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BASEBALL / HIT AND RUN
May 25, 2010

Time ripe for slumping Swallows, Takada to part ways

The vote of confidence the Tokyo Yakult Swallows gave manager Shigeru Takada on Friday served only to underscore how much the team is in need of a new voice.
COMMUNITY / How-tos / LIFELINES
May 25, 2010

Nova visas; seeking U.S. citizenship

Reader SB was working for Nova and his visa runs out next fall.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WHO'S WHO
May 25, 2010

Expat dancer Hibari Misora-inspired

Chris Chavez maintains an upbeat outlook about life in Japan but leaves the rosy-tinted view for idealists or those newly arrived. This Mexican-American's snapping brown eyes differentiate clearly the good, bad and indifferent of living as a foreign woman in Tokyo.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE ZEIT GIST
May 25, 2010

Looking East as British system goes south

In the months preceding the Lower House election last year, an ambitious Ichiro Ozawa, destined to become Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) secretary general, headed to Britain to study the "Westminster system." His aim was to bring Japan's politics closer to that of Britain, to weaken the power of the...
Japan Times
BASKETBALL
May 24, 2010

Old hand Oguchi leads by example

Veteran guard Masahiro Oguchi's leadership, defensive tenacity, scoring and passing skills helped the Hamamatsu Higashimikawa Phoenix make a smooth transition from the JBL to the bj-league last season.
Japan Times
BASKETBALL
May 24, 2010

Phoenix confirm superiority with bj-league championship triumph

From start to finish, the Hamamatsu Higashimikawa Phoenix were the bj-league's best team this season.
BUSINESS / YEN FOR LIVING
May 23, 2010

The Japan-Swiss EPA means nothing to cheese lovers

The euro has dropped and an agreement with Switzerland has been signed, so why does the price of cheese in Japan still do high?
BASEBALL / BASEBALL BULLET-IN
May 23, 2010

Niigata hoping to lure an NPB team to new stadium

City officials in Niigata have, at least three times in the past five years, expressed their desire to land a Nippon Professional Baseball franchise to play in a beautiful new ballpark opened in 2009.
Japan Times
MORE SPORTS
May 23, 2010

Lance takes off gloves, fires back at Landis over claims

Floyd Landis ignored desperate pleas from his sponsor to avoid a public fight with Lance Armstrong, according to e-mails the seven-time Tour de France champion released in trying to prove the disgraced cyclist has "zero credibility."
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
May 23, 2010

Can celebs cut mustard in rough-and-tumble politics?

TAs the July 11 Upper House election draws near, the parties add more candidates to their slates and, predictably, many turn out to be athletes and showbiz personalities with no political experience. Celebrity candidates have been a fixture of Japanese elections as long as there have been Japanese elections,...
COMMENTARY / COUNTERPOINT
May 23, 2010

What's a rogue gusher when you never had a cherry tree anyway?

Fingerpointing, dear reader, has been elevated to an art. Halliburton is pointing the finger at BP. Transocean is also pointing the finger at BP. And BP, not to be outdone, is pointing fingers at both Halliburton and Transocean.
BUSINESS
May 22, 2010

Thai finance chief lists poll criteria

Thailand's finance minister said Friday that early elections are a possibility, but the government isn't bound by its offer to hold them by November because antigovernment protesters never accepted the deal.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
May 22, 2010

The Island of Heavenly Fields

I live next to a heavenly field. So do lots of other people on my island.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Japan Pulse
May 21, 2010

Municipal meet-ups and pet-owner get-togethers for shy singles

Tired of speed-dating? Maybe your local government can help you in your hunt for the One.
JAPAN
May 21, 2010

Former negotiator lays base woes on Okinawa

Every story has more than one side.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
May 21, 2010

'King' Solomon mines fresh lease on life

After a few relatively lean years, the Japan Blues & Soul Carnival has landed a big fish again in the person of Solomon Burke, a soul legend of the 1960s who is currently enjoying an incredible late-career renaissance, while serving as an inspiration to everybody from Mick Jagger to Joss Stone.
Events / Events Outside Tokyo
May 21, 2010

Your chance to star with two stage legends

Two titans of Japanese theater, contemporary dramatist Hideki Noda (who has also triumphed three times directing kabuki plays at its Kabukiza mecca) and star kabuki actor Kanzaburo Nakamura, will team up on stage at Tokyo Metropolitan Art Space in Ikebukuro from Sept. 5-28 to perform a new play by Noda...
MORE SPORTS
May 19, 2010

Woods plans to play British Open

ORLANDO, Fla. (AP) Tiger Woods has added the British Open to his summer schedule, he said on his Web site on Monday.
LIFE / Digital / IGADGET
May 19, 2010

Sony makes the NEX move, Pioneer's iPod docks double as home theaters

Fashionably late: Sony has finally released its alternative to the already popular Olympus EP-2 and Lumix DMC-GF1 micro four-thirds, interchangeable lens cameras. Using the same technology that Olympus and Panasonic pioneered, the Alpha NEX-3 and NEX-5 are effectively compact DSLR cameras, light enough...
BASKETBALL / NBA / NBA REPORT
May 19, 2010

Criticism of LeBron patently unfair

NEW YORK — Have you ever seen a city turn so fast on its Messiah?
COMMENTARY
May 18, 2010

Overhaul industrial policy to bolster the economy

Japan's industrial power is so stagnant that it seems a crisis is in store for our economy. Even as it lags far behind the United States in creating intelligent information systems, Japan is finding that South Korea, Taiwan and China are catching up with it in manufacturing.
COMMUNITY / How-tos / LIFELINES
May 18, 2010

Still waiting for that last paycheck

Reader TS writes: "I return to the U.S. next week and I was supposed to receive my final pay check from a really bad ALT company . . . last week, but did not receive payment. I've called them but the secretaries say that the people in charge are not in the office. I called my direct contact and he has...

Longform

Bear attacks have dominated Japanese news headlines in recent months, with 13 people so far having been killed by the animals.
Japan’s bears have been on their killing spree for more than 100 years