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Japan Times
SPORTS / SPORTS SCOPE
Jan 16, 2015

USOC gets Olympic bid wrong again

"Once you become predictable, no one's interested anymore."
Japan Times
ASIA PACIFIC / Crime & Legal
Jan 16, 2015

Macau sex ring bust shows China expanding crackdown on graft

The arrest of a prominent Macau executive in the largest prostitution bust in the city's history shows Chinese President Xi Jinping is broadening his crackdown on corruption to restrict even long-tolerated vices.
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 15, 2015

Shaping China's influence

It is in the best interests of Japan, the U.S., South Korea and Australia to become members of the China-established Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, to join China in shaping the future.
JAPAN
Jan 15, 2015

Trial classes for 2020 Games volunteers planned in Hachioji, Koganei

Tokyo will launch training seminars on a trial basis next month for volunteers interested in providing linguistic help to visitors at the 2020 Olympics.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Jan 15, 2015

'Jules Pascin Exhibition'

Traveling was a major source of inspiration for Jules Pascin (1885-1930), a painter who was of Italian-Serbian and Spanish heritage and born in Bulgaria. Educated in Vienna and then in Munich, he later moved to France, where in the 1920s he became a significant figure of the Modern School of Paris. This...
BASEBALL / Japanese Baseball / HIT AND RUN
Jan 12, 2015

Fighters' Saito braces for vital year

Yuki Saito is hard at work in Chiba, at Kamagaya Stadium, the Hokkaido Nippon Ham Fighters' ni-gun base, these days. He's busy preparing for the upcoming season, which might turn out to be a pivotal one for the star pitcher.
WORLD
Jan 12, 2015

Move over Nessie, Scotland gets new, prehistoric marine reptile

Scotland has its very own prehistoric marine reptile — and, no, we're not talking about Nessie, the mythic Loch Ness monster.
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel
Jan 10, 2015

Between a rock and an art place in Kurashiki's merchant quarters

Timing, as they say, is everything. With a bad habit of turning up to places and appointments too early, I often find myself wandering through train stations and pocket parks, and past the shuttered doorways of shops.
COMMENTARY / Japan / COUNTERPOINT
Jan 10, 2015

The people's Emperor speaks truth to power

Emperor Akihito began the new year with a statement that pointedly referred to two major controversies: war memory and nuclear energy. His thoughts on these demonstrate why he is so admired by the public and underscore the crucial role the 81-year-old monarch plays in contemporary Japan.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Books
Jan 10, 2015

Cataloging the creatures of the unknown

"Yokai dwell in the contact zone between fact and fiction, between belief and doubt ... Yokai begin where language ends," says Michael Dylan Foster in the introduction to "The Book of Yokai," summing up what words often fail to conjure. His book takes readers on a journey into the inexplicable, mysterious,...
COMMENTARY / Japan
Jan 8, 2015

College entrance exams fail to make the grade

Before Japan's Central Council for Education undertakes the formidable task of revising Japan's university entrance exam, it needs to understand why such exams, both here and in the U.S., fail to make the grade.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Stage
Jan 7, 2015

'Flies' festers at core of family life

Central to William Golding's dystopian novel "Lord of the Flies" is the notion of violence as a social construct. "Maybe there is a beast ... maybe it's only us," says the protective Simon before a hostile assembly of other schoolboys marooned on the uninhabited island where the English Nobel laureate...
Japan Times
Places
Jan 6, 2015

Winter travel destinations in Japan

Our natural inclination might be to stay indoors during winter, but Japan offers such a wide range of cold climate destinations, from skiing off piste in Hokkaido’s Niseko to soaking in onsen in Nagano. Here’s a selection of locations well worth the trek.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / A TASTE OF HOME
Jan 6, 2015

Embark on a Peruvian adventure without boarding a flight

Sitting in the wood-clad, dimly lit dining room of the Miraflores restaurant, I begin to feel like I'm planning a year volunteering abroad. A glance at the Peruvian flag on the wall, the figurines on the bar counter and the map plastered across the door, and I imagine gleefully imposing myself on whichever...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Jan 6, 2015

Jazz trumpeter Toshinori Kondo issues a challenge to modern-day musicians

On a chilly Friday afternoon in December, trumpet player Toshinori Kondo reclines in the clutter of his Kawasaki recording studio, pours out two cups of shōchū liquor, and starts to explain what prompted him to abandon a lucrative career in Japan and move to Amsterdam in 1993.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / THE HIGH GROUNDS
Jan 6, 2015

Nozy Coffee knows blends are old news

Sometimes a bit of youthful brashness goes a long way. Masataka Nojo was still just a university student when he started his coffee empire in 2009, from a humble coffee stand in Kanagawa Prefecture's Shonan region.
Japan Times
JAPAN / AT A GLANCE
Jan 4, 2015

Ginza: Tokyo's beacon of prosperity

Ginza, Tokyo's posh shopping and entertainment district, has delighted visitors for over a century with high-end shops selling everything from jewelry and clothing to sweets and stationery.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Entertainment news
Jan 3, 2015

Bono 'may never play guitar again'

Bono, the front man of the Irish rock group U2 who was injured in a cycling accident last year, said on Friday his recovery has not been easy and he may never play guitar again.
Figure Skating / ICE TIME
Jan 2, 2015

Machida's decision to quit both selfish and untimely

Tatsuki Machida's sudden retirement at the Japan nationals in Nagano last week came as a shock to just about everybody.
COMMUNITY / Voices / COMMUNITY CHEST
Jan 1, 2015

Readers' letters: Roppongi, Ferguson, 'Massan,' Julien Blanc and more

Some emails received in response to Community articles at the tail end of 2014.
JAPAN / History
Jan 1, 2015

Donald Keene reflects on 70-year Japan experience

My first visit to Japan was very short, only a week or so in December 1945. Three months earlier, while on the island of Guam, I had heard the broadcast by the Emperor announcing the end of the war. Soon afterward, I was sent from Guam to China to serve as an interpreter between the Americans and the...
Reader Mail
Dec 31, 2014

Tourists want to go off the track

Regarding the Dec. 23 Jiji article "Tourists flocking to Japan but few venture off the beaten track": I have escorted 10 tours to Japan from Australia over the last few years and we certainly have ventured off the beaten track, visiting such places as Cape Soya and Cape Nosappu in Hokkaido, Fukaura,...
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / NAGOYA RESTAURANTS
Dec 30, 2014

Head to a temple for a New Year's meal

Although there are countless places to visit on New Year's Eve, one of the liveliest is Osu Kannon, a temple that is busy most days of the year and packed to the brim during the holidays.
Japan Times
WORLD
Dec 30, 2014

Their nation in pieces, Iraqis ponder what comes next

The machine gun poking out from between a framed portrait of a Shiite imam and a stuffed toy Minnie Mouse was trained on anyone who approached the checkpoint.
JAPAN
Dec 29, 2014

Shibuya shuts parks, thwarting year-end soup distribution for homeless

Tokyo's Shibuya Ward closes three parks for more than a week to prevent supporters of the homeless from carrying out traditional year-end soup deliveries.

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