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COMMENTARY / COUNTERPOINT
Oct 7, 2012

For the young to get on board, Japan's irksome business ways must change

"How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying" is a satirical book by American writer Shepherd Mead that was a huge best-seller in 1952 before being made into a musical that premiered on Broadway nine years later. It tells the story of J. Pierrepont Finch, an ambitious young fellow who works his...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives
Oct 6, 2012

Video journalist's work takes him to centers of the world's conflicts

Takeharu Watai has spent all of his two-decade career in video journalism as an independent. But he is conscious that public distrust of the mass media, particularly over its coverage of the Fukushima nuclear disaster and the nation's nuclear energy policy, has grown so strong that, by default, it extends...
Japan Times
LIFE
Sep 30, 2012

Telework answers rural and disabled needs

Disaster mitigation and a better "work-life balance" for staff are not the only benefits of having employees working outside the office, an increasing range of companies are now coming to realize.
COMMENTARY / World
Sep 26, 2012

Transforming how India addresses its problems

Last month, I visited the Jaipur Foot clinic in New Delhi. You may have heard of the Jaipur Foot. It is both an invention — a prosthetic foot made from cheap materials costing about $45 (versus $8,000 for a similar device in the United States) — and an amazing, low-cost network of clinics around...
Japan Times
LIFE
Sep 23, 2012

Street dance sweeps young Japan

The cool, wild and powerful movements of rhythm-heavy hip-hop dance are gripping the body and soul of ever more Japanese children and young people.
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.
COMMENTARY / COUNTERPOINT
Sep 9, 2012

Putin's siege-mentality Russia now firmly in the grip of a 'cold civil war'

There is an old Soviet-era Russian joke about two rival groups of archeologists who cannot agree on the age of a mummy discovered in Central Asia. At their wits' end, they call in the NKVD — the name of the dreaded KGB in Stalin's time — to settle the dispute.
EDITORIALS
Sep 9, 2012

Upper hand on pneumonia

Deaths from pneumonia have been on the rise as the graying of Japan's population progresses. Utmost care is necessary to prevent old people from succumbing to pneumonia. In 2011, some 125,000 people died of pneumonia. Of these, 97 percent were 65 or older. Pneumonia may be described as the biggest enemy...
Japan Times
JAPAN / EXPLAINER
Sep 4, 2012

Part of aging process: Preparing for the end

When young people say "shukatsu," they mean job-hunting. But nowadays, older people are grimly playing on the word by changing the kanji for "shu" to convey a different kind of activity: preparing for "the end."
COMMUNITY / Issues / JUST BE CAUSE
Sep 4, 2012

Toot your own horn — don't let the modesty scam keep you down

As per this column's title, this month's topic was chosen, well, "just because" it's been on my mind.
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE ZEIT GIST
Sep 4, 2012

With Berlitz beaten but not bowed, union fights on

Before instructors became embroiled in a fierce legal battle with Berlitz Japan, there was a time when the English language school chain's robust image made it a top choice among foreign job-seekers.
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE ZEIT GIST
Sep 4, 2012

Our mixed-race children deserve better than this, so why bother with Japan?

When it comes to parceling out rights, Japanese law makes a very clear distinction: What you get depends upon whether you are a Japanese citizen or not. Sort of.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / CLOSE-UP
Sep 2, 2012

Film star Satoshi Tsumabuki moves up to a new stage

Wearing a headband and tracksuit, Satoshi Tsumabuki — the 31-year-old darling of the Japanese entertainment world — was easy to spot among a crowd of actors in a rehearsal studio in downtown Tokyo recently. He was there preparing for "Egg," Hideki Noda's new play, which opens Wednesday at the Tokyo...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Issues / LIGHT GIST
Aug 28, 2012

How did we end up here, in 'Hashimotopia,' 2022?

