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COMMUNITY / How-tos / LABOR PAINS
Feb 28, 2012

Oversleeping radio anchor set tough precedent for firing staff

A radio news anchor oversleeps a live broadcast twice, forcing the radio station to cancel the broadcast. Should he be fired?
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE ZEIT GIST
Feb 28, 2012

Threatened Goldman Japan workers unionize

The past year has been anything but business as usual for the financial industry. Faced with a frosty economic climate, financial service companies have been busy chopping dead wood. Last year, 200,000 financial service jobs ended up on the cutting block worldwide.
Reader Mail
Feb 26, 2012

Historical realities of getting old

In Craig Bowron's Washington Post article "At the end of a loved one's life, why is it so hard to let go?" (reprinted in The Japan Times on Feb. 22), certain impressions about life expectancy need to be further interpreted with examples from advanced societies other than the United States.
Japan Times
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Feb 26, 2012

Job-seeking comedy avoids real issues

In 2004, novelist Ryu Murakami published "13-sai no Hello Work," a job guide for 13-year-olds, though most of the copies were bought by adults. The book did not offer practical advice, but rather job descriptions in all lines of work, from engineer to prostitute, in order to give readers an idea of what...
JAPAN / CHUBU CONNECTION
Feb 25, 2012

Centrair gearing up for a busy summer of travel

Starting in late March, the number of international flights at Central Japan International Airport, also known as Centrair, will return to what they were before the Lehman Brothers collapse in September 2008, reaching 294 per week when airlines switch to their summer timetables.
Reader Mail
Feb 23, 2012

Don't make light of 'center exam'

In the Feb. 3 opinion article "Exam forces students to cram irrelevant facts," was the writer, professor Julian Dierkes of Canada, looking at the same national university exam that I took?
Reader Mail
Feb 23, 2012

Prospect for Japan-China ties

Regarding the Feb. 19 Kyodo article "China calls for closer financial ties": This is a good initiative. It warms my heart every time I hear of the prospect of better relations and trade between China and Japan. If Japan had an independent foreign policy free of U.S. influence, I'm sure our relations...
COMMUNITY / How-tos / LIFELINES
Feb 21, 2012

Ill-prepared schools put returner, family in tough spot

In response to our recent two-part series on education ("Rejoining school system in Japan after time away can be tough" and "Acceptance — social and otherwise — a crucial issue for Japan returnee kids," Jan. 10 and 17), Rosie decided to share the story of her daughter's difficulties entering the...
Reader Mail
Feb 19, 2012

Time to send U.S. forces packing

Regarding the Feb. 14 front-page Kyodo article "Okinawa marines not Iwakuni-bound": Get the U.S. forces out of Japan. World War II ended almost 70 years ago. Japan does not need U.S. forces based there. All the United States is doing is bullying Japan and other countries, using economic sanctions and...
JAPAN / Media / BIG IN JAPAN
Feb 19, 2012

Media ratchets up fear of another major earthquake

So called megathrust earthquakes such as the one that struck off the coast of Miyagi Prefecture on March 11, 2011, tend to occur in pairs, with a relatively short gap between them.
Reader Mail
Feb 19, 2012

Explaining things to Okinawans

I write in response to a Japanese newspaper's editorial view that the outcome of last Sunday's Ginowan mayoral election in Okinawa Prefecture should serve as a springboard to ensure that U.S. Marine Corps Air Station Futenma is relocated to the Henoko district of Nago in the same prefecture.
Japan Times
JAPAN / CHUBU CONNECTION
Feb 18, 2012

Nagoya aid for tsunami-hit city starts to pay off

A shiitake grower farmer in disaster-hit Rikuzentakata, Iwate Prefecture, is working to cultivate a sales channel in the Chubu region, while a Nagoya-based civil engineering company launches an office near the Tohoku city.
BUSINESS / YEN FOR LIVING
Feb 17, 2012

So how much do politicians' secretaries make?

