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Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Mar 5, 2003

Not just another pretty spaz

Singer-songwriter Rhett Miller, who is in Tokyo for a few days plugging his album "The Instigator" is feeing encouraged. "I told my manager I wanted to come back in May with a band," he says between sips of green tea at the offices of Warner Music Japan. During a solo acoustic showcase the night before...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY
Mar 2, 2003

The lady explorer who took a native interest in Hokkaido

"Mori is a large, ramshackle village . . . a wild, dreary-looking place with a number of . . . disreputable characters . . . a forlorn, decayed place." Yubetsu "looks like the end of all things, as if loneliness and desolation could go no farther."
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Feb 26, 2003

Freed jazz

Musicians can be extraordinary in so many different ways. John Coltrane was on a radical quest for enlightenment until the day he died. Bill Evans could voice chords in ways no one else ever imagined. Like a cat, Theolonius Monk could step off an edge and always land on his feet. And Miles Davis? You...
COMMENTARY
Feb 20, 2003

Farcical economic flip-flops

Japan's economic debate has moved from the bizarre to the ridiculous. Just two years ago we were told that fiscal restraint was the key to economic recovery. Annual bond issues to finance government spending would not be allowed to exceed 30 trillion yen ($250 billion). In other words, cutting demand...
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel / NATURE TRAVEL
Feb 16, 2003

The turbulent isles are tranquil at last

Last of two parts Despite its appearance of timeless peace and tranquillity, the Seychelles has a turbulent history. Originally discovered by the Dutch, this remote archipelago in the Indian Ocean rapidly became a haunt of pirates.
COMMENTARY
Feb 8, 2003

Advice for Roh Moo Hyun

HONOLULU -- A recent visit by South Korean President-elect Roh Moo Hyun's foreign-policy transition team reveals that the incoming administration's policy toward North Korea is still very much in the formative stage. As a longtime student of Korean security affairs, allow me to offer South Korea's incoming...
JAPAN / Science & Health / NATURAL SELECTIONS
Feb 6, 2003

Freaks that are something to quack about

In 1832 the young Charles Darwin embarked on one of the most epic journeys in the history of biology, if not of all science. As a naturalist on the H.M.S. Beagle, Darwin saw things that challenged the prevailing view of how life arose. On returning to England five years later, he began work on what he...
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel / NATURE TRAVEL
Feb 2, 2003

Sexuality takes a suggestive form in Eden

First of two parts The Vallee de Mai, on Praslin Island, the second-largest island in the Seychelles archipelago, is a heavenly spot. But for some, it is also a glimpse of hell or, as Milton put it, "Paradise Lost."
Japan Times
COMMUNITY
Feb 1, 2003

Need a guide to Japan's flea markets? Here it is

Rather, here he is: Theodore Manning, whose book "Flea Markets of Japan: A Pocket Guide for Antique Buyers" was published last month. He no longer lives here, having returned last year to America after a 10-year stretch, so I call him in his new home base of Chicago and we talk by phone.
COMMUNITY / How-tos / LIFELINES
Jan 28, 2003

Doing the tango, mama-san misery and chopper care

Learning the tango Today I found white and pink plum trees in full bloom in a local hillside cemetery.
EDITORIALS
Jan 24, 2003

The next BOJ governor

The Bank of Japan's governor, Mr. Masaru Hayami, is to retire in late March when his five-year term expires. At the moment, who will succeed him is a matter of speculation. There is no question, however, that the next governor will face the same difficult challenge that has confronted the outgoing governor:...
JAPAN
Jan 18, 2003

New Diet session opens up new questions

The Diet opens a 150-day session Monday amid widespread speculation in Nagata-cho that Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi may dissolve the House of Representatives and call a snap election sometime this year -- possibly even during the session.
EDITORIALS
Jan 16, 2003

From business to politics

A fter a nine-year break, Nippon Keidanren (Japan Business Federation) this year is resuming its role in mediating political donations from affiliated companies. The aim, of course, is to increase its influence on politics. In other words, Nippon Keidanren is seeking to sway politics with the policy...
JAPAN / Science & Health / NATURAL SELECTIONS
Jan 16, 2003

When two hemispheres of the brain work as one

The French surgeon Paul Broca had a patient in his care in 1861 who had fallen and broken his hip. Eighteen months earlier the man, called Lelong, had collapsed with a stroke that left him unable to speak. When Lelong died on Broca's ward, a hip fracture being a fatal condition in those days, an autopsy...
BASKETBALL / NBA / NBA REPORT
Jan 16, 2003

