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Japan Times
LIFE / Travel
Mar 18, 2023

Can ChatGPT plan your next vacation?

Goodbye travel agents, hello AI-powered personalized itineraries.
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel
Dec 3, 2022

Tokyo named among the world's best destinations for disabled travelers

Amsterdam, Las Vegas, Paris and Tokyo were all among the most accessible cities according to a recent report, but there's still more work to be done.
JAPAN
Sep 7, 2022

Japan opens borders to foreign travelers on ‘self-guided tours’

The country also raised the daily arrival cap to 50,000 and dropped a requirement that visitors test negative for COVID-19 within 72 hours of departing for Japan.
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel
Aug 8, 2021

Persist, pivot, prosper? Tourism businesses on weathering the pandemic

With the Olympics and a national vaccine rollout underway, The Japan Times checks in with four small tourism businesses. How are they holding up? And how did they pivot to stay in business?
JAPAN
Dec 30, 2020

Tokyo’s pandemic border policy highlights insecure status of foreign residents

Chaos, lack of debate and fears of public backlash are thought to have been behind unequal treatment of foreign nationals residing in Japan.
Japan Times
ASIA PACIFIC
Jun 4, 2020

Cheap holidays target locals across tourism-reliant Southeast Asia

With cash flow drying up at Thailand’s popular beach resort of Phuket, hotels are racing to restart tourism — starting with local travelers.
WORLD / Science & Health
Sep 28, 2019

'Flight shaming' is in the air as U.N. summit faces climate crisis

As world leaders met in New York, one question kept coming up at climate change events: How did you get here?
Japan Times
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics / FOCUS
Jun 12, 2014

As visitor numbers boom, North Korea becomes ultimate tourist trap

"Taking you to places where your mother would rather you stayed away from." That's how one Western travel agency advertises its tours to North Korea.
EDITORIALS
Nov 10, 2012

Poor planning led to tour disaster

Four Japanese tourists, a Chinese tour conductor and a Chinese guide were caught in a blizzard while trekking on a mountain overlooking the Great Wall outside Beijing on Nov. 3. Apparently Amuse-Travel Co., which organized the trekking tour, relied on its Chinese partner to ensure the safety of the party...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Sep 5, 2004

Traveling with eyes wide open

SUN AFTER DARK: Flights into the Foreign, by Pico Iyer. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2004, 224 pp., $22.95 (cloth). "They say travel broadens the mind," says G.K. Chesterton, adding, "but you must have the mind." Further, that mind must be both attentive and reflective, independent and philosophical, and...
Japan Times
BUSINESS / FOCUS
Jan 7, 2023

China’s deep-pocketed tourists are staying home, for now

The $280 billion force that is Chinese tourism may not reemerge for months, thanks to lingering infections, restrictions for new arrivals and surging costs.
JAPAN / New Normal 2.0
Jun 27, 2022

Japan prepares for bounce in tourism, but pre-pandemic demand still far off

Destinations such as Niseko in Hokkaido are gearing up for 'revenge travel' by domestic and foreign tourists, but caution over COVID-19 limits the expected rise in numbers.
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Mar 10, 2021

Dirt-cheap flights offered as airlines rebuild battered networks

Dirt-cheap fares are popping up from airlines brave enough to expand or start out amid the COVID-19 crisis, as they try to eke out sales and get a jump on competitors that have pared back operations.
Japan Times
WORLD / Politics
Feb 24, 2021

Antony Blinken, without leaving U.S., tries to mend fences with allies abroad

As part of his effort to re-energize American alliances frayed by the Donald Trump years, Blinken has spoken with dozens of his counterparts around the world but has yet to leave the U.S.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE FOREIGN ELEMENT
Nov 23, 2020

Cheap, spacious, crowd-free: Rural Japan is having a moment with the foreign community

Laura Blackhall took a risk purchasing an empty house in the Ibaraki countryside. Amid and following a pandemic, though, it's a choice that just might pay off.
Japan Times
JAPAN / Society / EXPLAINER
Nov 5, 2020

The ins and outs of Japan’s eased re-entry steps for foreign residents

Even with the most recent changes to border control measures that came into effect Sunday, there are growing concerns over strict and unclear requirements for re-entry.
JAPAN / Society
Sep 25, 2020

Japan to allow entry for all nontourist new visa applicants from October

Under the existing travel controls, travelers from 159 countries and regions have been denied entry in principle.
Japan Times
JAPAN
Sep 23, 2020

Japan to loosen border enforcement measures to allow in new arrivals

The country will start allowing entry for long-term residents and international students, regardless of where they come from, reports say.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World / Geoeconomic Briefing
Sep 1, 2020

How to reopen national borders

As the coronavirus pandemic rumbles on, countries are now looking at how to allow travel in a bid to help their economies recover.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink
Jul 11, 2020

What’s the future of international food tourism in post-coronavirus Japan?

Food remains one of Japan's greatest assets as a travel destination, and industry insiders are cautiously optimistic about the future of culinary travel.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / Japan
Oct 15, 2019

Your next vacation may be virtual

Airlines are investing in virtual reality because the global tourism boom is unsustainable.
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Jan 15, 2018

High-speed rail now gives flight routes in Asia and Europe a run for their money

Across Asia and Europe, high-speed rail is providing a competitive alternative to air travel on the same routes, in terms of price and the all-important barometer of time.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Books
Feb 20, 2016

The ink-stained road: 'age of experience'

In the new age of experience that defines the travel accounts on Japan from the immediate pre- and postwar periods, writers began resisting the easy enamor of the Orient. Instead of viewing Japan as an exotic wonderland, they took a more considered, critical view of what they encountered.
COMMENTARY / World
Sep 8, 2015

ASEAN: moving beyond terrorism fears

A focus on strengthened security and basic law and order will be fundamental to the sustained growth of any ASEAN member- state's tourism sector.
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel
Nov 23, 2008

Japan looks beyond tourism's 'Golden Route'

In 2001, soon after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the U.S., a friend working at a Tokyo travel agency griped about how terrorism affected his business, saying that tourism, after all, is a "peace industry."
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
May 31, 2007

Photography now

The borderline between photojournalism and travel photography is hard to define.
JAPAN
Jul 19, 2005

'Connoisseur tourists' flock to charter jets

The major travel agencies are chartering an increasing number of jumbo jets to offer bargain-priced package tours to "rather unusual" tourist destinations across the world.
Japan Times
JAPAN
Jun 20, 2002

Japanese tourists snub Mickey Mouse

As Japanese tourists put the events of Sept. 11 behind them and once again hit the package tour trail, one destination remains suspiciously absent from their itineraries: the United States.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / PERSONALITY PROFILE
Aug 18, 2001

Joe Grace

"To all those who remember me in Tokyo, be certain that there is life after retirement. You've just got to find your niche," Joe Grace said.

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