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COMMENTARY
Oct 10, 2008

Distressed Chinese dairy companies get help

HONG KONG — At a time when the United States — and now Europe — is acting to rescue financial institutions such as Bear Stearns, Merrill Lynch and AIG, it is interesting to note that Chinese authorities are offering a hand to distressed companies caught in the contaminated milk scandal.
COMMENTARY
Oct 6, 2008

Counterproductive antiterrorism

Buried deep in the U.S. Pentagon somewhere is an official in charge of the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. As he goes about his daily chores — organizing the floor shackles, bully guards, illegal confinements, arbitrary trials and occasional torture sessions — he no doubt thinks he is...
Japan Times
JAPAN
Sep 30, 2008

N. Korea, viewed from the inside

North Koreans are aware of Kim Jong Il's reported illness and anticipating an end to his dictatorship, said a Japanese journalist who recently returned from the China-North Korea border.
Reader Mail
Sep 28, 2008

Is foreign rice really that bad?

Amid all the recent clamor over "tainted" foreign rice, Philip Brasor's Media Mix article of Sept. 21, "Koizumi branded the bad boy in latest food scandal," provides interesting food for thought. Apparently the rice in question was found to have 0.003 parts per million (ppm) of methamidophos residue,...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY
Sep 2, 2008

Urawaza — quirky, everyday Japanese tips — head West

Two years ago, a mysterious 20-second video clip triggered some unexpected buzz on the Web site YouTube. In the segment, an ordinary-looking housewife draws an invisible line across the chest of a shirt with her finger. Then she pinches the shirt under the armpit and at the shoulder, does a quick flipping...
JAPAN
Aug 23, 2008

Horie resumes blog after long cybersilence

Former Internet venture star Takafumi Horie is staging a comeback, but quietly, and with far less attention than he sought during his high-tech heyday a few years ago.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Aug 14, 2008

Kutcher gets lucky — in Vegas and in life

Model turned actor and TV producer Ashton Kutcher is the first to admit he's a very lucky man. In the mid-1990s he auditioned for several U.S. TV series before joining "That '70s Show," which in 1998 launched his career as a nationally known face.
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Aug 10, 2008

Celebrity rules as the Olympics strays far from its ideal

The big story this year in competitive swimming is the LZR Racer swimsuit, which was developed by the British sportswear manufacturer Speedo. At least six world records have been set by swimmers wearing the suit. Studies have shown that its drag-diminishing properties lower racing times by 1.9 to 2.2...
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Aug 3, 2008

The obsession over those dumbed down cute mascots

Japan is overrun with cute mascots. They represent everything from chain stores to police departments, and for the past decade or so there has been a marked increase in the popularity of one species of mascot called "yuru-kyara." The second half of this word stands for "character," while "yuru" is from...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / CLOSE-UP
Aug 3, 2008

Jiang Rong: Writing in a world of wolves

Jiang Rong (pen name of Lu Jiamin), who is now 62, was born in Jiangsu Province, China, and educated in Beijing. In 1967, at age 21, he volunteered to go and work in Inner Mongolia, where he'd heard about the practice of people there paying homage to "wolf totems" erected in the rolling grasslands that...
COMMENTARY
Jul 21, 2008

Birth of a massacre myth

With the Beijing Olympics looming we see more attempts to remind the world about the alleged June 4, 1989, massacre of democracy-seeking students in Beijing's Tiananmen Square.
JAPAN / G8 SUMMIT 2008
Jul 8, 2008

Souvenir press kits aim to drive environmentalism theme home

TOYAKO, Hokkaido — A resolution against global warming may not be issued at the Group of Eight summit, but journalists covering the Toyako gathering will at least head home with eco-friendly wristwatches and rechargeable batteries.
Reader Mail
Jul 6, 2008

Asking for trouble from police

Regarding Debito Arudou's July 1 Just Be Cause column, "July forecast: rough with ID checks mainly in the north": Arudou claims he was stopped at Chitose Airport (Sapporo) last month merely for being "Caucasian." Yet, on his own Web site, Arudou admitted that he had "hung around" and had a tape recorder...
JAPAN
Jul 6, 2008

Still 'efficient' G8 faces new realities

The 19th-century historian and political analyst Walter Bagehot divided affairs of state between what he called the dignified and the efficient. In the dignified category were great formal meetings of state, the pomp and ceremony surrounding heads of state and monarchs, and all the symbolic parades and...
JAPAN / G8 COUNTDOWN
Jul 1, 2008