Lawmakers' publicly paid secretaries can make a lot of money.
COMMENTARY / World
Feb 17, 2012

America's pivot to Asia is not just about countering China

"All right China, come out with your hands up; we've got you surrounded!"
JAPAN
Feb 17, 2012

Hashimoto forges ahead with fiery reform agenda

Osaka Mayor Toru Hashimoto's campaign to fundamentally reform the central government is moving forward even as Diet lawmakers and members of his own group criticize his goals as unrealistic.
Reader Mail
Feb 16, 2012

Consider the defense alternative

Regarding the Feb. 10 Kyodo article "Iwakuni housing land sale in doubt": Does the Japanese government have no honor? Is its word no good? First we had the interminable squabbles over moving the bulk of the 3rd Marine Division from Okinawa to Guam, and relocating U.S. Marine Corps Air Station Futenma...
COMMENTARY / World / SENTAKU MAGAZINE
Feb 14, 2012

Put children before politics

Almost a year after the crisis at Tokyo Electric Power Co.'s Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant following the March 11, earthquake and tsunami, one serious question remains: to what extent have residents in the vicinity of the plant been exposed to radiation?
JAPAN
Feb 14, 2012

Hashimoto group hopes to upset political applecart big time

Osaka Mayor Toru Hashimoto's local political group is preparing a platform for the next Lower House poll that will likely include promises to shrink or even abolish the Upper House, create a system for voters to directly elect the prime minister, and to drastically limit the state's role to diplomacy,...
Reader Mail
Feb 12, 2012

Nursing-care tests raise dilemma

The Jan. 31 article "Foreigners' poor test grades force rethink on nurse tests" does raise a dilemma: Should Japan, or should it not, make the nurse certification test easier for foreigners? It may come down to answering the following questions:
Reader Mail
Feb 12, 2012

Different take on entrance exam

Roger Pulvers' Feb. 5 Counterpoint article, "Facts, facts and more facts: 'Education in Japan now only befits the past," states: "Students are admitted on the basis of the results of entrance exams that test rote-learned knowledge. There is little or no space for students to demonstrate their individual...
Reader Mail
Feb 12, 2012

Shaky will to reduce smoking

The Feb. 3 Kyodo article "Health ministry plan aims to cut smoking rate to 12% in 10 years" completely evades the obvious way to reduce smoking and passive smoking: Ban smoking inside all buildings, especially and including all coffee houses, bars, izakaya and restaurants. Join the civilized world.
Japan Times
JAPAN / CHUBU CONNECTION
Feb 11, 2012

Survivors of Thai floods carve a temporary niche in Aichi

The devastating floods in Thailand last year took a toll on some 450 Japanese companies operating in the country.
Reader Mail
Feb 9, 2012

JMA doesn't speak for hospitals

Regarding the Jan. 23 Kyodo article "U.S. won't breach 'mixed treatment' medical insurance rules in TPP talks": It would seem to me that the Japan Medical Association (JMA), which consists of mainly nonhospital physicians, should seek the opinion of citizens and hospitals before making pronouncements...
COMMENTARY
Feb 9, 2012

Dubious reasons to attack Iran

It is hard not to be impressed by the one-dimensional reasons the United States gives for its various animosities.
Reader Mail
Feb 5, 2012

Only Japanese-speaking nurses

Regarding the Jan. 31 article "Foreigners' poor test grades force rethink on nurse tests": Our society is aging fast and we need to improve nursing care, especially for more and more elderly people. So, hiring professional nurses from abroad is a very good way to increase the supply and release pressure...
Japan Times
JAPAN / CHUBU CONNECTION
Feb 4, 2012

Lone Brazilian school in Nagoya to shut down

Nagoya's only Brazilian school, Colegio Brasil Japao, is closing down after running into financial difficulties due to a falling number of students.
Reader Mail
Feb 2, 2012

Lower voting age doesn't help

Regarding Masami Ito's front-page article on Jan. 27, "Talks to start on lowering voting age": Representative democracy is an extortion racket. Lowering the voting age, like extending enfranchisement to women and poor males in the West, has resulted only in a lower quality of extortion, such as brutality...
Reader Mail
Feb 2, 2012

Ability to deal with uncertainty

Sawa Takamitsu, in his Jan. 24 article "More crucial than English," makes a number of interesting points that have to do with research budgets and even the involvement of business people in deciding the course of studies at Japanese universities. While I agree with everything the author says regarding...
Reader Mail
Feb 2, 2012

Upshot of starting in spring

I am writing with reference to the front-page Jan. 19 Kyodo article "Todai panel recommends fall enrollment." As a longtime resident and teacher here in Japan, there are many aspects of the current education system that I would like to see change. However, the April start to the academic year is not...

Longform

Tetsuzo Shiraishi, speaking at The Center of the Tokyo Raids and War Damage, uses a thermos to explain how he experienced the U.S. firebombing of March 1945, when he was just 7 years old.
From ashes to high-rises: A survivor’s account of Tokyo’s postwar past