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September 17, 2025
 

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Japan Times
LIFE / Language / BILINGUAL
Jul 23, 2021

Explore the vocabulary of beginnings ahead of the opening ceremony of the Olympics

The opening ceremony of the Tokyo Olympics may have you thinking about new beginnings and fresh starts. It's time to raise the curtain on some new vocabulary.
Japan Times
LIFE / Language / BILINGUAL
Apr 30, 2021

With all due respect, here's how you give a speech at a Japanese wedding

Japanese uses a lot of set phrases on formal occasions, you'll need to know them if you're going to give a speech at a wedding.
Japan Times
LIFE / Language / BILINGUAL
Nov 24, 2020

A few tips on what to focus on in the final stretch leading to the JLPT

If you haven't started recapping for the Japanese-Language Proficiency Test yet, consider this your warning.
Japan Times
LIFE / Language
Sep 2, 2019

How to address the 'sisters' we've never met

When meeting new people in Japan, it's essential to address them in the correct way, so be sure not to confuse your obasans with your o-nu0113sans.
Japan Times
LIFE / Language / BILINGUAL
Sep 25, 2017

Learn Japanese as you travel the world

Japanese guidebooks are more than just vocabulary lessons. They provide subtle insight into Japanese grammar as well.
LIFE / Language / BILINGUAL
Feb 16, 2015

Exercise your intuition as you untangle chaotic headlines

Being somewhat 背が高い (se ga takai, tall), I shamelessly confess my height advantage — I stand about 188 cm — has facilitated my ability to 盗み読み (nusumi-yomi, literally "theft-read," meaning to read over other people's shoulders) on public transport.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE FOREIGN ELEMENT
Jul 15, 2013

Trolls or media watchdogs?: Japan's foreign-born defenders

Have the foreign media got it in for Japan? Do they unduly focus on, and sensationalize, Fukushima radiation leaks, alleged racial intolerance and the self-aggrandizing policy pronouncements of the reborn Liberal Democratic Party?
COMMENTARY / COUNTERPOINT
Dec 12, 2010

Half the world's people are bilingual — but how many Japanese?

First of two parts
JAPAN / Media / BIG IN JAPAN
Dec 5, 2010

Privacy is losing its very meaning

Words come and words go. Times change, language evolves.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WHEN EAST MARRIES WEST
Dec 9, 2006

Painting the air baby blue

The world used to be more beautiful. The sky was bluer, the grass was greener, and good always triumphed over evil.
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 15, 2006

Infamous English word is just an import

HONG KONG -- Apart from Thatcherism and the creation of the modern game of soccer, some cynics say that the major English contribution to modern international life has been the widespread promulgation of the dreadful "F" word.
EDITORIALS
Dec 28, 2005

Portrait of a year in buzzwords

If it's December, it's time for those list-loving dictionary folks to be announcing their Words of the Year again -- and in the process providing editorial writers with a revealing lens on the past 12 months. This year, their labors yielded a couple of startlingly different scenarios.
LIFE / Lifestyle / ON THE BOOK TRAIL
Feb 3, 2005

"Pirates!" "Mammalabilia"

"Pirates!" Celia Rees, Bloomsbury; 2004; 296 pp. Celia Rees's "Pirates!" is a gripping read from page one: It gains on you like Blackbeard's fearsome pirate ships, takes you hostage, and holds you without mercy till the last page. Her story of two young women taking to a life at sea as pirates is so...
COMMENTARY
Sep 3, 2004

Labour seeks a constituency

LONDON -- A ruler can obtain power only with the help of his own people. He uses them to fight against those who revolt against his party. They fill his administrative offices and he appoints them to prestigious and lucrative positions. They help him to achieve his ascendancy. This is true so long as...
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WHEN EAST MARRIES WEST
Feb 28, 2004

Hitting the nail on the head

"The nail that sticks up gets hammered down!"
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art / CERAMIC SCENE
Sep 11, 2002

A dream of living pots

Koichi Takita looks more like a Zen monk than a world-renowned ceramic artist. His shaven head and glowing demeanor exude the sense of a man who has attained enlightenment while playing with mud.
CULTURE / Art
Feb 8, 2001

Calligraphy: a goodwill ambassador for Japanese culture

MADRID -- I used to take it for granted in my youth that my practice of "sho" (Japanese calligraphy) would bear no relation to my career as a diplomat, but over the past half century I have often found that sho serves as a good topic of conversation with my guests.
CULTURE / Art
Aug 6, 2000

Untruely, unmadly, shallowly in love

Daisuke Takeya went to New York to study art in 1989 and got thoroughly sick of being told by everybody and anybody that they loved him, in typically free and easy American style. On the other hand, he enjoyed the mispronunciation of his name Daisuke into Daisuki, meaning "I really like you" in Japanese...
COMMUNITY
Jun 23, 2000

Hearts will blossom on a classic ground

One beautiful day in mid-autumn, while watching my silent garden-scape, I remembered a voice I had heard from the flowers in the summer sun. "We flowers want your heart to blossom," they had said in one voice.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives
Mar 1, 2000

Conversation: enough said

I heard once that the average male speaks 2,000 words a day, while the average female speaks 7,000.
Japan Times
WORLD
Sep 11, 2021

What does it mean to ‘never forget’?