Walking home the other night, I glanced furtively over my shoulder and clocked the notorious tattoo-enforcement police heading in my direction. I ducked into a nearby konbini and cursed that bad decision inked onto my forearm in the 1990s.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WHO'S WHO
Aug 28, 2012

American photojournalist combines traditional with modern in daily life

Everett Brown's lifestyle is a reflection of his philosophy on life.
COMMENTARY
Aug 20, 2012

Measuring a society's value

Guan Zhong, an ancient Chinese savant, once stated that people learn to behave with good manners only when they have sufficient clothing and food.
EDITORIALS
Aug 15, 2012

The minimum wage dilemma

The number of people receiving livelihood assistance known as seikatsu hogo (literally, livelihood protection), Japan's final social safety net, increased for nine consecutive months and reached a record 2,108,096 as of March 2012.
LIFE
Aug 12, 2012

Japan's Paralympians overcome adversity by leaps, bounds and innovative design

When Oscar Pistorius made his dramatic debut in the men's 400-meter race in London last Saturday — becoming the first double amputee to compete alongside able-bodied athletes in Olympics history — some people might have wondered if the South African's artificial legs gave him a competitive edge over...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives
Aug 11, 2012

Import club caters to need for home comfort

The blonde man in shorts and a baseball cap, sporting a lopsided grin and a dangling backpack and parking a rusty bicycle, looked less like a captain of industry than a superannuated college student. Yet American Chuck Grafft, 50, is founder and CEO of Foreign Buyers Club, one of the largest importers...
JAPAN
Aug 7, 2012

Noda forges on as temperatures rise

Tokyo is in the dead of summer and if anything, things are only getting hotter in the political hub of Nagata-cho.
COMMUNITY / Issues / JUST BE CAUSE
Aug 7, 2012

For nikkei immigrants in Japan, it doesn't have to be a bug's life

As Beto awoke one morning from uneasy dreams, he found himself transformed in his futon into a gigantic cockroach.
COMMENTARY / COUNTERPOINT
Jul 29, 2012

In our time of global aggression we could learn from the 'Land of Sorry'

Back in 1991, I was offered a tenured position at a university in Kyoto. Needless to say, this was a big step for me and my family, who were all looking forward to settling into Kyoto life.
EDITORIALS
Jul 26, 2012

Obsession with a safety myth

The government-commissioned panel charged with investigating the nuclear crisis at Tokyo Electric Power Co's Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant submitted its final report to Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda on Monday. The report made clear that obsessed with the myth of nuclear safety, both Tepco and the...
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE ZEIT GIST
Jul 24, 2012

How I learned to stop worrying and embrace the atom

Like millions of other people in Japan, I watched the events of March 2011 unfurl with shock and trepidation. The massive earthquake, the terrible tsunami and then what seemed to be a dreadful nuclear disaster.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WORDS TO LIVE BY
Jul 24, 2012

Noriko Hama, Japanese economist and Dean of Doshisha Business School

Noriko Hama, is a Japanese economist, the Dean of Doshisha Business School in Kyoto and a contributor to The Japan Times. Well known for her candid television commentaries, popular columns, she is completely absorbed in the world of economics, and utterly unfazed by its ups and downs. Hama has never...
Japan Times
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Jul 22, 2012

Strength in numbers for protesters, but just how many are there?

Ever since last summer, when antinuclear demonstrations materialized in response to the Fukushima nuclear reactor meltdown, there's been an ongoing argument about just how many people show up for these protests. Conventional wisdom says the organizers exaggerate the numbers while the major media underestimate...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives
Jul 21, 2012

Architect builds Heart House for 3/11 survivors

When Richard Bliah visited Ishinomaki last August after the coastal city in Miyagi Prefecture was devastated by the March 11 earthquake and tsunami, the veteran French architect was quite sure many residents lost not only family and friends but also the "network of people living in the same area" —...
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Jul 21, 2012

Raw beef liver not alone in Japan's big menu of extreme foods

The ban on serving raw beef liver at restaurants in Japan is a small victory for the bovine community. The question now is, will this cause a black market to fill the gap? Could mere cow tipping turn into liver-stealing? Will we have little yatai restaurants inside pastures with cows on display the way...
COMMENTARY
Jul 20, 2012

Italy's curse of the undead: Berlusconi to 'bunga' again?

Abraham Lincoln was right: You can fool all the people some of the time, and you can fool some of the people all of the time, but you cannot fool all the people all the time. Unfortunately, his dictum is irrelevant to modern Italian politics.

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