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LIFE / Travel / NATURE TRAVEL
Oct 18, 2000

Ghost hunting in York

With Halloween just around the corner this column bravely steps beyond the boundary of nature travel and pops its toes into the chilling twilight realm of "supernature" travel.
ENVIRONMENT / WILD WATCH
Oct 18, 2000

Seeing spots before your eyes

Rain brings changes to the African savanna. As storm clouds near, even the smells change. The temperature flutters, falls; the stuttering, buzzing and sawing of insects takes on a different pitch; then a hush, before the pittering of raindrops splashes dust from the baked ground. The pittering turns...
CULTURE / Books
Oct 17, 2000

Japanese will fight for rights

THE RITUAL OF RIGHTS IN JAPAN: Law, Society, and Health Policy, by Eric A. Feldman. Cambridge University Press, 2000, 219 pp., 14.95 British pounds (paper). Debunking myths is a noble endeavor, especially for scientists who are in the business of separating fact from fiction. The belief that Eric Feldman...
JAPAN
Oct 16, 2000

Rail firms to beef up mobile-phone ban

A Tokyo subway operator and six major private railway firms plan to launch a joint campaign today to stress their ban on mobile-phone use in trains during rush hour, due to the danger of interference with pacemakers, the companies announced Sunday.
MORE SPORTS
Oct 16, 2000

Halard-Decugis, Schalken claim Japan Open tennis titles

It was death by a thousand cuts or, to put it another way, victory by a thousand errors.
JAPAN
Oct 15, 2000

Dioxin in mother can shrink son's prostate gland: report

Even minute quantities of dioxin in a pregnant woman may cause shrinkage of her son's prostate gland and weaken his immune system, according to the results of recent experiments on rats conducted by a Japanese scientist.
CULTURE / Books / POETRY MIGNETTE
Oct 15, 2000

Rexroth revolution comes home to Japan

Yokohama-based essayist and poet Morgan Gibson has been and continues to be one of the most prolific contributors to Japan's English literary scene. Of his own work he had poems published in the 1970s in pioneering journals like One Mind and Kyoto Review and later, in the '80s, in publications like Blue...
MORE SPORTS
Oct 15, 2000

Lapentti, Schalken book spots in Japan Open tennis final

With the top three seeds out of contention, it was left to the fourth seed, Ecuador's Nicolas Lapentti, to lead the way into the final of the Japan Open tennis tournament on Saturday, and the world No. 16 duly obliged with a clinical 6-3, 6-4 victory over Slovakia's Dominik Hrbaty.
JAPAN
Oct 15, 2000

Japan 'has never apologized': Zhu

Visiting Chinese Premier Zhu Rongji stated Saturday that Japan has never officially apologized to the Chinese people for its wartime aggression and said he wants the Japanese people to consider that fact.
BASEBALL / MLB
Oct 15, 2000

Hawks pitcher Fujii passes away at 31

Daiei Hawks pitcher Masao Fujii died at a Fukuoka hospital Friday. He was 31, three days short of his 32nd birthday. Fujii had been hospitalized at the National Kyushu Medical Center for interstitial pneumonia.
COMMENTARY / World
Oct 15, 2000

Olympic success puts Sydney at the top

SYDNEY -- So you liked watching the world's best-ever Olympic Games? Wait, there's more. Hold that remote control for the next sports extravaganza from Australia, the Sydney 2000 Paralympics.
COMMUNITY
Oct 12, 2000

Till bedtime do us part

At midnight every night, Shoko Ohara, a 39-year-old construction company employee, drives to the station to pick up her hard-working husband Takeshi, an engineer. The two chat during the 10-minute ride to their suburban home, and while Takeshi takes a bath, Shoko warms up his dinner in the kitchen. She...
SPORTS / SPORTS SCOPE
Oct 12, 2000

Bunny thrives in Predators' den

Yujiro Nakajimaya, captain of the Kokudo Bunnies and a member of Japan's national team, is not your average Japanese professional hockey player. In four teenage years spent at Notre Dame College, a high school in Wilcox, Saskatchewan, the Hokkaido native gained more than just a fluent command of English....
JAPAN
Oct 12, 2000