For all its slogan-like simplicity, these twinned words seem freighted with the complexities of guilt, obligation and even presumption — as if we could ever forget.
Japan Times
BUSINESS / Economy / FOCUS
Jun 25, 2020

Narendra Modi's plan to save the Indian economy: Look inward

Faced with millions of job losses following a nationwide lockdown, Modi has ratcheted up calls to boost local manufacturing.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / BLACK EYE
Sep 30, 2019

Say bad thing, read boilerplate apology: Japan, we can do better

A joke about her skin hasn't bothered Naomi Osaka, but there are broader ramifications from such kind of comedy.
Japan Times
LIFE / Language / BILINGUAL
Mar 25, 2019

To differentiate a 'piri-piri' throat from a 'muzu-muzu' one, you'll have to know your onomatopoeia

If you ever want to take a break from grammar and reading when studying Japanese, dive into the world of 'giongo' and 'gitaigo.'
Japan Times
JAPAN / History / THE LIVING PAST
Aug 19, 2017

Wabi lies at the heart of Japanese history

You could spend your entire life in modern Japan without ever hearing the term wabi, though no overview of Japanese history or art is complete without it. It's a beautiful word, hard to define like most beautiful words. Poverty is the heart of it, which sounds dispiriting, but there's the Zen phrase...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / CLOSE-UP
Jul 6, 2013

Yoko Narahashi: From Hollywood to Hirohito

From "Empire of the Sun" to "The Last Samurai," and from "Memoirs of a Geisha" to "Babel" — when Hollywood film directors have turned their cameras to the Land of the Rising Sun, there is one person they have insisted on having by their side: Yoko Narahashi, a casting agent, producer, sometimes director...
Japan Times
WORLD / Science & Health
Jun 26, 2013

A mother helps son in his struggle with schizophrenia

The mother drives her son everywhere because he is not well enough to drive. He sits next to her, and at the red lights she looks over and studies him: how quiet he is, how stiffly he sits, hands in his lap, fingers fidgeting slightly, a tic that occasionally blooms into a full fluttering motion he makes...
Pro-Israel demonstrators march toward the International Court of Justice in The Hague, the Netherlands, on Thursday.
WORLD
Jan 12, 2024

Israel faces accusation of genocide as South Africa brings case to U.N. court

South Africa argued that Israel "means to create conditions of death” in Gaza, and demanded the court order an emergency suspension of the military campaign.
In the quest for immortality, some researchers believe mind uploading will be our ticket to an eternal existence.
PODCAST / deep dive
Feb 8, 2024

Japan’s take on immortality; problems in Palworld

As scientists and technologists attempt to tackle the problem of aging and death, we discuss Japanese ideas about immortality.
Wildlife researcher Amelia Hiorns says Japan's bears feel the pressure of human presence and have learned that encountering us is not worth their time.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / 20 QUESTIONS
Mar 30, 2024

Amelia Hiorns: 'Guiding and introducing people to Japan's nature has been rewarding'

Wildlife researcher Amelia Hiorns shares how separate interests in Japan and in bears culminated in conservation work in the mountains of Nagano.
Haneda Airport security staff arrested over theft
Tokyo police have arrested a 21-year-old security inspector at Haneda Airport after he allegedly stole cash from a passenger during a baggage inspection.
Japan's elderly population down at around 36.2 million
The estimated number of people age 65 or older in Japan stands at 36.19 million as of Monday, accounting for record 29.4% of the country's total population, according to the internal affairs ministry.
SDF spots China’s biggest aircraft carrier for first time
The Fujian aircraft carrier is seen in Shanghai in May 2024 as it leaves for its first sea trial.
White House threatens broad crackdown on liberal groups
FBI Director Kash Patel (right) listens to senior White House adviser Stephen Miller speak in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington on Monday.
Why more hotels in Japan are offering room-only service
Nipponia Hotel Ise Kawasaki Merchant Town in Ise, Mie Prefecture
Japanese athletes inspired by raucous home fans at World Athletics Championships
Fans cheer on the home favorites during the women's marathon at the World Athletics Championships in Tokyo on Sunday.
Pole vault rivals in awe after Duplantis has another historic night in Tokyo
Sweden's Armand Duplantis competes in the men's pole fault final during the World Athletics Championships at National Stadium in Tokyo on Monday.
Japan's major art events converge this fall
Shinji Ohmaki’s “Tokinokage” exhibited at Fuji Textile Week 2021 shows the use of fabric as art.
Tara Davis-Woodhall leaps to gold and finds redemption at world championships
Tara Davis-Woodhall celebrates after winning the women's long jump final at the World Athletics Championships at Tokyo's National Stadium on Sunday night.
An aesthetic escape to Hakone’s art-drenched hills
Between traditional examples of fine art and sleek, modern exhibitions that blend with nature, Hakone offers a unique escape from Tokyo's urban sprawl.

Podcast

One of the many entrances to the Kabukicho neighborhood in Tokyo’s Shinjuku Ward.
Kabukicho: Tokyo’s ‘stadium of desire’

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’
By Alex K.T. Martin

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