LeBron's new wheels really no big deal

NEW YORK -- What's all the frenzy and fury about LeBron James cruisin' around Akron in his new whip, a Hummer H2 purchased by mom, "To Son, With Love?"
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art / CERAMIC SCENE
Jan 8, 2003

Redeemers with feet of clay

Of the 14 ceramic objects designated as national treasures in Japan, the fact that no fewer than eight are chawan (tea bowls) is a clear sign of their importance in the culture.
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT / WILD WATCH
Jan 3, 2003

Vast visions made real

First of two parts These days the United States may not be pulling its weight and taking any kind of responsible lead vis-a-vis climate change and the Kyoto Protocol. In the past, however, there have been undeniable -- if occasional -- grand American visions or strokes of inspired leadership. One such...
CULTURE / Music
Jan 1, 2003

2002: The sound of a year

Chickens Coming Home to Roost Award Last fall, Dr. Dre was sued by an Indian composer who said the producer used a sample of the composer's music in Truth Hurts' hit single "Addictive" without permission and without giving credit. The composer accused Dre of "cultural imperialism" and "perpetuating...
COMMENTARY
Dec 26, 2002

A rising China lifts Asian economies

HONG KONG -- For many years now, a debate has raged over the political and economic implications of a rising China, both for the region and for the world. That China is rising is not a matter of debate.
COMMENTARY
Dec 23, 2002

Contrived crisis in education

Educational reform is becoming a political issue in Japan. At the center of the controversy is the Education Basic Law, which took effect in 1947 when the Constitution was established. Earlier this year the Central Council for Education, an advisory panel to the education minister, published an interim...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music / HIGH NOTES
Dec 18, 2002

Chris Botti: "December" & Ella Fitzgerald: "A Swinging Christmas"

At the end of the year, music takes an ugly turn. Blaring from speaker after speaker are the same feeble renditions of songs that sound worse with each passing commercialized year. And what's worse, you probably know all the words. Even on hearing background music, the lyrics start to circle uncontrollably...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY
Dec 15, 2002

Chushingura Chushingura

Snow has been the backdrop to some of Tokyo's most colorful and epoch-making events.
BASKETBALL / NBA / NBA REPORT
Dec 12, 2002

Tomjanovich should add Washington to staff

NEW YORK -- If Sacramento Kings president Geoff Petrie, a two-time NBA Executive-of-the-Year winner, wants to earn permanent Petey Props, he will apply for the NBA's first legal exception.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY
Dec 1, 2002

'Mongrel' seeker after new self-understandings

"One day, people will realize they are a mongrel people with a mongrel history."
COMMENTARY
Nov 21, 2002

Hu inherits but Jiang still leads China

HONG KONG -- As Chinese Communist Party's 16th Party Congress convened on Nov. 8, the delegates stood for two minutes of silence in memory of past leaders. Along with Mao Zedong and Zhou Enlai, one of the names read out was that of Liu Shaoqi. It was a pointed reminder of CCP tumult and strife in past...
COMMENTARY
Nov 20, 2002

North Korean motives fan speculation

SEOUL -- I have given a series of lectures on U.S. Asia policy in the weeks since the revelation about North Korea's secret nuclear weapons program. While the audiences and locations in South Korea, Japan and the United States have varied widely, the questions have been remarkably similar. Along with...
EDITORIALS
Nov 19, 2002

Mr. Hu at the pinnacle of power

Now that the Chinese Communist Party has completed a smooth leadership transition, the world is watching how Mr. Hu Jintao, the new party chief, will navigate his one-party socialist state of 1.3 billion people through the treacherous waters of globalization. Predicting his future course is complicated...
CULTURE / Music / HIGH NOTES
Nov 13, 2002

The Archie Shepp Quartet

Archie Shepp was handed the free-jazz mantle directly from John Coltrane. After contributing tenor sax to Coltrane's quintessential "Ascension" recording in 1965, Shepp went on to record his own series of visceral works in a similar revolutionary style. With a group of like-minded players, Shepp continued...
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT / WILD WATCH
Nov 7, 2002

A venerable flash in the pan

Among Japan's amazing diversity of plants that can overwhelm a visitor from overseas, there are (thankfully) some familiar forms. Astonishingly, given the literally hundreds of thousands of plant species on Earth, some here will be familiar whether you hail from North or South America, from Europe, Africa,...

Longform

After pandemic-era border regulations eased, Indian migrants began returning to Japan. Their population now stands at more than 50,000 across the country.
How remote work is rewriting the migrant experience in Japan