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BUSINESS
Aug 21, 2007

Fukui to keep pushing for higher rates, defying Abe

Bank of Japan Gov. Toshihiko Fukui may say no to an interest rate increase this week. It won't be his last word on the subject.
BUSINESS
Aug 21, 2007

Abe to lead huge biz entourage to India

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, who says relations with India may become more important than Japan's links with the U.S. or China, will lead his biggest corporate mission to the South Asian country Tuesday.
MORE SPORTS
Aug 19, 2007

Moses trying to help less fortunate hurdle obstacles

Edwin Moses was an untouchable, unbeatable performer as a track and field superstar during his heyday in the 1970s and '80s.
COMMENTARY / World
Aug 19, 2007

Something's up as 'buy' confidence slips

NEW HAVEN, Connecticut — The sharp drop in the world's stock markets on Aug. 9 — after BNP Paribas announced that it would freeze three of its funds — is just one more example of the markets' recent downward instability or asymmetry. The markets have been more vulnerable to sudden large drops than...
Japan Times
LIFE / WEEK 3
Aug 19, 2007

Mere death needn't be a barrier to enjoying a nice cup of tea with the deceased

'Tick, tock, tick, tock," goes the clock of human life. Living with regrets is one of the hardest things to do. What if your dad died and you hadn't had that last cup of tea with him? Not much you can do about that — or so you might think.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY
Aug 18, 2007

Classical accordionist finds harmony with Asia

Another a fine example of synchronicity if ever there was one!
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Aug 17, 2007

'Factotum'

The work of poet/author Charles Bukowski, America's "Budweiser Baudelaire," has always had a kind of contradictory appeal. On the one hand, Bukowski, a misanthropic alcoholic, delivered a harsh, no-holds-barred account of life on the skid-row underbelly of society. And yet he did so with such prosaic...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Aug 17, 2007

Girls have all the fun

If there was a festival anthem to this year's Summer Sonic, it was "Girls Just Wanna Have Fun." The overflowing crowd at Cyndi Lauper's Sunday set on the Sonic Stage was mostly made up of women who mouthed every word to her string of hits. And when she finished with her biggest hit, the female members...
BUSINESS
Aug 14, 2007

Inflation shows Japan is doing OK again

Inflation, deflation, disinflation; expansion and contraction, it can do your head in. Markets are all about balloons and bubbles at different stages of contraction and expansion. The art is to get the best out of the expanding balloon, avoiding the deflating ones along the way.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE ZEIT GIST
Aug 14, 2007

Abuse, racism, lost evidence deny justice in Valentine case

In 1999, a Brazilian resident of Japan named Milton Higaki was involved in an accident that killed a schoolgirl. Rather than face justice in Japan, he fled to Brazil fearing "discrimination as a foreigner in Japanese courts."
COMMENTARY / World
Aug 12, 2007

India set to enter Africa as a competitor

LONDON — China's increasing influence in Africa has attracted great attention in recent years. But Asia's other rising power, India, is also becoming more active on this front, as its economic links are moving beyond its traditional partners in the British Commonwealth.
COMMENTARY / COUNTERPOINT
Aug 12, 2007

Forsake not the elderly, for they bear a great bounty

They are remodeling the station near where I work in Tokyo, and I marvel at the diligence of the security guards directing pedestrians inconvenienced by the building work. Virtually all the guards are seniors, most likely retirees from other forms of employment. I usually arrive at my station by 6 a.m.,...
Reader Mail
Aug 12, 2007

Hypocrisy of the nuclear powers

Regarding Brad Glosserman's July 30 article, "Ending the nuclear threat": This article is misleading, supercilious and biased toward the United States. Neither the Proliferation Security Initiative (2003) nor United Nations Security Council Resolution 1540 (2004) has been very effective.
CULTURE / Books
Aug 12, 2007

Nothing romantic about being yakuza

Yakuza Moon: Memoirs of a Gangster's Daughter by Shoko Tendo, translated by Louise Heal. Tokyo: Kodansha International, 2007, 192 pp., $22.95 (cloth) The late author Koji Kata, a prolific chronicler of crime in contemporary Japan, once observed, "Nobody ever set out in life with the aim of becoming...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Aug 10, 2007

Steely Dan

In their 1970s heyday, when Steely Dan didn't play live, there's no telling how much fans would have paid to see their favorite studio recluses on stage.
EDITORIALS
Aug 9, 2007

U.N. acts, at last, on Darfur

The United Nations Security Council at long last has agreed to send a peacekeeping force to Darfur. The decision to send "blue helmets" is a critical step in the attempt to bring peace to the troubled region. But peacekeepers are only a means to an end. Real peace depends on a political settlement and...
EDITORIALS
Aug 7, 2007

Summer break in Baghdad

The most important question for Iraq is: Does the presence of foreign military forces prevent its descent into civil war, or do they permit the Baghdad government to avoid taking responsibility for the nation's future? The decision by the Iraqi Parliament to take a summer recess despite failing to take...
COMMUNITY
Aug 7, 2007

Pride vs. prejudice

Japanese people take 10 months to gestate, have longer intestines and higher body temperatures. And there are no gays in Japan.
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Aug 5, 2007

Keeping the horror of Hiroshima alive

Masako's Story: Surviving the Atomic Bombing of Hiroshima, by Kikuko Otake, edited by Dr. Jesse Glass. Tokyo/Toronto: Ahadada Books, 2007, 94 pp. with photos and maps, $15 (paper) The cenotaph for the Hiroshima victims reads "Let all the souls here rest in peace, for we shall not repeat the evil," but...

Longform

Dangami House is a 180-year-old former samurai residence of the Kato clan, who ruled over Ozu, Ehime Prefecture, until the Meiji Restoration.
A house, a legacy and the quiet work of restoration in rural Japan