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Japan Times
LIFE / Travel / NATURE TRAVEL
Nov 5, 2002

Trapped in a cold tent by a strong wind outside

As readers may recall, our last Halloween horror story left us in Chobe national park, Botswana. Not the northern part of Chobe: the part with easy access, good roads, fantastic riverbank campsites and glorious views over the game-rich flood plain to the distant forests of Namibia. No. That would have...
EDITORIALS
Nov 3, 2002

A sneer heard round the world

Last week brought another of those bittersweet cultural anniversaries that seem bent on reminding us how hard it is to keep the cutting edge sharp, but also why it matters to keep trying.
JAPAN / Media
Nov 3, 2002

Vernacular Views

Philosophy Professor Kenji Tsuchiya of Ochanomizu Women's University has got a big problem, as related in his column in the weekly Shukan Bunshun.
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Nov 3, 2002

The many faces of Macao

MACAO, by Philippe Pons. Translated from the French by Sarah Adams. London: Reaktion Books, 2002. 135 pp. with 33 illustrations, £14.95 (paper) At the end of his splendid evocation of the city of Macao, Philippe Pons quotes a paragraph by journalist and novelist Italo Calvino about cities that "sometimes...
COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM MOSCOW
Nov 3, 2002

Terror in our own backyard

A key phrase in my recent e-mail exchanges has been, "The world has gone crazy." The hostage drama in Moscow; the shooting spree in the Washington, D.C. area; the bombing of two nightclubs in Bali; the Finnish teenager who blew up himself and six other people in a suburban shopping mall; the killing...
SOCCER / PREMIER REPORT
Nov 1, 2002

Saints skipper Strachan runs tight ship

LONDON -- It was, said Southampton striker James Beattie, "a moment of madness."
BUSINESS
Nov 1, 2002

Sumitomo posts 5.4% rise in profit

Trading house Sumitomo Corp. said Thursday its group net profit in the first half to Sept. 30 grew 5.4 percent to 21.41 billion yen, despite sales sinking 5.5 percent to 4.57 trillion yen.
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT / WILD WATCH
Oct 31, 2002

Birds' island havens failing whole species

Teuri-jima Island is a special place, being a legally protected breeding habitat of seabirds. It was also the main subject of a recent Japan-U.S. government-level symposium in the nearby mainland town of Haboro, Hokkaido. Shocking facts emerged from that meeting.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Oct 30, 2002

The noble art of collecting

Artists trying to earn a living before these days of government grants, international art fairs and global cultural celebrity were at the mercy of the people holding the purse strings. Teaching was (and remains) a way of getting by, but for the premodern artist, real security depended largely on catching...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art / NEW ART SEEN
Oct 30, 2002

Afloat but not adrift on the sea of dreams

As the fall exhibition season moves into high gear, there are a number of good shows going up at Tokyo's leading contemporary art galleries, and what is notable is that a fair number of them are based on well-defined themes.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Stage
Oct 30, 2002

Psyched up

Members of Keiko Takeya's Dance 01 company rehearse for "Psyche," to be presented in collaboration with Italy-based Iranian artist Hossein Golba. "Psyche" (meaning "breath, life and soul" in Greek) will employ the language of dance to evoke the fluid, metaphysical world of the intellect, says Golba....
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music / J-POPSICLE
Oct 30, 2002

Yaida takes off on flight of 'flancy'

Why monkey with a winning formula? That seems to be the logic behind singer/songwriter Hitomi Yaida's third album, "i/flancy," which reached No. 1 on the Oricon album chart for the week ending Oct. 28.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Oct 30, 2002

Louis XIV understood power, absolute power

Ovid's "Metamorphoses" (composed 8 A.D.) described the palace of the sun, tall-columned and fashioned from precious metals, inside which sat the radiant god Apollo on a throne studded with emeralds. The Roman poet's description was pure fantasy, but Louis XIV, King of France from 1643-1715, seemed set...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music / HIGH NOTES
Oct 30, 2002

Patricia Barber: "Verse"

