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May 14, 2025
 

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JAPAN / Media / BIG IN JAPAN
Feb 25, 2017

Is Abe attempting to fuse the church and state?

It was morning in the land of the gods. "The mountains and the waters serve our sovereign," wrote a seventh-century poet. "And she (Empress Jito), a goddess, is out on her pleasure-barge upon the foaming rapids."
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives
Jul 17, 2016

Feeling despair from a distance as black lives taken

"When I despair, I remember that all through history the way of truth and love have always won. There have been tyrants and murderers, and for a time they can seem invincible, but in the end, they always fall. Think of it — always." — Mahatma Gandhi
Japan Times
WORLD / Politics
Feb 22, 2016

With eye on Downing Street, Boris bets all on 'Brexit'

With one hand in his suit pocket and the other mussing his signature blond hair, Boris Johnson on Sunday took the riskiest gamble of his career: to oppose Prime Minister David Cameron by campaigning for Britain to leave the European Union.
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 18, 2016

Why economic growth lags

A new book offers a sobering reminder of technology's limits.
Japan Times
MORE SPORTS / MAN ABOUT SPORTS
Dec 1, 2015

Newton affair reveals ugly truth about discourse in U.S.

Sports, MAS has often heard it said, are a metaphor for life.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / BLACK EYE
Sep 20, 2015

'Don't sell your soul for a Japanese man'

Having overcome isolation and a loss of self-confidence in Japan, one American mother now finds herself doling out advice to women seeking Asian men.
JAPAN / View from Osaka
Feb 14, 2015

Winter offers a wake-up call for local revitalization drive

Kansai's corporate titans gathered in Kyoto earlier this month for their annual retreat, formally known as the Kansai Economic Forum. While there was no shortage of the usual slightly daft old men with slightly daft ideas, this year saw two important, positive changes.
COMMENTARY
Nov 3, 2014

Does being gay make Tim Cook a better boss?

Strange as it may seem in 2014, Apple's Tim Cook is the first chief executive of a Fortune 500 company to come out in public about being gay. Members of this exclusive club are still unsure whether that's wise.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Voices / COMMUNITY CHEST
Nov 2, 2014

Children of Japanese 'war brides' tell tales of racism, hardship and perseverance

The sons and daughters of American servicemen and their Japanese wives recall the tales their parents told them about adjusting to life in the U.S. in the postwar years.
Japan Times
LIFE / Digital
Jun 12, 2014

International Tokyo Toy Show allows a peek at Christmas hits

It's that time of year again. Children erupt with joy as they see their favorite anime characters come to life, and tech-savvy young adults scramble to figure out the latest cutting-edge gadgets. It's not Christmas, but the International Tokyo Toy Show runs a close second.
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT / OLD NIC'S NOTEBOOK
Jan 4, 2014

To the Simien and back — 47 years on

By the time you read this I should be in the Simien Mountains of northern Ethiopia. I have been asked to go back there to tell the nation's current generation what the forests and wildlife were like in 1967, '68 and '69 when I served the government of Haille Selassie as the country's first game warden...
COMMUNITY / Voices / COMMUNITY CHEST
Oct 7, 2013

Fukushima, suicide and nihongo fluency: readers' mails

A grab bag of readers' mail in response to recent Community articles.
Japan Times
WORLD / Politics
Aug 30, 2013

Cory Booker: hope, hype — and heir to Barack Obama?

If Cory Booker were a television character you might think the writers were over-egging things a bit. Tall, athletic, handsome, he is an ambitious politician with a flair for drama. He rescues a woman from a burning building, saves a freezing dog, chases a scissor-wielding mugger, invites hurricane victims...
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Aug 10, 2013

Koda's baby gaffe may find different reception now

Five years ago, singer Kumi Koda caused an uproar when she joked on a late-night radio show about how a woman's amniotic fluid (yōsui) becomes "spoiled" as she gets older. The subtext of the comment was the advantage of having babies at a younger age, but those quick to ridicule Koda's lack of gynecological...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE FOREIGN ELEMENT
Jul 2, 2013

The LDP constitution, article by article: a preview of things to come?

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is pushing for constitutional change. Yet he is playing the political huckster by proposing to first only fiddle with the amendment procedure in Article 96, lowering the threshold for the process to move forward from the approval of two-thirds of both houses of the Diet, as...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Books
May 5, 2013

Revealing the many masks of Mishima

This is a whale of a book — both unusually massive and extremely informative and stimulating. The title means "mask" in Latin and is probably an allusion to Yukio Mishima's first full-length novel, "Confessions of a Mask," published in Japan in 1949 and translated into English by Meredith Weatherby...
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT / OUR PLANET EARTH
Feb 24, 2013

One former student's inspiring path to success

Seeing fewer years ahead and more behind me as a teacher, I often think back over the students who have passed through my classrooms and wonder how many will truly make a difference in the world.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Voices / COMMUNITY CHEST
Jan 8, 2013

From Taiji to Okinawa, readers dissect some issues of 2012

In the first of our new Community Chest letters columns, we bring together a selection of mails received in response to some of the final Community stories of 2012.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE ZEIT GIST
Sep 11, 2012

18 months on, 'stayjin' in Tokyo, Iwaki tell a tale of two cities

While the media both in Japan and overseas reported on a perceived exodus of foreigners in the immediate aftermath of the March 11, 2011, disasters in Tohoku, the reality is that very few actually left for good.
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Aug 5, 2012

