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CULTURE / Music
Nov 26, 2000

Looking up so tears won't fall

Tragedy crushes some people, twists and mangles them in ways from which they never recover. Others emerge stronger, as if all the pressure had fused to produce a diamond. Violin prodigy Diana Yukawa shows such sparkle.
JAPAN / LIFE OFF MIYAKE
Nov 2, 2000

Assemblyman places fellow exiles first

The future of Miyake Island may be as hazy as the smoke billowing from its volcano, but for Kazuyoshi Yamada, it comes before his own losses.
CULTURE / Art
Oct 8, 2000

History and literature both enrobed

It is a mystery. How people took threads of silk and steeped them in poetry, passion and pride. How the line between art and life blurred in the weaver's hands. How, in short, Japanese artisans created garments that went far beyond fashion to enter the timeless realm of beauty.
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Sep 7, 2000

Educational TV: PTA knows best?

The Data Watching section of the Sept. 7 issue of Dime contains the results of various unrelated surveys regarding the current state of parent-child relationships. In addition to questionnaire answers about corporal punishment and what constitutes bad behavior, there is a list compiled by the Japan PTA...
JAPAN
Sep 1, 2000

Group explores cross-cultural links

This summer, the usual revelers in Tokyo's Shinjuku Ward encountered a group of apparently out-of-place people who were on a mission to explore the nocturnal life of this multicultural town.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Aug 13, 2000

Seven key ways to enjoy the rest of your days

I've finally figured out why Japanese people don't take more vacations -- they don't want to. Work is comfortable and safe for them. Vacations offer too much adventure. Japanese people try to avoid using the "f" word: Fun.
JAPAN
Aug 12, 2000

Young journalists cover Republican National Convention

PHILADELPHIA -- Mika Maeda, a 16-year-old high school student from Kanagawa Prefecture, made her journalistic debut last week here at the Republican National Convention.
BUSINESS
Aug 11, 2000

Sumitomo, Mitsui firms eye 401(k)

Eight companies belonging to the Sumitomo and Mitsui groups announced Thursday that they will jointly set up a company in September to handle the 401(k) type of pension plan expected to be introduced next year.
BASEBALL / MLB
Jul 25, 2000

Japan unveils Olympic baseball squad

Eight professionals, including Seibu Lions star Daisuke Matsuzaka and Kintetsu Buffaloes slugger Norihiro Nakamura, have joined 16 top amateur players in Japan's baseball squad for the Sydney Olympics in September.
COMMUNITY
Jul 23, 2000

I am, therefore who am I? An artist's search for self

What is the link between a 12-meter-long bronze snake slithering into the future as part of an exhibition for the physically and mentally challenged and the 20 brains (made from materials as diverse as pebbles and chili peppers), eight costumes, pieces of body armor and fragments of temple roof tile...
JAPAN
Jul 20, 2000

Kadena Air Base noise stirs memories of war

NISHINOMIYA, Hyogo Pref. -- For many elderly people living near the U.S. Kadena Air Base in central Okinawa, aircraft noise is intolerable not only because it disrupts their sleep but also because it brings back unbearable memories of war, according to Kozo Hiramatsu, an expert in acoustic ecology.
COMMUNITY
Jul 19, 2000

Teachers share solutions to school concerns

People arriving in Japan in their professional capacities frequently see little more of the country than the interiors of taxis, hotel rooms and sterile offices, with the occasional tourist sight in central Tokyo thrown in.
COMMUNITY
Jul 9, 2000

Funding films by finding housing for foreigners

Walking with Akio Sakurai to his real estate office in Tokyo's Chuo Ward, he told the story of an Indian couple -- the husband working for a major European bank -- for whom he had found an apartment. The day before they were due to sign the contract, the landlord rang and withdrew the offer. A Japanese...
JAPAN
Jun 22, 2000

Japan health systems ranked best

Japan's health systems are the best among the 191 member countries of the World Health Organization, according to a WHO survey in the World Health Report 2000, released Wednesday.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WHEN EAST MARRIES WEST
Jun 21, 2000

The dying truth

In our marriage, my Japanese wife and I have met and resolved oodles of cultural issues, but one fairly thorny matter remains . . . how to face that ultimate marital crisis: death.
LIFE / Travel
Jun 4, 2000

Unlikely hero fights for Mindanao

MANILA -- The potential locked up in the island of Mindanao -- in its resources, its environment and, perhaps most importantly, its people -- is just waiting to be tapped.
CULTURE / Art
Jun 1, 2000

Tea goes down well in Washington, D.C.

