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COMMENTARY / World
Sep 4, 2005

Neo-emperor of evil genius

NEW DELHI — History is replete with myths woven by victors. The myths about Mao Zedong, including his military exploits and triumphs over imperialism and capitalism, have helped keep the Chinese communists in power, even as a transformed China now practices capitalism and presents itself as a large...
COMMENTARY
Sep 4, 2005

Neo-emperor of evil genius

NEW DELHI -- History is replete with myths woven by victors. The myths about Mao Zedong, including his military exploits and triumphs over imperialism and capitalism, have helped keep the Chinese communists in power, even as a transformed China now practices capitalism and presents itself as a large...
COMMENTARY / World
Sep 4, 2005

Neo-emperor of evil genius

NEW DELHI — History is replete with myths woven by victors. The myths about Mao Zedong, including his military exploits and triumphs over imperialism and capitalism, have helped keep the Chinese communists in power, even as a transformed China now practices capitalism and presents itself as a large...
CULTURE / Music
Aug 28, 2005

Cuban salsa godfather keeps his stories real

Despite the embargo imposed by the United States on Cuba since 1961, the music of this north Caribbean island has somehow made its way into every corner of the earth, including Japan. It is no coincidence that "The Sons of Cuba," the most recent film from the creators of "Buena Vista Social Club," culminates...
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel
Aug 26, 2005

Visitors become statuesque in Kawagoe

Tokyo may be big, but it's not big on history. The city's most popular historical spot, Asakusa, is centered on Asakusa Kannon temple, and its main hall was built in 1958. Frank Lloyd Wright's sublime Imperial Hotel survived the onslaughts of the 1923 earthquake and 1945 fire bombing, but didn't survive...
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / TOKYO FOOD FILE
Aug 19, 2005

Shimauta Paradise, Phuket Aroyna Tabeta: Urban oases for summertime dining

Trapped in Tokyo through another steamy summer and, not surprisingly, we are dreaming of south-sea islands. Sun-dappled beaches of pure white sand lapped by the calm, azure ocean; the wind soughing through fields of sugar cane; and a plate of stewed pigs' ears and goat sashimi washed down with high-octane...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / PERSONALITY PROFILE
Aug 6, 2005

Puneet Nanda

"The sari," said Puneet Nanda in Tokyo, "is a most elegant and amazing garment."
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Jul 17, 2005

Is it a crime to want realism?

DRAGON'S EYE, by Andy Oakes. Overlook TP, 2005, 460 pp., $14.95 (paper). Eight horribly mutilated bodies are found chained together in Shanghai's Huangpu River. Four of the corpses, the autopsies reveal, turn out to be recently executed criminals; two others are European males; one appears to be an overseas...
JAPAN
Jul 9, 2005

'Cool Biz' dress code spreads through halls of promotion

The "Cool Biz" casual dress code campaign launched by Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi on June 1 has spread to the bureaucracy, Diet and Supreme Court, but whether the intended effect -- of setting air conditioners at higher levels in cities to reduce carbon dioxide emissions and thus help curb global...
COMMUNITY
Jul 9, 2005

Humanitarian paints hope for students of Vietnam

Fred Harris looks around the Foreign Correspondents' Club of Japan in Yurakucho, central Tokyo, and observes with his usual keen but fond eye, "This was the first club I joined when I came here in 1964." (He was also in Japan while serving as a U.S. soldier during the Korean War.)
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / TOKYO FOOD FILE
Jul 1, 2005

Sekirei: In a beer garden of heavenly delights

The grass is as closely mowed a croquet lawn. In the distance, conifers jut into the early evening sky. The air is sultry, the city traffic just a far-off hum. A waiter wearing a black bow tie delivers a tall glass of frothing beer to your table. You sink back in your armchair. Summer's here, and there...
Japan Times
JAPAN / A GENERATION CLOCKS OUT
Jun 22, 2005

Manufacturers face mass reduction in skilled ranks

For manufacturers, the mass retirement of baby boomers will mean losing leagues of highly skilled workers still indispensable even in this age of automation and computerization.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Jun 22, 2005

Teaching the world to sing in perfect harmony

When Kazufumi Miyazawa, vocalist of the Japanese rock band The Boom wrote the song titled "Shima-uta" about 15 years ago, no one imagined the path it would take, starting as a huge domestic hit and then gaining a life of its own abroad.
CULTURE / Music / JAZZNICITY
Jun 19, 2005

Only one way to get that big band sound

Forming a jazz big band in this day and age is a somewhat insane undertaking. Scheduling the right musicians, writing elaborate arrangements and hiring a studio with the right equipment to record 16 players at once are headaches big enough to hold back even the most inspired leader. The bottom line for...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Jun 19, 2005