¥60 billion G8 budget draws flak

Japan plans to spend more than ¥60 billion in taxpayer money to host next week's Group of Eight summit in Hokkaido and related events, prompting some to question if that sum could better be used to alleviate the national health-care and social welfare crises.
COMMUNITY / Issues / JUST BE CAUSE
Jun 3, 2008

Good news from grass roots

Reader Rodney in Vancouver recently e-mailed: "I've often found your articles informative and useful, but they tend to take a tone of complaint. Please tell us about some face-to-face, grassroots efforts that have helped make Japanese more considerate and respectful of those who are different."
SUMO / SUMO SCRIBBLINGS
May 27, 2008

Asashoryu mars Kotooshu's day of glory

In a shade over 250 years of recorded sumo history, no European has ever been crowned king of the ring. No European has ever held aloft the Emperor's Cup. No European has ever won a Grand Sumo Tournament.
Japan Times
SPORTS / SPORTS SCOPE
May 25, 2008

Morozov blames agent for breakup with Takahashi

When you have been in the business as long as I have, you develop a kind of sixth sense about when something is not right.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
May 16, 2008

R&B queen Double adds jewel to crown

Staying at the top of the game after 10 years is no mean feat in Japan's fickle music business. As one of the first artists to bring American-style R&B to these shores, Double's achievements are doubly impressive. And now she's celebrating her first decade with an album of collaborations with Japanese...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE ZEIT GIST
May 13, 2008

Team Japan faces huge hurdles on road to Homeless World Cup

Japan's collective image of homelessness is a fairly bleak one: Men in unwashed clothing, faces devoid of expression, hauling armfuls of flattened cardboard that will be their resting place for the night; rows of depressingly permanent-looking blue tarp huts in parks and beneath bridges, tucked out of...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE ZEIT GIST
Apr 22, 2008

Summit wicked this way comes

You've probably heard about July's G8 Summit in Toyako, in my home prefecture of Hokkaido. In case you're unfamiliar with the event, here's a primer from the Foreign Affairs Ministry:
SOCCER / PREMIER REPORT
Apr 19, 2008

Liverpool perseveres as owners air dirty laundry in public

LONDON — It says much about the new wave of Premier League owners that a hugely popular manager who feels his position is being undermined is considering his future despite continued success, while one jeered by the club's fans seems set to remain in charge.
COMMENTARY / World
Mar 26, 2008

Scary signs in BOJ debacle

HONG KONG — Even Google couldn't believe it. Asked to supply its best information about Koji Tanami, Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda's second "best available" candidate to be governor of the Bank of Japan (BOJ), the search engine instantly responded, "Do you mean Bank of Japan tsunami?"
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE ZEIT GIST
Mar 18, 2008

Police in dock over rape

Crimes by women and crimes against women in Japan receive uneven coverage in the press. Female suspects, particularly those charged with serious offenses, are so thoroughly skewered in the media that defense attorneys often complain that a fair trial is near impossible. Crimes against women receive...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Feb 22, 2008

Takagi taps the color of sound

Is Masakatsu Takagi a musician that makes video art or a video artist that makes music?
BASEBALL / HIT AND RUN
Feb 21, 2008

Power-hitting phenom Nakata thrust into spotlight

As if professional baseball isn't hard enough on rookies, try tackling what Hokkaido Nippon Ham newcomer Sho Nakata is probably about to go through.
Japan Times
LIFE
Feb 10, 2008

Eyewitness: Burma from the inside

Burma's Bloody September came home to people in Japan with the slaying of veteran freelance photojournalist Kenji Nagai on Sept. 27, 2007 in Yangon during a mass demonstration. The video clip showing him being gunned down by a Burmese soldier at point-blank range was repeatedly aired, arousing public...
Japan Times
JAPAN
Feb 7, 2008

Crown Princess panned for living high life

First, Crown Princess Masako feasted on classy Mexican fare from a 13-dish special menu in her honor. Then it was roast duck and shark's fin soup at a top Chinese eatery. A month later, she enjoyed a sumptuous repast at a French restaurant where the course featured exquisite black truffles.
EDITORIALS
Jan 24, 2008

Profiting on a scrap of information

The Securities and Exchange Surveillance Commission has launched an investigation of three NHK employees — two reporters and a director — on suspicion of insider stock trading. They are suspected of garnering ¥100,000 to ¥400,000 in profits after trading 1,000 to 3,000 shares on "insider" knowledge....

Longform

After the asset-price bubble crash of the early 1990s, employment at a Japanese company was no longer necessarily for life. As a result, a new generation is less willing to endure a toxic work culture —life’s too short, after all.
How Japan's youth are slowly changing the country's work ethic