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Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE ZEIT GIST
Jul 31, 2007

'Eikaiwa' vets look beyond Big Four

Globalization, the Internet and increased mobility have made the planet a smaller place. The world is now often referred to as a global community, and its lingua franca is undoubtedly English. It is the official language of air traffic control and the de facto language of both international business...
COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM NEW YORK
Jul 30, 2007

How a woman portrayed Hitler as human

NEW YORK — What kind of courage, or audacity even, is required to stage, in Washington, a play featuring Adolf Hitler — one provocatively titled "My Friend Hitler" and written no less than by Yukio Mishima? After all, not just Hitler, but anything associated with Hitler is condemned here. And Mishima...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Jul 29, 2007

Not all nonsense is silly

Erotic Grotesque Nonsense: The Mass Culture of Japanese Modern Times, by Miriam Silverberg. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2007, 370 pp., with many illustrations $49.95 (cloth) From the late 1920s on, the impact of the modern on traditional Japan had become so noticeable that some new terminology...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / PERSONALITY PROFILE
Jul 28, 2007

Katy Onda

On a recent announcement for a one-day cooking school, Katy Onda wrote that she would introduce a British menu suitable for the summer.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Jul 26, 2007

And the beat goes on

Weatherbeaten and remote, the fishing port of Ogi hardly seems like a cultural magnet. Yet the unassuming little community on the southern peninsula of Niigata Prefecture's Sado Island has achieved worldwide renown as the site of Earth Celebration, a music festival with a twist.
Japan Times
JAPAN
Jul 25, 2007

Unseated champ Takeru Kobayashi practices whole dog

Takeru Kobayashi prepares for the annual Nathan's International July Fourth Hot Dog Eating Contest the same way an Olympic athlete would prep for a track meet.
Japan Times
LIFE / Style & Design / ON: DESIGN
Jul 24, 2007

DoCoMo's Simpure L2, Uniqlo's Hotels Homes, etc.

Word play
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Jul 20, 2007

'Mala Noche'

Gus Van Sant's first movie feels like an unrequited first love; jagged around the edges, tingling with expectation and inevitably, gorgeously, unsatisfying. Titled "Mala Noche (Bad Night)" and based on the autobiographical novel by Oregon's cult novelist Walt Curtis, the film is so unabashedly poignant...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Jul 20, 2007

'Tennen Kokkeko'

Nobuhiro Yamashita scored an international hit in 2005 with "Linda, Linda, Linda," a comic drama about a schoolgirl band whose lead singer drops out just before a big school festival. When it was screened at the Udine Far East Film Festival last year, the audience whooped with laughter at its deadpan...
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel
Jul 20, 2007

A quick exit from Tokyo

In the lexicon of Japanese travel, the expression "An-Kin-Tan" — an abbreviated reading of the three kanji for yasui, chikai and mijikai — refers to journeys that are cheap, close and short.
EDITORIALS
Jul 12, 2007

Gambling on a show of strength

The weeklong siege against militant Islamists holed up in Islamabad's Red Mosque ended Tuesday when security forces stormed it in a fierce battle that left more than 50 militants and eight soldiers dead. If those killed since street battles between security forces and militants began July 3 are included,...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Jul 12, 2007

Graffiti artist comes in from the cold with a varied show that keeps its street cred

Thirty years ago, graffiti stepped off the street to became the darling of the modern art world. With its visual diversity, and despite its defiance of those who viewed it as vandalism, New York galleries came to embrace it during the 1980s in the name of the avant garde. But as Japan's still small-scale...
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Jul 7, 2007

How a look out to sea can help you determine lodging rates

Just as I was jogging down the beach past Amano-san's house, I saw her in her yard with a hoe, turning up the grass. I winced each time the hoe cut into the ground, digging up another patch of green, but she was working very hard at this. I suppose dirt is easier to take care of.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / TOKYO FOOD FILE
Jul 6, 2007

Eating your way along the coast

The ocean sparkles; the beach beckons; a breeze stirs the appetite. And the Shonan coast — an hour or so south of Tokyo by train — looks mighty appealing, especially the secluded inlets down the peninsula in genteel Hayama. That's where you'll find the Food File.
COMMENTARY / COUNTERPOINT
Jul 1, 2007

Food for thought — and a writ to go

Dear Reader: Today I bring you news of the most chilling and awful purport. Don't worry, it doesn't affect you — at least I hope it doesn't. It is yours truly who is getting the short end of the chopstick on this one. I tell you, I feel as if I've been reborn with a greasy spoon in my mouth — but...
BUSINESS
Jun 29, 2007

Doutor investors OK tieup with restaurant operator

Doutor Coffee Co. shareholders voted in favor of the company's proposed integration with Nippon Restaurant System Inc. on Thursday, undeterred by opposition from investment fund Harbinger Capital Partners, the largest outside shareholder in Doutor.
BUSINESS
Jun 28, 2007

Skeptical shareholders get apology from Fujiya

Fujiya Co. President Yasufumi Sakurai apologized Wednesday to shareholders for the confectioner's food sanitation problems that forced the suspension of operations at nearly 900 retail outlets and restaurants.
Reader Mail
Jun 27, 2007

Get the cat off the head

Regarding Kaori Shoji's June 12 article, "It's a dog's life when you wear a cat on your head," on the Bilingual page: There are some misleading comments about Japan and the Japanese in this article that I think need to be cleared up:
COMMENTARY / COUNTERPOINT
Jun 24, 2007

Maj. Gen. Okada: a rare leader who took the blame

How do you make an anti-war film? I don't mean those gore-driven "war is hell" spectaculars that often seem like a sub-genre of horror movies. I am referring to a work that prompts people in any country to say, "We must never allow this sort of thing to happen again — not to our own people and not...
Japan Times
LIFE
Jun 24, 2007

PARKLIFE: You'd be amazed

Pick a park. Get up early. Stay till late. In between you'll be amazed what goes on.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WHEN EAST MARRIES WEST
Jun 23, 2007

A doughnut by any other name

Basically, I try to live my life according to that time-tested maxim from the Roman philosopher Seneca, who said wisdom is knowing the proper limit of things.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / BEST BAR NONE
Jun 22, 2007

Duck Rock rides a new club wave

In the late 1970s, a club called Tsubaki House opened on the fifth floor of an office building on the southwest corner of Yasukuni and Meiji streets in Shinjuku. At a time when disco was still the rage, Tsubaki House was one of the few venues in Tokyo doing something different.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Jun 21, 2007

Soundtrack of the summer: Pet Shop Boys

Neil Tennant's genteel vocals were once the perfect ironic comment on the stylistic assertiveness of commercial pop, but as he's entered middle age and his themes have become more wistful (but only a little less ironic) he's turned into the Noel Coward of English dance pop. Fortunately, he and his silent...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Jun 16, 2007

Father's Day gifts on 100 yen

Dear Dad,

Longform

In 2020, 38% of all households were single-person. That figure is projected to rise to 44.3% by 2050.
The rise of AI companionship in a lonely Japan