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EDITORIALS
Dec 5, 2010

A Tokyo subway merger?

This year saw author, social critic and Tokyo Vice Gov. Naoki Inose call for uniting Tokyo's two subway systems, Tokyo Metro and the city-run Toei subway. The two sides have entered talks but are still far from agreement.
COMMENTARY / World
Dec 5, 2010

Know them by their bliss

NEW YORK — What's the best way to really know someone? Is it to uncover their daily worries, hassles or fears? To discern what traits they most hide from others, and perhaps even from themselves?
COMMENTARY / World
Dec 3, 2010

North Korea evokes pity and condemnation

UNITED NATIONS — Amid severe food shortages affecting up to a quarter of the population, horrific human rights abuses, and an expanding and costly nuclear weapons program, the United Nations has tried to respond to North Korea with a combination of carrots and sticks.
JAPAN
Dec 2, 2010

UNESCO selects Nicol woodland

The UNESCO branch in Japan announced Wednesday that writer and environmentalist C.W. Nicol's Afan Woodland Trust has been registered as one of its "future heritage sites."
COMMENTARY
Nov 29, 2010

Trigger-happy Indian cops cut corners to deliver quick justice

CHENNAI, India — India's democracy is being increasingly tarnished by its police force, which uses brutally illegal methods to deal with crime. Some officers are staging incidents to murder people who have been arrested on suspicion of committing particularly heinous offenses.
JAPAN / Media
Nov 28, 2010

Nicholas Bornoff, Japan Times writer and author of 'Pink Samurai,' dies aged 61

Nicolas Bornoff, who died of cancer in London on Oct. 30, was my predecessor as a film critic at The Japan Times, starting in the late 1970s and continuing for nine years. His style, in contrast to fellow reviewer Andy Adams' slangy journalese, aimed for the elevated and authoritative, which made me,...
LIFE / Travel / BACKSTREET STORIES
Nov 28, 2010

Eats, shoots and leaves in Hakusan

It's hunting season in Tokyo. I kit up and trek out to the Hakusan area of Bunkyo Ward, hoping to shoot (with camera) the wild shades of autumn.
COMMENTARY
Nov 27, 2010

NATO's Afghan nightmare

The agreement at the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) summit meeting in Lisbon on a transition plan to help end the war in Afghanistan within the next four years raises troubling questions about regional security and the global fight against transnational terrorism. As the United States and...
CULTURE / Film
Nov 26, 2010

Radcliffe, Watson prepare to graduate from Hogwarts

HOLLYWOOD, California — W hen asked about longtime "Harry Potter" costar Emma Watson, with whom he stars in the penultimate film of the blockbuster movie franchise, actor Daniel Radcliffe says: "She's great. She'll go far, professionally and educationally."
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink
Nov 26, 2010

Reel in the catch of the season

The long, record-breaking hot summer hasn't been good for sanma, or Pacific saury. Catches of this normally inexpensive fixture of the fall dinner table in Japanese homes have been so poor that its prices have skyrocketed — if you can find any to buy at all. Another popular fish that is in peak season...
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WORDS TO LIVE BY
Nov 25, 2010

Showa Women's University President Mariko Bando

Mariko Bando, 64, is the president of Showa Women's University in Tokyo. She is also a best-selling author with more than 30 books under her belt, including "The Dignity of a Woman," which has sold over 3 million copies. An advocate of women's rights, Bando is director of the Japan National Committee...
COMMENTARY / World
Nov 25, 2010

China and India exposed

BERKELEY, Calif. — Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao's forthcoming trip to India, following hard on the heels of President Barack Obama's recent visit, will provide another opportunity for the media to gush about the growing global economic clout of China and India. We can be sure that the soft underbellies...
Japan Times
LIFE / Lifestyle
Nov 25, 2010

Mozart's growing influence on food

Although the claim that listening to Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's complicated scores can boost your IQ has been debunked, its effect on bananas has yet to be disputed. So in July, the Hyogo Prefecture-based fruit company Toyoka Chuo Seika shipped out its first batch of "Mozart Bananas" to supermarkets in...
COMMENTARY
Nov 24, 2010

Always expect the unexpected in politics

LOS ANGELES — Sometimes truly strange things happen in life. For those of us on America's West Coast, who would have thought that Jerry Brown would become governor of California again? His first time out as our chief state executive (in his 30s, and full of rather unconventional ideas), they called...
COMMENTARY
Nov 23, 2010

