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CULTURE / Books
Feb 20, 2011

'Remote Control': Big Brother is watching you

If you want an all-action, well-written and intelligent novel to read in 2011, then look no further than this excellent conspiracy-theory thriller.
Japan Times
BASKETBALL / HOOP SCOOP
Feb 20, 2011

Apache coach Hill helped prepare Griffin for NBA

Dribbling one basketball while running or walking, gliding through a maze of defenders or with a hand in your face is a challenging task for anybody, even world-class athletes. Dribbling two at once is enough to drive many folks bonkers.
JAPAN
Feb 19, 2011

Tabloids feast on Imperial family foibles

Emperor Akihito is a quiet, studious type. The paragon of respectability. But, oh, what a family!
COMMENTARY / World
Feb 19, 2011

Bracing for Pakistan's 'Mubarak moment'

ISLAMABAD — Pakistan's domestic situation is becoming increasingly precarious. Indeed, serious questions are being raised as to whether the country can survive in its present form.
SOCCER / PREMIER REPORT
Feb 19, 2011

Arsenal's win impressive, but work remains

LONDON — One of the beauties of football is that at times you simply cannot explain how something happens.
Japan Times
JAPAN
Feb 18, 2011

Guardsman fast-tracks book, calls video leak 'civic duty'

The decision to leak classified footage of the Japan Coast Guard's run-in last year with a Chinese trawler wasn't an easy one to make, but ended up being a matter of civic duty, former coast guardsman Masaharu Isshiki says in his new book on the Senkaku Islands clash, in which he wasn't a participant....
JAPAN
Feb 18, 2011

Space station may get chatty, tweeting JAXA humanoid robot

Lonely astronauts on the International Space Station may soon be getting an android friend from Japan.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Feb 18, 2011

'Gakko wo Tsukuro (Let's Create a School)'

The Japanese audience has long loved period dramas, including ones based on the lives of real people, generally men wearing topknots. And usually, at some point, the swords come out, as in the story of the 47 ronin (masterless samurai) who in 1703 attacked a shogunate official in revenge for his role...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Feb 18, 2011

Japan's celebrated Edo Period painters: Having the good fortune to see all that is Gitter's

The first time I met renowned Japanese art collector Dr. Kurt Gitter was at an Asian art conference in New York in 2001, where he was on a discussion panel on Japanese art. An audience member asked Gitter, "Sir, since you and others have passionately collected antique Japanese works for decades and since...
COMMENTARY
Feb 17, 2011

What became of the Meiji spirit?

LONDON — The number of Japanese studying at top universities abroad has been declining while the number of outstanding Chinese students has been increasing. Numbers are not everything, but it is disturbing to see reports that Japanese students are less willing than Chinese to participate actively in...
Japan Times
JAPAN
Feb 17, 2011

U.S. submariners learn to live without smokes

YOKOSUKA, Kanagawa Pref. — When the USS Charlotte arrived for a recent port call, some of its crew were surely relieved to find themselves in Japan, traditionally a smoker's haven.
BASKETBALL
Feb 17, 2011

Smothering defensive effort allows Apache to breeze past Happinets

Defensive intensity doesn't always guarantee good results.
COMMENTARY
Feb 16, 2011

Good sense of the Arabs

They wouldn't do it for al-Qaida, but they finally did it for themselves.
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel
Feb 13, 2011

Furano: A winter wonderland

Here I am, taking a holiday in minus-20 Hokkaido instead of plus-20 Okinawa. I'm either losing my marbles or just a normal Canadian pining for a winter wonderland.
CULTURE / Books
Feb 13, 2011

Living with the bomb

THE DRAGON'S TAIL: Americans Face the Atomic Age, by Robert A. Jacobs. University of Massachusetts Press, 2010, 151 pp., $24.95 (paper) FILLING THE HOLE IN THE NUCLEAR FUTURE: Art and Popular Culture Respond to the Bomb. Edited by Robert A. Jacobs. Lexington Books, 2010, 276 pp., $32.95 (paper) There...
Japan Times
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Feb 13, 2011

K-pop takes on the world while J-pop stays home

Last week, the Fuji TV newsmagazine "Mr. Sunday" looked at Korean pop's success in Japan from two angles. Taking a street-level perspective, the show's host, Seiji Miyane, hung out in Tokyo's Okubo district, which has become "the new Harajuku" because young Japanese women flock there to rub up against...
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Feb 12, 2011

How 'bout that sumo?

The March Grand Sumo Tournament has been canceled due to bout-rigging. The May tournament is now in doubt as well. Who knows, sumo may be the world's first canceled sport.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Feb 11, 2011

Miila and the Geeks take Tokyo 'riot grrrl' sound international

A small girl, stylishly dressed in a short, black-and-white dress crouches hunched over a microphone, spitting out vocals that might be English or might be Martian for all the audience can tell beneath the thick overlay of distortion; a sax player with crazy hair is engaged in some kind of intense, seemingly...
Reader Mail
Feb 10, 2011

Worldwide problem with 'honor'

Sumo's continued troubles demonstrate a problem that afflicts the world, not just Japan. Some years ago it was safe to assume that all young individuals coming up into the world had been taught certain fundamentals at home: basic things about right and wrong, respect for others, courtesy toward elders...
JAPAN
Feb 10, 2011

Kato shouldn't be hanged: lawyers

Tomohiro Kato was mentally ill and lacked the ability to control his actions when he murdered seven people and wounded 10 others on the streets of the Akihabara electronic district in 2008, defense attorneys told the Tokyo District Court on Wednesday, hoping to keep their client off death row.
Japan Times
LIFE / Style & Design / ON: FASHION
Feb 10, 2011

Blue moon rising over Tokyo

Comme des Garcons' Marunouchi: no longer alone
SOCCER / SOCCER SCENE
Feb 10, 2011

J. League exodus a double-edged sword for Japanese game

With yet another raft of Japanese players currently making their European club debuts, J. League fans could be forgiven for wondering what is left for them when the season starts next month.

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’