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CULTURE / Music / HOGAKU TODAY
Jan 6, 2001

Japanese music gets support from New Year's tradition

New Year's in Japan is a period when Japanese suddenly seem to "rediscover" their traditional music. Radio and television stations, which, except for NHK, practically ignore traditional music for most of the year, get into the seasonal spirit and air programs of the classical performing and theatrical...
COMMENTARY
Jan 6, 2001

China and Taiwan fight over the WTO

WASHINGTON -- The changing of the political guard will soon be under way in Washington. Despite disquiet in many foreign capitals, few dramatic changes in U.S. foreign policy are likely.
JAPAN
Jan 5, 2001

Asahi, IHT to jointly publish daily

Major national newspaper Asahi Shimbun Co. will jointly publish an English-language newspaper in Japan with the International Herald Tribune, the Japanese daily said Thursday.
CULTURE / Film
Jan 5, 2001

A film genius in his own mind

Harmony Korine -- screenwriter of "Kids," director of "Gummo" -- fancies himself the enfant terrible of contemporary cinema. Well, he is . . . terrible. Certain critics have been calling him "the new Godard," and I'd agreewith that too. But when was the last time Godard made anything that played better...
CULTURE / Books
Jan 5, 2001

Have Japanese novelists lost touch with readers?

The fading interest in reading among younger Japanese first caused alarm several years ago in Japan, but I was recently startled to see a full page devoted to the topic in The New York Times' Book Review section (Dec. 10).
JAPAN
Jan 3, 2001

State manual outlines food-crisis scenarios

The government has drawn up a manual for a potential food crisis sometime this century on the basis of the new basic agricultural law, which came into force in July 1999, government sources said Tuesday.
JAPAN
Jan 3, 2001

Reform fledgling offspring of 'lost decade'

During the bubble economy of the late 1980s, few could have predicted the acute banking crisis and long economic malaise that have typified the past decade.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WHEN EAST MARRIES WEST
Jan 3, 2001

Kicking up a stink about smelling as natural as a skunk

While beauty traditionally belongs to the beholder's eye, correct hygiene might be better ascribed to his or her nose.
JAPAN / STAGING A COMEBACK
Jan 1, 2001

Carrying out reform is only the beginning for politicians

The final 10 years of the 20th century have been called a "lost decade" for Japan, which continues to suffer woes from the burst of the late-1980s bubble-economy. Japan's comeback as a globally competitive economic powerhouse will require fundamental reforms not only in the industrial and financial sectors...
JAPAN
Jan 1, 2001

Reporters following Mori find him blunt, hot-tempered

Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori has often lost his temper during his nearly nine months in office and expressed himself too bluntly, resulting in a number of controversial remarks, according to reporters who cover the prime minister's every move.
JAPAN
Jan 1, 2001

Emperor encourages all to overcome difficulties

As the Imperial family prepared to mark the first New Year's Day of the 21st century at the Imperial Palace, the Emperor expressed hope that the Japanese people will pull together to deal with difficulties such as the economic slump and the aging society and create a better future for all.
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 1, 2001

New opportunities for Japan-U.S. ties

The administration of U.S. President-elect George W. Bush will include many pro-Japanese officials. This reflects U.S. political history. Many officials of President Bill Clinton's administration had served under President Jimmy Carter, who came to power 12 years earlier. For example, former Secretary...
JAPAN
Jan 1, 2001

Millennial launch prompted more couples to get married

The number of marriages registered in Japan in 2000 rose by an estimated 26,000 from the year before to 788,000, with couples apparently wanting to tie the knot in a year billed as the start of the new millennium, the Health and Welfare Ministry said Sunday.
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 1, 2001

A question of hegemony

An implicit alliance has emerged in Washington since the Cold War's end between avowedly "Wilsonian" liberals, anxious to extend American influence and federate the democracies, and unilateralist neoconservative believers in U.S. power projection, who call for American world leadership, aggressively...
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 1, 2001

Progress alone won't be enough

IT, shorthand for information technology, was a buzzword in Japan in 2000. Never before had computers and the Internet caused such a furor in the media. To be sure, IT had created a boom several times in the past, but its impact had been confined to the corporate sector. In contrast, the latest boom...
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 1, 2001

The true meaning of civilization

History shows that on the eve of the collapse of the Roman Empire, its denizens reveled as if they were crazy. Just before Paris fell to German forces during World War II, dressed-up people danced all night at nightclubs in the city. And when the Cuban government of President Fulgencio Batista fell,...
JAPAN
Dec 31, 2000

Cities set to merge divided over new leader

It looked like a match made in heaven when, on Aug. 10, the two beaming mayors of Hoya and Tanashi shook hands on a deal to merge the two western Tokyo cities.
JAPAN
Dec 31, 2000

Elderly choke on yearend delicacy

Four elderly people have had traditional "mochi" rice cakes stick in their throats since Tuesday, causing the choking deaths of two of them, the Tokyo Fire Department said Saturday.
COMMUNITY
Dec 31, 2000

Michinoku Ginko chief banks on Japanese-Russian relations

Talk about a profitable end to the year. Invited to meet a Taisho man -- that is, someone born in the last year of what many consider to be Japan's most liberal period of the 20th century -- I was met in one location to be maneuvered into a taxi and delivered outside another: a nondescript utility block...
COMMENTARY / World
Dec 31, 2000

Solving the Kashmir dispute

Three of the world's most protracted conflicts are in Asia: the Palestinian-Israeli crisis in West Asia, Kashmir in South Asia and Korea in East Asia. The world's interest is engaged in South Asia because of the fate of over 1 billion people, the importance of India as the world's most populous democracy...
EDITORIALS
Dec 30, 2000

Economy still stuck in a rut

Looking back to 2000, the critical question hanging over the Japanese economy is: Has there been movement, or at least the preparations for a move, toward a new system befitting the start of a new century? The answer, unfortunately, is no.
BUSINESS
Dec 30, 2000

Haggling, fast turnover key to new fashion market

Young women browse through vogue clothes, leather jackets, accessories, wigs and colorful lingerie displayed at about 50 booths in Tondemun Sijan, a new fashion market in Tokyo's Shibuya Ward.
CULTURE / Art
Dec 30, 2000

Shadow between abstract and concrete

The geometrical dreams of Omar Rayo are awaking at Shinjuku Park Tower.
BUSINESS
Dec 29, 2000

FSA orders suspension for errant Nomura unit

Japan's financial watchdog said Thursday it has ordered a unit of Nomura Securities Co., the country's largest brokerage, to suspend part of its operations for two months from Jan. 9 as punishment for trading securities on behalf of foreign clients without contracts.
BUSINESS
Dec 29, 2000

100 yen stores now the shopping craze

Relatively new to a Japanese retail scene long dominated by now-suffering high-priced department stores and supermarket chains, 100 yen shops are catching on.
JAPAN
Dec 29, 2000

Shopping district tour shakes Mori's belief in full recovery

Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori recently confessed that his goal of realizing a full economic recovery has yet to be achieved.
BUSINESS
Dec 28, 2000

Online brokerage sure of success despite late entry

Tokyo-Mitsubishi TD Waterhouse Securities Co. was late to establish its online discount brokerage operations in Japan. When the joint venture between Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi and discount brokerage TD Waterhouse Group of the United States began accepting accounts in July, several major players had already...
COMMUNITY
Dec 28, 2000

Rescue center flies in the face of despair

Passersby are sure to do a double take when they see the wooden building on the corner of the busy intersection in Kawasaki, 15 minutes walk from Musashi Nakahara Station.

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