The community in mind as a matter of practice

RITUAL PRACTICE IN MODERN JAPAN: Ordering Place, People, and Action, by Satsuki Kawano. Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press, 2005, 152 pp., with b/w photos, $17.00 (paper). "Ritual" has meanings other than the primary dictionary definition, which insists upon the prescribed order of a religious ceremony...
CULTURE / Music
Jun 19, 2005

Only one way to get that big band sound

Forming a jazz big band in this day and age is a somewhat insane undertaking. Scheduling the right musicians, writing elaborate arrangements and hiring a studio with the right equipment to record 16 players at once are headaches big enough to hold back even the most inspired leader. The bottom line for...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art / NEW ART SEEN
Jun 15, 2005

The art that rocks the boat of war in Iraq

If you don't like U.S. President George W. Bush -- particularly if you don't support his war in Iraq -- then there is a new gallery exhibition in Tokyo that you will relish.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / CLOSE-UP
Jun 5, 2005

Seiji Hirao: Mr. Rugby

At the Rugby World Cup Sevens in Hong Kong in March, a group of eminent rugby journalists were talking about Japan's bid to host Rugby World Cup 2011.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY
Jun 4, 2005

Puppets build spirit and release pent-up feelings

Speaking from personal experience, Heather Goodwin believes that puppets can speak for human beings in ways that lead to improved health and confidence -- indeed, improvement all round. Heather teaches puppetry at Emerson College in Sussex, south of London in the U.K., and she will be in Tokyo this month...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
May 29, 2005

In the spirit of humanism

THE CINEMA OF GOSHO HEINOSUKE, by Arthur Nolletti, Jr. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2005, 243 pp., with photographs, $27.95 (paper). Though Heinosuke Gosho (1902-1981) is remembered in Japan where his films are still occasionally shown, he is all but unknown abroad. This neglect is not due...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY
May 21, 2005

Collaborating on Japan's photography masters

Mumi Trabucco and Kanji Embutsu share a passion for photography. Which is why -- if not how -- they have come to be working together on the two-day exhibition "Modern Masters of Photography -- Japan" to be staged at Prudential Tower in Tokyo's Akasaka-Mitsuke on May 28 and 29.
Japan Times
Features
May 15, 2005

Never-ending playtime

Remember when you were little and the days were long and filled with play? Back then, too, your playmates likely included a happy band of figures and stuffed animals that took on lives of their own in your imaginary world.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / PERSONALITY PROFILE
May 14, 2005

Takashi Kikuchi

The College Women's Association of Japan is already preparing for its 50th anniversary print show in October. Proceeds from this show each year are allocated to CWAJ's scholarship and education fund. Most beneficiaries are female graduates of different nationalities planning advanced studies in Japan...
EDITORIALS
May 10, 2005

The crimes of Mr. Taylor

West Africa appears to be a political tinder box. Real democracy is a distant dream and the life span of governments is determined more frequently by bullets than by ballots. Not only are there civil wars in several countries but the combatants (on both sides) commit atrocities against civilian populations....
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art / NEW ART SEEN
May 4, 2005

Girls in the company of wolves

For more than a decade female Japanese artists have been a dynamic force in contemporary photography, and now they are making big waves in other artistic media as well, as the phantasmagoric work of Tomoko Konoike best illustrates.
BASEBALL / BASEBALL BULLET-IN
May 1, 2005

History set to be made with first interleague games in Japan

By the time you read the next offering of the "Baseball Bullet-In" on Sunday, May 8, Golden Week 2005 will be over, and Japan pro baseball's first session of interleague play will have begun.
EDITORIALS
May 1, 2005

A peek over the wall

Hearing the words "gated community," most people in this country probably think of America -- and not with admiration. The phrase, after all, denotes privilege and exclusion, fear and distaste, not unlike those more heavily freighted labels of the past, "pale" or "ghetto."
SOCCER / PREMIER REPORT
Apr 29, 2005

Chelsea deserves credit for achievement, but may not get it

LONDON -- When Arsenal won the Premiership title last year even supporters of Tottenham Hotspur and Manchester United, the Gunners' two biggest rivals, had to acknowledge -- albeit through gritted teeth -- that it had been a fabulous achievement.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Apr 27, 2005

Russian diva's voice to die for

"Russians always need a little shit in our lives. If everything is good and we seem completely happy, then we become suspicious of that." This is Russian opera star Anna Netrebko's philosophy -- slightly incongruous for one who, at a glance, seems to have it all and to be enjoying every bit of it.

Longform

Rock group The Yellow Monkey played K-Arena Yokohama in June as part of a nationwide tour. Concerts are increasingly popular in the age of social media as users value in-person experiences.
Inside Japan’s arena boom: Sports, sound and city-building