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Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT
Jan 3, 2007

'Superavians' scrape a high life in the suburbs

BRISBANE, Australia -- Summer has arrived in the leafy Brisbane suburb of St. Lucia. The only things falling from the trees are exquisitely scented frangipani flowers and the odd possum. Not much to rake up, but somebody next door has been at it half the day by the sound of it.
JAPAN
Dec 26, 2006

People slow to embrace offer of free hugs

embraces a passerby in the rain in Shibuya Ward, Tokyo, on Nov. 19. ERIC PRIDEAUX PHOTO
JAPAN
Dec 26, 2006

People slow to embrace offer of free hugs

embraces a passerby in the rain in Shibuya Ward, Tokyo, on Nov. 19. ERIC PRIDEAUX PHOTO
Japan Times
LIFE / Style & Design / ON: DESIGN
Dec 26, 2006

Easy Desk Aluminum, Waste Me Not Calendars, Plusminuszero's Humidifer, Metaphys' celtis game

The new year brings with it a perfect opportunity to make life improvements, or at least pretend to do so. This month's column, therefore, is about making you more productive, better organized (with a touch of eco-related ingenuity), enhancing the air around you -- as well as adding a bit of fun to our...
BASEBALL / BASEBALL BULLET-IN
Dec 24, 2006

Best Christmas gift might be cable or satellite TV

If you have not yet found that Christmas gift for the baseball fan in your family, an idea might be to get him or her a cable and satellite TV dish, tuner and service if you do not already have it. Otherwise, that fan will be watching fewer Japanese games in 2007 if your household has only terrestrial...
Japan Times
MORE SPORTS
Dec 20, 2006

Focused Matsui aims to promote squash

When the name of the sport is mentioned, most people would probably say they have heard of it. But they probably don't know how difficult it is to play it in Japan.
Japan Times
Reference / SO WHAT THE HECK IS THAT
Dec 19, 2006

Men's restrooms

Dear Alice,
Japan Times
LIFE / WEEK 3
Dec 17, 2006

How can anyone remember 100,000 numbers?

Unless you're a mathematician or an engineer, pi probably ranks high on the list of things that are of little or absolutely no use in your life.
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel
Dec 15, 2006

Go green in Tokyo

It's a great day, the sun is shining, it's not too cold, so how about a day of hiking in Tokyo?
JAPAN / CONSUMER LOAN CRACKDOWN
Dec 13, 2006

Will lending law revision put brakes on debt-driven suicide?

First in a series
JAPAN / CONSUMER LOAN CRACKDOWN
Dec 13, 2006

Will lending law revision put brakes on debt-driven suicide?

First in a series
JAPAN / Science & Health / NATURAL SELECTIONS
Dec 13, 2006

Polonium, peacocks -- and a dead spy

It's one of the biggest stories of the year -- and certainly the most unusual. I'm talking about the murder of Alexander Litvinenko, a former Russian spy living in London who was poisoned with a radioactive isotope last month. Nothing like this has been seen for nearly 20 years, back when the Cold War...
Japan Times
LIFE
Dec 10, 2006

Politics at the grass roots

Judging by the society pages of certain publications in Japan, politicians at both the local and national levels seem to spend a lot of their time being photographed with ambassadors, captains of industry, assorted aristocrats, passing film stars and all manner of other folk.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / VINELAND
Dec 8, 2006

Koshu: Japan's great white hope

Winemaking in Japan has a long but difficult history. At first glance, there's the auspicious fact that Japan lies at a similar latitude to sunny, dry California. But here, unlike California, the rainy season strikes during the early summer flowering, and recurrent typhoons batter vineyards just prior...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Voices / VIEWS FROM THE STREET
Dec 5, 2006

Views from Tokyo: What are the best ways to tackle bullying in schools?

Thomasina Larkin asks about the best ways to tackle bullying in schools
CULTURE / Books
Dec 3, 2006

Magic in the ordinary world

BLIND WILLOW, SLEEPING WOMAN by Haruki Murakami, translated by Philip Gabriel and Jay Rubin. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2006, 334 pp., $24.95 (cloth). Just as fiction that is purely mundane can be, well, mundane, fiction that is only fantastic is often only dull. Authors such as Paul Auster and Jonathan...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Dec 2, 2006

One man's trash, another's treasure

I remember my first years in Japan rummaging through the garbage on "sodai homi no hi" (big garbage day) I couldn't believe the things people threw out: perfectly good furniture, practically unused stereos etc.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Dec 1, 2006

Klaxons

While scores of Western bands have recently rediscovered the jarring joys of late-1970s punk-funk, creating an explosion of apoplectic guitar dance-'em-ups, few are as odd as Klaxons. Fusing this sound with an electro edge, the band have found themselves touted as glowstick-bearers of the so-called "nu-rave"...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music / JAZZNICITY
Dec 1, 2006

Ub-X freely tinkers with the engine of jazz

Piano, bass and drums form the engine of jazz. Most jazz bands build on this foundation by adding other instruments, while a select few work from within to upend the conventions of the piano trio and fashion a completely new sound. Ub-X, one of the latter, is a group that sounds like no other.
BASEBALL / BASEBALL BULLET-IN
Nov 26, 2006

Fan power fails this time, as 'Guts' bolts Fighters for Giants

Despite the best efforts of those Hokkaido Nippon Ham Fighters fans who sought to convince star player Michihiro Ogasawara to remain with the club, the infielder decided to use his free agency and switch to the Yomiuri Giants.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Voices / VIEWS FROM THE STREET
Nov 21, 2006

Where are your favorite night haunts?

Japan Times
Reference / SO WHAT THE HECK IS THAT
Nov 21, 2006

Samurai Scarecrows

Dear Alice,
JAPAN
Nov 20, 2006

Voters weighed both base issue and local economy

NAHA, Okinawa Pref. -- It was more than just the U.S. military bases. As Okinawans went to the polls Sunday to vote in the gubernatorial election, the local economy was also on their minds.
Japan Times
LIFE / WEEK 3
Nov 19, 2006

Decorum drives 'disingenuous' bid to free streets of discarded butts

Tokyo is home to some of the world's more bizarre museums, including ones devoted to such odd subjects as washing machines, curry, kites and parasites. The latest addition to this outre melange is the Mobile Ashtray Museum.
LIFE / Food & Drink
Nov 17, 2006

High tea and cocktails

The ghosts of Tokyo past may still haunt the inner recesses of Kagurazaka, but increasingly they are being hemmed in by the encroaching architecture of the brash modern city. As with Sakura Sakura, though, a small but growing number of the surviving prewar low-rise, timber houses are being given a new...

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