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EDITORIALS
Mar 29, 2009

Supporting single mothers

As the economy worsens, some people will suffer more than others. For the first time ever, the number of Japanese single mothers receiving child-care allowances to supplement their low income has topped 1 million, the health and welfare ministry reported in March. These single-mother households greatly...
BASEBALL / HIT AND RUN
Mar 29, 2009

The Japanese way carried the day in World Baseball Classic

Baseball may have been invented in the United States, but it's being perfected in Japan.
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Mar 29, 2009

Make room in the scrapyard of history for those quaint TV sets

When regular television broadcasts in America started in 1939, the intrinsic evils of the medium were already being discussed, and by the '50s the term "idiot box" had been coined.
Japan Times
SOCCER / World cup
Mar 28, 2009

Japan aims for another victory against Bahrain

SAITAMA — National team manager Takeshi Okada is determined to settle his side's rivalry with Bahrain once and for all in Saturday's World Cup qualifier at Saitama Stadium.
SOCCER / PREMIER REPORT
Mar 28, 2009

Gerrard hoping to show club form for England

LONDON — One of the best moves England manager and master tactician Fabio Capello could make before England plays Slovakia on Saturday is to hand the No. 8 jersey to Steven Gerrard.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Mar 28, 2009

Practicing for the Olympics

My grandmother used to reminisce about spending the first five minutes of Spanish class practicing rolling her r's. My grandmother would be proud — the ESL classroom doesn't just spend five minutes on English pronunciation, we spend an entire class on it.
EDITORIALS
Mar 28, 2009

Worrisome state of agriculture

Agriculture in Japan is experiencing difficult times. The nation's calorie-based food self-sufficiency rate is the lowest among developed countries. There are fewer farmers and those remaining are rapidly graying. The number of abandoned agricultural fields is rising.
CULTURE / Film
Mar 27, 2009

'Fish Story'

Film critics like to be surprised, which comes from being unsurprised too many times. This critic, however, has become tired of "The Sixth Sense" school of script writing, enamored as it is of that 1999 hit's sleight-of-hand ending. But while a good magician can fool the eye in dozens of ways, a scriptwriter...
CULTURE / Film
Mar 27, 2009

Masterpiece maker

The Japan Times interviewed Yoshihiro Nakamura at the Ebisu headquarters of the Amuse talent agency, where Nakamura was holding forth all day for the press. Despite the PR grind, he was relaxed, with a ready laugh, and spoke in a distinctive low, rumbling voice.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Mar 27, 2009

'Watchmen'

Like The Sex Pistols, who wickedly declared themselves "the last rock 'n' roll band," "Watchmen" should have been the superhero comic to end all comics. When Alan Moore wrote the "Watchmen" series in the mid-1980s (illustrated by Dave Gibbons), his canny deconstruction of the superhero genre seemed total,...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music / FUZZY LOGIC
Mar 27, 2009

Guitar Wolf return to silence the lambs

"We've come back and we're going to attack your planet with humongous love," says Seiji (that's Mr. Guitar Wolf himself) as he downs vegetable juice at a Jonathan's family restuarant near Yoga Station in western Tokyo.
JAPAN
Mar 27, 2009

Bill offers aid to ailing international schools

An association of ruling bloc lawmakers has drafted a bill to let municipalities provide financial aid to certain types of international schools, many of which are losing students as Brazilian residents lose their jobs amid the recession.
JAPAN
Mar 27, 2009

When push comes to shove, can Japan shoot down missile?

First of two parts
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Mar 27, 2009

Slump hits demand for haute couture

The first model to walk the runway during Japan Fashion Week strutted her stuff in the nude. She was also a robot — a high-tech gimmick in a fashion world struggling to retain attention as the global economy staggers through recession.
EDITORIALS
Mar 26, 2009

A little lift from baseball

Team Japan, dubbed Samurai Japan, beat Team Korea (South Korea) 5-3 in the final game Monday at Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles to win its second consecutive title in the triennial World Baseball Classic.
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Mar 26, 2009

Toyota aims to keep hybrid pole position

OYAMACHO, Shizuoka Pref. — Pushing the pedal to the metal, the machine quickly raced to 70 kph on the short circuit at legendary Fuji Speedway as if it was personally attacking the standard image that hybrids are sluggish off the mark.
BASEBALL / Japanese Baseball / WORLD BASEBALL CLASSIC
Mar 24, 2009

Kawasaki steps out of the shadows to will Japan to victory

While Samurai Japan has discreet, silent players that lead the squad with their bats instead of their mouths, like Ichiro Suzuki or Michihiro Ogasawara, the contribution of less-heralded players is appreciated too.
Japan Times
JAPAN / EXPLAINER
Mar 24, 2009

Smokes here cheap, in state's interest

The World Health Organization calls smoking "one of the biggest public health threats the world has ever faced."
COMMENTARY
Mar 24, 2009

Barring the people needed

The Calderon affair — the expulsion of a Filipino couple who entered Japan illegally but whose Japanese-fluent daughter was born and raised in Japan — is seen as an indictment of Japan's confused immigration policies. And rightly.
Reader Mail
Mar 22, 2009

Questions remain in murky case

Regarding a reader's response to my March 3 article, "Rape victim fights for justice against U.S. military, Japan": It's generally a bad idea to get involved in spats with anonymous letter writers, but the March 12 letter "Questions about an alleged rape" contains such a litany of accusations, I feel...
Japan Times
BASKETBALL / ONE-ON-ONE WITH ...
Mar 22, 2009

Holm on the rebound with Sendai after tough year

The Japan Times will be featuring periodic interviews with players in the bj-league — Japan's first professional basketball circuit — which began its fourth season in October. Chris Holm of the Sendai 89ers is the subject of this week's profile.
Japan Times
BASEBALL / Japanese Baseball / WORLD BASEBALL CLASSIC
Mar 21, 2009

Asia ready to make final push for world domination

SAN DIEGO — Before the start of the World Baseball Classic, Ichiro Suzuki said he wanted the world to see the power of Asian baseball.
COMMENTARY
Mar 21, 2009

Are Earth's oceanic 'carbon sinks' filling up?

Russian and South Korean scientists made a disturbing discovery recently in the Sea of Japan. They found that the amount of carbon dioxide, the main global warming gas, being absorbed in the water dropped by half between 1992 and 2007.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY
Mar 21, 2009

From box office hit to the serenity of temples

Vampires and yoga seldom appear in the same sentence — except when talking about Fran Rubel Kuzui.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WHEN EAST MARRIES WEST
Mar 21, 2009

Culture shock connections

Japan is not as shocking as it used to be.
BASKETBALL / BJ-LEAGUE NOTEBOOK
Mar 20, 2009

Sojourner continues with charitable efforts

Grassroots efforts play a pivotal role in helping a sport grow and develop a vital presence in a society.

Longform

A sinkhole in Yashio, which emerged in January, was triggered by a ruptured, aging sewer pipe. Authorities worry that similar sections of infrastructure across the country are also at risk of corrosion.
That sinking feeling: Japan’s aging sewers are an infrastructure time bomb