Let trade transform Burma

NEW DELHI — The election process in Burma has altered its political landscape, giving birth to new institutions and players, triggering a generational change in the armed forces, bringing to power the military-backed Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP), and facilitating the release of prodemocracy...
JAPAN
Nov 23, 2010

Japan hand Chalmers Johnson dead at 79

OSAKA — American author and scholar Chalmers Johnson, whose views on postwar Japan angered American academics and Japan experts in the late 1980s but influenced a generation of students studying the country, died Saturday in California at age 79.
ENVIRONMENT / WILD WATCH
Nov 21, 2010

The explosion of life: uprising

First of two parts
COMMENTARY / World
Nov 21, 2010

Recalling the foundation of modern tyranny

NEW HAVEN, Conn. — Eighty years ago, in the autumn of 1930, Josef Stalin enforced a policy that changed the course of history, and led to tens of millions of deaths across the decades and around the world. In a violent and massive campaign of "collectivization," he brought Soviet agriculture under...
COMMUNITY
Nov 20, 2010

A modern-day alchemist melds senses of sight, smell

On the back of Maurice Joosten's business card, a silvered phrase floats across the otherwise blank expanse: "Solve et Coagula" ("Dissolve and Unite"). For Joosten, 48, this ancient dictum of alchemy provides a motto linking his work as an artist, aroma designer and yoga instructor.
COMMENTARY
Nov 18, 2010

A new great game in Asia

U.S. President Barack Obama's 10-day Asian tour and the consecutive summit meetings of the East Asian Summit (EAS), the Group of 20 and the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) helped put the spotlight on Asia's security challenges at a time when tensions between an increasingly ambitious China and...
Japan Times
LIFE / Lifestyle
Nov 18, 2010

Worlds of Flavor conference adds Japan to its menu

Japan's ailing economy may lack the impact it once had on global finance, but there's one area of influence where the country's significance is on the rise: the world of gastronomy. Earlier this month, a team of 39 top-tier Japanese chefs wowed an international audience with dazzling displays of technique...
COMMUNITY / Voices / HAVE YOUR SAY
Nov 16, 2010

The final word on JET, for now

Arudou misses the mark Debito Arudou's recent article on the JET (Japan Exchange and Teaching) Programme (Just Be Cause, Sept. 7) and many of the responses which followed (Have Your Say, Oct. 12):
CULTURE / Books
Nov 14, 2010

Bloody imperial rumble in Burma's jungle

The prologue to this stupendous book opens in Yamagata, where a Japanese general from World War II is struggling to atone for the deaths of soldiers who lost their lives under his command in India. They had been trying to mount an assault from Burma, which Japan had already conquered.
COMMENTARY / World
Nov 11, 2010

Dreaming of a new Edo era

SEOUL — All eyes have shifted to Seoul as Group of 20 leaders convene Thursday and Friday for the first time in the South Korean capital. The choice is long overdue, as South Korea is a remarkable success story: In one generation, the South Koreans, formerly pummeled by civil war, under constant threat...
COMMENTARY / World
Nov 10, 2010

Building the India-United States partnership

WASHINGTON — U.S. President Barack Obama's first presidential visit to India offers a unique opportunity to cement a global partnership with a rapidly emerging power. Set to become the world's third- or fourth-largest economy by 2030, India could become America's most important strategic partner.
COMMENTARY
Nov 7, 2010

The life and times of an American 'mentor'

LOS ANGELES — As far as I know, Nebraska-born Theodore "Ted" Sorensen, who died last week at 82, disagreed with me only twice. He was right both times.
JAPAN
Nov 4, 2010

No end in sight to Ryoma craze

From Prime Minister Naoto Kan to Sapporo Beer, lawmakers and companies are invoking the image and legacy of Sakamoto Ryoma, the 19th century samurai who helped overhaul Japan's government and economy. Kan mentioned Ryoma in a speech June 8, the day he became prime minister, drawing comparisons between...

Longform

A small shrine perched atop rocks braves the waves hitting the shoreline during a storm in Shimoda, Shizuoka Prefecture. The area is under threat of a possible 31-meter-high tsunami if an earthquake strikes the nearby Nankai Trough.
If the 'Big One' hits, this city could face a 31-meter-high tsunami