fatal, rape of a young woman on a bus in New Delhi last month.
WORLD / Crime & Legal
Jan 9, 2013

Gun advocates push for call to arms on Jan. 19

American gun enthusiasts can express their zeal on an upcoming "Gun Appreciation Day" right before Barack Obama is sworn in for a second term as president.
SUMO / SUMO SCRIBBLINGS
Jan 8, 2013

Seven sumo stories to look out for in the year of the snake

1. Baruto — make or break
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Voices / HOTLINE TO NAGATACHO
Jan 8, 2013

Refer Senkaku issue to ICJ to avoid a train wreck

Dear Prime Minister Shinzo Abe,

Longform

After the asset-price bubble crash of the early 1990s, employment at a Japanese company was no longer necessarily for life. As a result, a new generation is less willing to endure a toxic work culture —life’s too short, after all.
How Japan's youth are slowly changing the country's work ethic