Strong work ethic is no path to better standard of living

Last week I spoke to a non-Japanese economics researcher employed by a Japanese university. He said he was working on a study that compared Spain's current fiscal crisis to Japan's economic situation as a means of determining if the former would suffer the same long-term problems as the latter. I mentioned...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY
Jun 2, 2012

Japan's great outdoors becomes Oregonian's office-cum-playground

Gliding through powder across Mount Hakkoda in Aomori Prefecture or scanning the surfers at Shonan Beach in Kanagawa Prefecture, Gardner Robinson's life and work merge so completely that on the clock and on the slopes are one and the same.
Japan Times
LIFE / Style & Design / ON: DESIGN
May 29, 2012

A spring jewelry collection

Kouichi Okamoto of Kyouei Design, who usually creates household items, has launched his first line of jewelry — and of course, it's not your average collection of fashion accessories. The series is titled "form of the function," and all the pieces are made from repurposed industrial components.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / THE ZEIT GIST
Jan 10, 2012

Local Japanese school is the obvious choice if you want your child to fit in

The first day of elementary school, a milestone in a child's life, brings a mix of emotions for parents. The pride and joy of seeing their child taking his first steps into the world are tempered with feelings of anxiety in moms and dads everywhere.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / LIGHT GIST
Aug 30, 2011

Mascots on a mission to explain the mundane

It is often said that the Japanese have a unique attitude towards law. Many explanations have been offered for why this is so, and in what circumstances:
Japan Times
LIFE
Dec 12, 2010

Brazil: the wild side

Statistics tell us one story of Brazil: It is the world's fifth-largest country and South America's largest by far, and it is an anomaly in being the only Portuguese-speaking nation on that continent.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE ZEIT GIST
Sep 21, 2010

Battling a broken system

First in a two-part series In July, Tokyo's family court granted me, an American, physical custody (kangoken) of my 13-year-old daughter exactly 120 days after she was abducted by my Japanese wife, a lifelong public servant employed as a teacher at a state school in Tokyo. This just may be the first...
Japan Times
LIFE
Jul 25, 2010

A northern odyssey

Komandorskiye Ostrova — the Commander Islands in English — are about as bleak and remote as anywhere imaginable for human habitation. Indeed, the two islands in the group, named Bering and Medny, support only one hardy community of fewer than 1,000 souls in a settlement called Nikolskoye on Bering...
Reader Mail
Jul 26, 2009

Words of wisdom for the long haul

I was pleased to see Mariko Kato's interview with Thomas Dillon in the July 14 Who's Who article, "Wit, humor help longtime columnist come to grips with life in Japan." Having always enjoyed Dillon's gentle style of wit in his regular column, it was interesting to read more about him.
Japan Times
JAPAN / Science & Health / NATURAL SELECTIONS
Jun 11, 2008

Of Darwin and Mishima . . .

If I said that I met Darwin last week, you might think I'd gone crazy.
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel / FREEWHEELIN' ACROSS JAPAN
May 16, 2008

Into the Land of the Dead

Second of two parts
Transport ministry issues warning to Haneda Airport operator
The operator of Tokyo's Haneda Airport has been warned by the government over its inappropriate transactions.
Xi defiance pays off as Trump meets most China trade demands
Then-Chinese Vice President Xi Jinping visits a school in South Gate, California, in February 2012. Experts say Xi won big in his standoff with U.S. President Donald Trump.
Nissan shares surge as carmaker set to cut 20,000 jobs in huge overhaul
U.S. President Donald Trump’s tariffs on cars and car parts imported to the U.S. have been painful to most global brands, but crippling in Nissan’s case.
Japan might be playing long game in U.S. tariff talks
Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba at the White House earlier this year. Ishiba said Monday that farmers won't be sacrificed for automakers in Japan's tariff negotiations with the U.S.
More details emerge about stabbing near Tokyo University metro station
Yoshitaka Toda, the suspect in Wednesday's knife attack at Todaimae Station on the Tokyo Metro Nanboku Line, leaves a police station in the Japanese capital the same day for a pre-detention medical examination.
Sculpted waves, sleek updos: Showa hairstyles are back in fashion
The larger-than-life hairstyles of Japan's Showa Era are unmistakable — and they're making a comeback.
Japan should produce its own AI defense solutions, Sakana AI CEO says
Sakana AI CEO David Ha speaks at a news conference in Tokyo on Tuesday.
Nissan gets ‘wake-up call’ with $4.5 billion annual net loss
Nissan CEO Ivan Espinosa in Tokyo as the company releases its results
Consumption tax set to dominate Upper House election debate
Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba enters his office in Tokyo on Tuesday.
Japan set for bigger role in Philippines after SDF’s debut in key drills
Philippine Army Brig. Gen. Michael Logico, who was involved in managing the latest iteration of the Balikatan U.S.-Philippine drills, told The Japan Times that he expects military ties with Japan to surge even further once Tokyo ratifies a key visiting-forces agreement with Manila.

Podcast

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

Longform

Japan's growing ranks of centenarians are redefining what it means to live in a super-aging society.
What comes after 100?
By Tomoko Otake

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Fujitsu crafts sustainable innovation for itself, society

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