WASHINGTON -- A beautiful Japanese tea room emerges as one enters and goes down the hall in Katherine Lyons' and Austin Babcock's spacious brick house. In this quiet neighborhood in suburban D.C., Lyons, or Soshu, her tea name, teaches the Urasenke tradition of chanoyu. The house has been Urasenke's...
BUSINESS
May 25, 2000

Bank deposit, insurance policy safety nets enacted

The Diet passed a bill Wednesday to create a new mechanism to safeguard deposits in the event of bank failures after the current blanket deposit protection system is lifted in April 2002.
BUSINESS
May 23, 2000

Sumitomo, Sakura back in black

Sumitomo Bank and Sakura Bank returned to the black in fiscal 1999, partly due to gains from sales of stocks and fewer bad-loan writeoffs compared to the year before, according to their earnings reports released Monday.
BUSINESS
May 10, 2000

Five firms tie up on trust bank

Four Japanese financial institutions have teamed up with Deutsche Bank AG to acquire DMG Trust Bank, a Deutsche Bank subsidiary, with the intention of turning it into Japan's first trust bank specializing in administering corporate pension funds, company officials announced Tuesday.
CULTURE / Art
May 7, 2000

Jewels of the printmaker's art

"I call these my jewels," said Joanna H. Schoff, as we bent to catch a gleam of silver in the softly lit museum. Treasures indeed, but instead of the brilliance of diamonds we were looking at far gentler beauties: rare gems of Japanese printmaking from the 1800s.
COMMUNITY
Apr 13, 2000

Grassroots effort helps sick kids

Like many of his Russian countrymen, 33-year-old Nikolai Lanine is not quick to smile. His steady and intelligent speech is punctuated with almost imperceptible shoulder shrugs, the body language of someone describing a seemingly futile situation, yet his actions provide evidence to the contrary.
LIFE / ALTERNATIVE LUXURIES
Apr 6, 2000

The alchemical way of self and bamboo

"The etymology of the word 'God' in English is totally different from the Japanese word kami, and has a completely different sense," says master charcoal burner Hironori Takebayashi, in his deep, laconic voice.
COMMUNITY
Apr 6, 2000

Sisters doing it for themselves at any age

Seiko Kuboi stops at the end of the catwalk and poses with hand on hip, showing off her gold lame-edged jacket, long black skirt and black bolero hat. The crowd goes wild. "Whoo-hoo! Looking good! Great hat!" they scream in raucous appreciation.
COMMUNITY
Apr 2, 2000

Activist monthly comes to Japan

When Caitlin Stronell first came to Japan in 1984 to spend a year in Tochigi Prefecture, her father gave her a subscription to the U.K. cooperatively produced monthly magazine New Internationalist. "He thought it'd keep me in touch with social and political activism in the rest of the world, while giving...
COMMUNITY
Mar 26, 2000

Lebanese Marie-Rose has a lot to say on love

Last Tuesday Marie-Rose Ishiguro was at odds with her handbag. Dressed in a bright red suit, with gold jewelry and matching buttons, she looked every inch the power executive. But her battered brown leather bag -- more a holdall really, handles secured with string and spilling papers, books and clothes...
CULTURE / Art
Mar 26, 2000

Impressions of an overlooked artist

In February 1866, three young artists tramped along the frosty paths of Fontainebleau, declaring that nature would ever be their muse. One, handsome, rich and carefree, would follow that muse until he lost everything except the respect of his friends. He died in poverty, in a home stacked with unsold...
BUSINESS
Mar 24, 2000

Daiwa's rogue trader dreams of a return

ATLANTA -- The culprit in a financial scandal that rocked Japan nearly five years ago now has his eye on a second shot at the financial arena from a most unlikely place -- a small town some 60 km northeast of Atlanta.
COMMUNITY
Mar 24, 2000

On speaking to a tulip in the garden

Late in the autumn I dug up a spot of earth in my small garden and planted a tulip bulb. Several days later, frost fell and before long snow covered the garden. When spring arrived the next year and the snow had all but disappeared, the tulip broke through the earth, sending out its sturdy stem and green...

Longform

Bear attacks have dominated Japanese news headlines in recent months, with 13 people so far having been killed by the animals.
Japan’s bears have been on their killing spree for more than 100 years