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EDITORIALS
Jan 11, 2012

Pension cuts coming

The government plans to reduce public pensions over three years starting in fiscal 2012, saying that it has overpaid by 2.5 percent. The overpayment has resulted from the Liberal Democratic Party-Komeito government's decision.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WHO'S WHO
Jan 10, 2012

Paper artist Gannon cut his own niche

Patrick Gannon admits he loves puzzles. As a literature major and aspiring writer in university, he delighted in deconstructing ideas and consciously pulling together disparate pieces to make a whole. Twenty years later, as a "cut paper" artist in Japan, Gannon, 40, employs the same intellectual techniques,...
LIFE / Language / KANJI CLINIC
Jan 9, 2012

The Kanji of the Year for 2011: human ties that bind

Every November, in its Kanji of the Year poll, the Japanese Kanji Aptitude Testing Foundation invites the public to vote for the character that best symbolizes the year drawing to a close. It then announces the winner in mid December.
LIFE
Jan 8, 2012

Stories spiked despite journalism's mission to inform

Olympus isn't the only story that has been or is being ignored or squashed by powerful forces in Japan. Here are three more gems from that rich vein.
BASKETBALL / BJ-LEAGUE NOTEBOOK
Jan 6, 2012

Big man Holm gives Albirex a powerful presence inside

What was the best offseason pickup by a bj-league team?
BUSINESS / YEN FOR LIVING
Jan 5, 2012

Mahjong parlors go deeper underground to stay in business

Police get wise and crack down on some of the mahjong industry's more creative ideas.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Dec 31, 2011

Year of the dragon — it'll be a hot one

The year of the dragon, (tatsu, ryu or ryo in Japanese) is upon us — and now just hours before the New Year, I can see the dragon peeking out of his lair, counting down the seconds until he is allowed to take over the world for a year. As midnight approaches, he waits . . . 10, 9, 8, 7, ready to pounce...
COMMENTARY
Dec 31, 2011

Year of revolution and crisis

Every year brings changes, but some years really are turning points: 1492, 1789, 1914, and 1989, for example. Does 2011 belong in the august company of such Really Important Years? Probably not, but it definitely qualifies for membership in the second tier of Quite Important Years.
JAPAN
Dec 31, 2011

Euro drops below ¥100 for first time since 2001

The euro weakened for a sixth day against the yen on Friday, dropping below 100 for the first time since June 2001, on concern Europe's debt crisis will weigh on the region's economic growth.
JAPAN / EXPLAINER
Dec 27, 2011

Many angles to acquiring Japanese citizenship

Nationality has long been a controversial issue in Japan. For most, it is something they are born with; for others, it is something they had to fight for. For some, nationality may be a source of pride, while for others, it may be the cause of discrimination.
COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM NEW YORK
Dec 26, 2011

Strange how isolationist stance can ruin a politician's reputation

Perhaps because it's a round number, the 70th anniversary of Japan's assault on Pearl Harbor has given me the impression that more articles on it saw print than in the past, except for, as I recall, the 50th anniversary of the same.
COMMENTARY
Dec 26, 2011

The Korean god that failed and then was gone

Major historic chapter-ending news often seems so terribly sudden. Many North Koreans were said to be sincerely weeping over the demise of "Dear Leader" Kim Jong Il, but for other people around the world, the end came none too soon. Their eyes are quite dry and will so remain, for as long as there is...
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Dec 23, 2011

Sapporo battles for Vietnam 'guzzlers' as China beer market slows

Japanese brewers are looking past China's $57 billion beer market to a country with less than one-tenth the population: Vietnam.
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE ZEIT GIST
Dec 20, 2011

Four years after 'Nova shock,' eikaiwa is down but not out

Ask any ordinary person what significance Oct. 26 holds and you might find them struggling for an answer, but for many involved in Japan's beleaguered English teaching industry, it was the day the nation's premier operator fell into administration and took much of the rest of the industry with it.
COMMENTARY
Dec 19, 2011

Motivation for college study

These days we often hear that there are two signs that the Japanese people, especially youths, have become inward-looking: The number of Japanese students going overseas for study has declined sharply, and far fewer employees in the public and private sectors are willing to take up posts outside the...
BASKETBALL / HOOP SCOOP
Dec 18, 2011

Don't expect Japanese basketball to embrace a real, workable plan

Every few months a false sense of hope surfaces on the blogosphere and in the mainstream media, where optimists peddle the message that Japan's basketball "leaders" finally have their act together, that a new men's pro league will, ahem, finally replace the outdated, increasingly irrelevant JBL and the...
Japan Times
MULTIMEDIA
Dec 15, 2011

Painting a picture of Yumeji Takehisa

A persistent and lingering myth is that Yumeji Takehisa (1884-1934), who forwent conventional art training at a sanctioned institution and earned widespread popular appeal for all the things the arts were supposedly not, was unimportant to the fine arts.
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Dec 14, 2011

Sony's buying binge said wrong ploy to beat Apple

Sony Corp. Chief Executive Officer Howard Stringer has announced acquisitions worth $8.4 billion this year to bolster phones and content. That may not be enough to turn around a company heading for a fourth consecutive loss.
CULTURE / Books
Dec 11, 2011

Deng: China's tarnished visionary

DENG XIAOPING and the Transformation of China, By Ezra F. Vogel. Belknap Press, 2011, 876 pp. $39.95 (hardcover) Deng Xiaoping is one of the most influential men in modern history and here his dramatic story, one intertwined with elite intrigues in the Chinese Communist Party, is recounted in detail...
Japan Times
JAPAN
Dec 10, 2011

Nisei vets, 92, unite via parallel lives

The lives of George Nakamura and Yukio Kawamoto have followed amazingly parallel paths.
COMMENTARY
Dec 9, 2011

Russia's cooperation options for design of a trade scheme

Nowadays the trend toward trade and investment liberalization is developing under restraints of the opposite — protectionist — tendency strengthened by the shaky and unpredictable world situation, which in turn was created by the global financial and economic crisis.
SOCCER / SOCCER SCENE
Dec 8, 2011

Reysol ready to take on world after shock title

It would have taken a brave person to tip Kashiwa Reysol for the 2011 J. League title before the season had begun. But as the newly crowned champions prepare to take on Auckland City in the Club World Cup on Thursday, it would take an even braver person to deny they deserved it.

Longform

Growing families are being priced out of Tokyo’s condo market, forced to choose between downtown convenience and suburban space.
Is living in central Tokyo still affordable?