Patricia Barber's singing, piano playing and songwriting have an intimacy that is veiled in intimation. She feels close, but elusive, as if she's constantly singing from the shadows. They are beautiful shadows, though, with an alluring stylishness. Over the course of seven releases, Barber has steadily...
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / BEST BAR NONE
Oct 27, 2002

Shake a leg down to Yotsuya for imported carnivale

Saci Perere is a remarkable little Brazilian nightspot -- not only for having survived for more than a quarter of a century, but also for having done so with never-diminishing energy. I think of the bar, which takes its name from a mischievous one-legged ghost in Brazilian folklore, as one continuous...
CULTURE / TV & Streaming / CHANNEL SURF
Oct 27, 2002

Romantics, reporter go far away, so close

In Japan, there's a commonly held romantic notion that people who really want to pursue certain kinds of ambitions have to go abroad to do so. Only by immersing oneself in an environment that offers no distractions from the goal can one truly master a discipline.
COMMUNITY
Oct 27, 2002

Putting the best face on death

People are said to look peaceful in death. But imagine if a deceased's family were to gaze fondly at their loved one only to find the face garishly caked with foundation, rouge and lipstick. Horrifying, or what?
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Oct 27, 2002

An unflinching look at the face of suffering

FEAR AND SANCTUARY: Burmese Refugees in Thailand, by Hazel J. Lang. Cornell Southeast Asia Publications: Ithaca, New York, 2002, 240 pp., $24 (paper) An army column enters a small farming village without warning. The soldiers have been taught that everyone there is a potential enemy. Should any villagers...
Japan Times
Uncategorized
Oct 26, 2002

Japan shares its antipollution expertise

The city of Kitakyushu has moved ahead of other municipalities in transferring Japan's industrial knowledge and technology -- including measures to combat pollution -- to developing countries.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Oct 26, 2002

Getting clubbed to keep up with the Satos

I have often thought I should "level up" my "life communication space" by joining one of the various clubs in my community, such as the pottery club or stained glass-making club. Although I would like to interact with my island community more, I hesitate because of the commitment. In Japan, people pursue...
SOCCER / PREMIER REPORT
Oct 25, 2002

Teen sensation Rooney has England buzzing

LONDON -- He's being called Ronaldo and after just nine Premiership appearances his shirt is the best seller in the Everton souvenir shop.
COMMENTARY / World
Oct 24, 2002

'Tax evaders' steal the talk of Shanghai

SEOUL -- A little over a month ago I was on the way to Shanghai to spend a month teaching at Fudan University. I read an article in a Hong Kong newspaper that said the topic on everyone's lips in China was the upcoming 16th National Congress of the Communist Party of China. This is the congress at which...
ENVIRONMENT / OUR PLANET EARTH
Oct 24, 2002

Getting up close and personal with global issues

While studying and researching in England several years ago, Eno Nakamura was surprised to find that Japanese and English children had strikingly different views of the future. That contrast convinced her of a critical need for Japanese schools to put more emphasis on "the future," and to get their students...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Stage
Oct 23, 2002

A musical that rewrites history

"Pacific Overtures" isn't one of Stephen Sondheim's most famous musicals, but the story it tells -- of the arrival of Commodore Matthew Perry's Black Ships in July 1853 and the opening of Japan to the West -- has been updated and given a new twist by a Japanese director and cast.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art / NEW ART SEEN
Oct 23, 2002

They don't make revolutions like this anymore

Way back when I was in college, images of Cuban rebel leader Fidel Castro (or Che Guevara, his right-hand man) were to be seen everywhere. Posters hung in student apartments and dorms, in teachers' offices, and in clubs, cafes and shops that catered to the campus crowd. The scruffy yet charismatic figure...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Stage
Oct 23, 2002

Take a flight of the imagination to the far side

Life in Tokyo is busy and routine, and it often seems that the chances of having a truly "new" experience become fewer as we get older. Similarly with the stage. If you've assiduously been going to the theater for more than 20 years, the freshness of the experience tends to fade. Regrettably, it is often...

Longform

Mount Fuji is considered one of Japan's most iconic symbols and is a major draw for tourists. It's still a mountain, though, and potential hikers need to properly prepare for any climb.
What it takes to save lives on Mount Fuji