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Japan Times
WORLD / Science & Health
Sep 6, 2013

Science's great unknowns: 20 unsolved questions

What is the universe made of? Astronomers face an embarrassing conundrum: they don't know what 95 percent of the universe is made of. Atoms, which form everything we see around us, only account for a measly 5 percent. Over the past 80 years it has become clear that the substantial remainder is comprised...
Japan Times
WORLD / Crime & Legal
Sep 6, 2013

Meet the journalist who calls Mexico's drug war 'a big lie'

During January 2011, Anabel Hernandez's extended family held a party at a favorite cafe in the north of Mexico City. The gathering was to celebrate the birthday of Anabel's niece. As one of the country's leading journalists who rarely allows herself time off, she was especially happy because "the entire...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Sep 5, 2013

Director James Mangold puts soul into Wolverine's demons

"The Wolverine" may look like just another in a long line of superhero movies to hit the screen this year — it's the latest installment in Marvel's "X-Men" franchise — but it's certainly the first one directed by a guy who cites director Yasujiro Ozu of "Tokyo Monogatari (Tokyo Story)" fame as an...
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / TOKYO FOOD FILE
Sep 5, 2013

Bépocah: Just like they cook it in Peru — but in Tokyo

It's not easy for a new restaurant to stand out, or to even gain a foothold, in a city of the scale and sophistication of Tokyo. Bépocah manages that feat with ease — and in two very different ways.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Sep 4, 2013

Shuji Terayama's underground public stage

Thirty years on from the death of Shuji Terayama, Japanese theater's most avant-garde provocateur continues his renaissance with a show of his films, photography and, most importantly, theater works at the Watari Museum of Contemporary Art, which follows on from the recent showing of printed ephemera...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Sep 4, 2013

Pianist Ai Kuwabara to live out her dream on stage at Tokyo Jazz Festival

Pianist Ai Kuwabara is waxing nostalgic at the offices of her record label, East Works Entertainment, in Tokyo's Minato Ward.
WORLD
Sep 4, 2013

Obama strains to win over public on Syria

President Barack Obama has turned the question of whether to strike Syria into an extraordinary national sales job — seeking to convince skeptics in Congress and among the public that military action would be worth the risk.
JAPAN
Sep 4, 2013

'Skilled foreigner' invite too rigid a bar

More than a year after its much-hyped introduction, a government-led initiative to lure "highly skilled" foreign professionals to Japan is making lackluster progress, with the number of those applying for visas under the new system much smaller than initially envisioned.
Japan Times
WORLD
Sep 4, 2013

Al-Qaida hopes to sabotage, destroy drones

Cells of engineers are working to exploit vulnerabilities of the weapons system, so far but they have not succeeded, a classified report finds.
Japan Times
LIFE / Lifestyle
Sep 3, 2013

Google crunches data on munching snacks in the office

Last year Google had an M&M problem. So, as it does with most dilemmas, the Internet giant put its data wizards into action.
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE FOREIGN ELEMENT
Sep 2, 2013

Tin Man's throne: the rise and fall of a Roppongi royal

Gilbert Otaigbe is the current owner of Black Horse bar and nightclub in Roppongi. At the height of his success in the mid-2000s, he owned at least seven bars, clubs and restaurants.
Japan Times
JAPAN / INTERPRETATION & TRANSLATION
Sep 2, 2013

Focusing on people, not just words

English interpreters in Japan may often be regarded as those who convert English into Japanese or vice versa. However, Mutsumi Katayama, who has worked for more than 20 years as a freelance professional interpreter, focuses more attention on interpersonal communication.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / How-tos / HOME TRUTHS
Sep 2, 2013

Housing loans: Nothing is 100 percent easy

The government has yet to confirm the timing of the approved consumption tax increase from 5 to 8 percent. It's slated to take place next April but there is still fear that the economy is too frail to withstand the effect the added tax might have on actual consumption. Consequently, the government is...
Japan Times
WORLD
Sep 1, 2013

The Syria questions you were too afraid to ask

The United States is preparing for a possibly imminent series of limited military strikes against Syria, the first direct U.S. intervention in the two-year civil war, in retaliation for President Bashar Assad's suspected use of chemical weapons against civilians.
Japan Times
WORLD / Crime & Legal
Sep 1, 2013

Mexican drug cartel activity in U.S. 'exaggerated'

When Sen. John McCain spoke during an Armed Services Committee hearing last year on security issues in the Western Hemisphere, he relayed a stark warning about the spread of Mexican drug cartels in the United States. "The cartels," the Arizona Republican said, "now maintain a presence in over 1,000 cities."...
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel
Aug 31, 2013

Treats galore in summertime Sapporo

I barely recognize Sapporo's Odori Park clothed in its summer coat of flowers. The last time I journeyed north to Hokkaido, this dozen-block strip of land running straight as a die through the middle of its capital city was sporting massive artistic creations fashioned for the annual Yuki Matsuri...
EDITORIALS
Aug 31, 2013

Tepco finally accepts overseas help

The continuing leakage of radioactive water into the Pacific Ocean is eroding international trust in Japan. Both the government and Tepco should accept all the help they can get from overseas.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WHEN EAST MARRIES WEST
Aug 30, 2013

How the West was lost — almost

"How was your trip to Las Vegas?" grins this friend who knows I never gamble. "Did you win a million bucks?"
Japan Times
WORLD / Society
Aug 30, 2013

High hopes for victims of female genital mutilation

A nondescript suburb on the outskirts of San Francisco. A plain brick building. Seven nervous women wait in the sunlight. They are here for surgery, which perhaps has as much claim as any other to describe itself as "miraculous."
Japan Times
JAPAN / Science & Health
Aug 29, 2013

Stressed expats need, but oft sidestep real help: therapist

Many expatriates who face problems adjusting to the cultural differences of Japan tend to abuse alcohol and other drugs to deal with the stress of the transition, according to a Polish psychologist and therapist who counsels foreign residents in Japan.
COMMENTARY / World
Aug 27, 2013

CCP's plan for pro-democracy voices: repression

A semisecret directive from the senior members of the Chinese Communist Party tells us how President Xi Jinping plans to manage pro-democracy voices in China: by shutting them down.
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Aug 27, 2013

Can the ailing Emerald Isle roar back as the Celtic Tiger?

Much of Ireland has been riveted this summer by recordings of phone conversations from 2008 that revealed not only shocking levels of greed and bad breeding among some of the country's top bankers, but a deliberate effort to snooker the government into bailing out the country's banks by concealing the...
COMMUNITY / Voices / HAVE YOUR SAY
Aug 26, 2013

Of nuclear village idiots and radiation scare-mongerers: letters

Nab Tepco execs, take over the clean-up
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT / OUR PLANET EARTH
Aug 24, 2013

Reflecting at leisure on who we are and where we live

My day job as a professor in Japan offers precious few chances to take a step back from work and give the old brain a bit of free rein. But August is one such golden opportunity.
JAPAN / History / THE LIVING PAST
Aug 24, 2013

Only in Japan could a sword be 'life-giving'

Few countries have broken with their past as sharply as Japan did. That was the price it paid for modernity.

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