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Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Mar 11, 2011

'Rakugo Monogatari (Rakugo Story)'

Rakugo, which might be described as traditional Japanese sit-down comedy, once had a certain snob appeal among foreigners here. If you could boast that your hobby was rakugo, as either a fan or participant, you were saying you had summited the Mount Fuji of the Japanese language. (The Everest to me was...
BUSINESS
Mar 11, 2011

Toyota gives big voice to Canadian exec

The executive who wrote Toyota Motor Corp.'s "global vision" announced by the president said Thursday that the changes at the automaker can't fix all crises but will speed up response to recalls.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Mar 11, 2011

'The Runaways'/'True Grit'

The Runaways were an all-girl band whose comet flared briefly in the late 1970s, living precariously on that fault line between party-hearty hard rock and attitude-laden punk. The fact that they were teenage girls who dared to play harder than the cock-rock boys made them notable at the time, when piggy...
Reader Mail
Mar 10, 2011

Let human capital trump arms race

Regarding Hiroaki Sato's Feb. 27 article, "Indefensible costs of military one-upmanship ": When it comes to national defense, Japan needs to accumulate human capital instead of participating in the arms race. In the 21st century, when many countries are locked in fierce competition to obtain natural...
COMMUNITY
Mar 10, 2011

Achieving happiness and well-being through positive psychology

Positive psychology is a hot topic these days. Books with "happiness" in the title are pouring out of publishers' lists, and studies on resilience, well-being and gratitude have made their way from academic journals to mainstream magazines. More than 200 colleges and universities in the United States,...
Japan Times
JAPAN
Mar 10, 2011

Briton excels at helping foreign women adjust

Japan got a little better last year in gender equality, according to the World Economic Forum: It moved up in the rankings to 94th place out of 134 countries, from 101st in 2009.
BUSINESS
Mar 10, 2011

Toyota sets profit goal of ¥1 trillion

Toyota Motor Corp. President Akio Toyoda said Wednesday the auto giant aims to earn more than ¥1 trillion in group operating profit as soon as possible as it tries to rebound from a record loss two years ago when it was hit by the global economic downturn and massive recalls.
LIFE / Language / BILINGUAL
Mar 9, 2011

Japanese women and the art of being alone

One of the biggest changes in Tokyo women over the past five or so years has been their new-found capacity for solitude. Tokyo joshi (女子, young girls, single women or any female who sees herself as being a relatively free-spirited individual) had been notorious — even among themselves — for their...
BUSINESS / YEN FOR LIVING
Mar 8, 2011

Childless Japanese couples look for bargains in Asia

More couples are turning to surrogacy in Japan, but the legal gray zone and exploitation of overseas surrogates is giving birth to a host of issues.
COMMUNITY / Voices / HOTLINE TO NAGATACHO
Mar 8, 2011

A worrying period for all ALTs

Dear Education Minister Yoshiaki Takaki: "How tall are you?" "How much do you weigh?" "Ooh, your eyes look like sunflowers." I guess if I got ¥100 every time a Japanese junior high school student asked me one of those questions, I wouldn't be writing this letter today.
COMMENTARY
Mar 7, 2011

U.S. foreign aid hinders more than it helps

SEATTLE — The United States will run up a record $1.65 trillion deficit in 2011. Yet Washington keeps subsidizing foreign governments. House Republicans have targeted foreign aid. This year the State Department would lose 16 percent of its budget; humanitarian aid would drop by 41 percent.
Reader Mail
Mar 6, 2011

Who'll report on worker abuse?

Regarding the March 2 article "English big business, and growing": Please don't make it sound as if all these private companies are doing a good thing. Some pay unfair wages and do not enroll their teachers in insurance or provide other benefits. They break labor laws and no one reports on that.
COMMENTARY / World
Mar 6, 2011

Minding the tensions over changes in China

The closing decade of the 20th century offered a crystal ball for anyone peering into the future of the Asia-Pacific region. Japan's economy, once the region's leader, was "lost" after its asset bubble burst, whereas China overcame the economic stagnation that followed the Tiananmen Square crisis of...
JAPAN / Media / BIG IN JAPAN
Mar 6, 2011

'Galapagos' has evolved as an analogy for Japan

English naturalist Charles Darwin put Galapagos on the map, having visited the group of islands, situated in the Pacific Ocean some 970 km west of continental Ecuador, in 1835, during the voyage of the HMS Beagle. His impressions and observations of the islands' unique biosystem contributed to his 1859...
COMMENTARY / World
Mar 6, 2011

Corruption tarnishes shiny India

HONG KONG — Corruption in India has become so public and pervasive that the government of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has been forced to take action on two blatant abuses. The problem is that corruption is only one highly visible part of a hydra-headed monster that is preventing India from fulfilling...
Japan Times
JAPAN
Mar 5, 2011

Queensland official pitches TPP

Andrew Fraser, treasurer and minister for state development and trade of Queensland, is grateful for the assistance the Japanese public and private sectors gave to his state after it was devastated by recent flooding and Cyclone Yasi.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY
Mar 5, 2011

Harmonia Opera marks milestone

Emiko Iinuma's voice has a distinctive sugared drawl, a sweet residue from her early years as a student at Baylor University in Waco, Texas. It is more than the drawl that attracts — her voice dances, leaps across decades, travels up and down pitch, whispers hardship and rises in forthright determination....
JAPAN
Mar 5, 2011

Analysts call arrest over exam cheating overkill

The media are in a frenzy over the arrest of a 19-year-old boy for allegedly posting questions from the Kyoto University entrance exam online to get outside help.
SOCCER / J. League
Mar 5, 2011

Grampus favored to repeat as J. League champions

The following is the second of a two-part J. League preview for the upcoming season. Team-by-team previews of the nine top-ranked teams competing in the first division are listed.
JAPAN
Mar 4, 2011

Kodansha International to close doors

Kodansha International Ltd., a leading English-language publisher of translated books on Japan, is closing down by the end of April, sources said Thursday.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Stage
Mar 4, 2011

It takes innovation, imagination and perseverence to challenge contemporary theater

Recently, while looking through a handful of upcoming production flyers displayed in a cozy, small-scale theater, I noticed to my surprise that one name kept reappearing: Norihito Nakayashiki.
Japan Times
JAPAN
Mar 3, 2011

Don't strike Libya, Egyptian envoy says

Egyptian Ambassador Walid Mahmoud Abdelnasser expressed concern Wednesday over the violence in neighboring Libya but stressed that the international community shouldn't militarily intervene.

Longform

Tetsuzo Shiraishi, speaking at The Center of the Tokyo Raids and War Damage, uses a thermos to explain how he experienced the U.S. firebombing of March 1945, when he was just 7 years old.
From ashes to high-rises: A survivor’s account of Tokyo’s postwar past