Nobel Prize surprises Tsukuba chemist

Hideki Shirakawa of Japan and Americans Alan Heeger and Alan MacDiarmid have been awarded the Nobel Prize in chemistry for their discovery that some plastics can conduct electricity. Shirakawa, 64, a professor emeritus at the University of Tsukuba, Ibaraki Prefecture, said the honor came as a total...
COMMENTARY / WASHINGTON UPDATE
Oct 11, 2000

U.S. race is too close to call

The 2000 U.S. presidential election campaign closely resembles a roller-coaster ride. The candidates are gyrating up and down in the polls, both in momentum and in spirit.
JAPAN
Oct 11, 2000

Scholar hits execs' Bangkok flings

When Yoko Kusaka moved to Bangkok with her family in 1996, she decided to pursue postgraduate studies in sociology, focusing on the corporate entertainment practices of Japanese companies in the city.
LIFE / Travel
Oct 11, 2000

In the quiet domain of the stone Buddhas

As you turn into the quiet country road leading to Usuki's Buddhist rock carvings, a stone torii gate, riveted into the earth, deeply corroded by wind and rain, comes into momentary view. Standing in a field of rippling green paddy, it is an unintentional signal that you have entered a different time...
COMMENTARY
Oct 9, 2000

The crystal balls grow opaque

All kinds of "self-confident" experts make predictions in the mass media about the economy and politics. In Japan, such experts are rarely held accountable if they err in their predictions. In the late 1980s, when the bubble economy peaked, Japanese experts expressed the following opinions that later...
BASEBALL / MLB
Oct 8, 2000

Hawks clinch PL crown

The Daiei Hawks clinched their second straight Pacific League crown on Saturday with a 1-0 victory over the Orix BlueWave in Fukuoka.
MORE SPORTS
Oct 8, 2000

Predators feast on Penguins in Tokyo

YONO, Saitama Pref. -- The smallest man on the ice had perhaps the biggest impact in the game Saturday afternoon as Cliff Ronning and his Nashville Predators skated to a 3-1 win over the Pittsburgh Penguins at Saitama Super Arena.
COMMUNITY
Oct 8, 2000

Occupational therapy via 'Women and Socks'

It is a rare thing to find any actress of middle years who has never been out of work for more than six months. Especially one willing to explore both biculturally and bilingually her country's history and the sensitive subject of postwar relations.
MORE SPORTS
Oct 7, 2000

Purple princess outdukes Dokic

Serena Williams might aspire to be the queen of women's tennis, but for now she's merely aiming to be a Toyota Princess.
JAPAN
Oct 6, 2000

NPA targets credit card fraud

The National Police Agency said Thursday it will develop a data-sharing system aimed at curbing the surge in crimes involving counterfeit credit cards, which caused losses exceeding 9 billion yen last year.
JAPAN
Oct 6, 2000

University organization aims to build regional ties

An organization of universities in Asia and the Pacific is promoting "life-long friendships" among young scholars to contribute to peace and prosperity in the region, one of the group's top administrators said.
CULTURE / Stage
Oct 6, 2000

Strange thing happened while crossing the bridge

Strange things, collaborations. Much admired by the devout acolytes of grant-dispensing foundations in the interests of "crossing cultures" and "mutual understanding," these unfortunate buzz phrases have thrown together more than a few unwieldy alliances in the fields of dance and theater.
COMMUNITY
Oct 5, 2000

Vanity, thy name is . . . Vince?

SAN FRANCISCO -- Clairol, the staid manufacturer of women's hair dyes, tried something new this year: It went after kids.
LIFE / Style & Design / BEAUTY EAST AND WEST
Oct 5, 2000

The power of St. John's wort: A herb to make you happy

In these days of miracle medication for nearly any psychological complaint, the botanical alternatives are getting a lot of attention. There have been happiness remedies around for millennia, of course; as with most botanical treatments, the knowledge is ancient.
OLYMPICS
Oct 4, 2000

Highs and lows of Sydney 2000

Citius, Altius, Fortius -- faster, higher, stronger.

Longform

Once smoky, male-dominated spaces, today's net cafes, like Kaikatsu Club, are working to make their operations more attractive to women customers.
The second life of Japan's net cafes