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JAPAN / ENERGY EQUATION
Sep 20, 2002

Energy goals, needs, realities not in sync

OSAKA -- It was another sweltering summer day in Den Den Town here, with the temperature expected to climb above 30 and humidity at nearly 80 percent.
COMMENTARY
Sep 20, 2002

Political lull comes to an end

This past summer was rather quiescent both politically and economically. About the only big story was former Foreign Minister Makiko Tanaka's resignation from the Diet over allegations that she misused the state-funded pay of her legislative secretaries.
EDITORIALS
Sep 19, 2002

The Pyongyang achievement

Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi and North Korean leader Kim Jong Il on Tuesday achieved a breakthrough, although a qualified one, in ending decades-long mutual enmity between Japan and North Korea. In fact, the outcome of the talks between the two leaders at the historic summit in Pyongyang was more...
JAPAN
Sep 19, 2002

Pro-Pyongyang residents receive death threats

The National Police Agency on Wednesday ordered police nationwide to prepare for possible attacks by ultranationalists against facilities related to North Korea in the wake of the signing the previous day of an agreement between Tokyo and Pyongyang to resume normalization talks, NPA officials said.
BUSINESS
Sep 19, 2002

Association helps end the health insurance limbo

Pressed by an ever-increasing number of people working as temps, both the government and temp agencies are trying to increase measures to make life more secure for the workers in this category.
Japan Times
JAPAN / BABY BUST
Sep 19, 2002

Birthrate suffers as women face unattractive choices

Mayumi Shinde, 40, has worked for seven years as a system engineer at a Tokyo firm, at one stage attaining a job capability assessment of S -- one special level higher than A, the normal top ranking.
JAPAN
Sep 19, 2002

Baby-products firm pushes male child-care leave

In a society where raising a child is perceived as more of a burden than a joy, what can a corporation do to change this mind-set?
JAPAN
Sep 19, 2002

Ishihara joins critics over Pyongyang 'deceptions'

Tokyo Gov. Shintaro Ishihara on Wednesday strongly criticized North Korea over its response to the abductions of Japanese nationals and other issues.
BUSINESS
Sep 19, 2002

Full time oft tough balancing act

For three young women, working as temps matches both their career plans and their private lives.
JAPAN
Sep 19, 2002

Koreans in Japan react to revelations, fret over compensation

Korean residents in Japan have expressed dismay at the fate of some of the Japanese nationals abducted to North Korea and at the obscuring of the issue of compensation from Japan for its 1910-1945 colonial rule of the Korean Peninsula.
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel / THEN AND NOW
Sep 19, 2002

Watching the river's flow

In the best-selling 19th-century guidebook, "Edo Meisho Zue (Famous Places of Edo)," there are many prints showing the picturesque scenery and ancient shrines in the vicinity of Oji in present-day Kita Ward. Robert Fortune, the Scottish botanist who was in Japan in 1860 and 1861, enjoyed his visit there,...
JAPAN / Science & Health / NATURAL SELECTIONS
Sep 19, 2002

Reproduction is no laughing matter for hyenas

In some ancient African cultures, the skulking hyena was considered to have special powers. Some of those powers, it was thought, could be attained by consuming a specific part of the hyena's body. The nose, for example, was believed to be a source of wisdom and intelligence. While attributing "special...
COMMUNITY / How-tos / LIFELINES
Sep 19, 2002

Check-up costs, parking perils, and 'quake advice

Health check-ups I'm not feeling well and feel I need to get a complete checkup or physical. It is my understanding that the national health insurance only covers diagnosed illness but not such preventive care. What can I do? -- Phillip in Tokyo
LIFE / Digital / NAME OF THE GAME
Sep 19, 2002

Shine on you crazy plumber

Mario, Nintendo's world-famous plumber/mascot, may be the oldest active character in video games, but he's certainly not washed up. Neither is "Super Mario Sunshine," Mario's latest adventure.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music / HIGH NOTES
Sep 18, 2002

Cruise: "The Art of Being a Girl"

It's hard to think of Julee Cruise without conjuring up images of cursing madmen or midgets in red-curtained rooms. Ever since her ghostly lullabies hovered eerily over the movie "Blue Velvet" and the '80s bizarro hit TV series "Twin Peaks," people assumed that she was just another character from the...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art / NEW ART SEEN
Sep 18, 2002

Two dimensions good, three dimensions better

I got some positive feedback on my review last week of the Doug Aitken show at the Tokyo Opera City Gallery. My remark, "I just don't like visiting galleries to sit on the floor and watch videos," struck a chord with a number of readers. Not that I don't like video and new media art, but most galleries...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music / J-POPSICLE
Sep 18, 2002

Talk about the passion . . .

Can Kiyoshi Hikawa save enka?
JAPAN
Sep 17, 2002

Comic book on Hiroshima A-bombing translated into Korean

OSAKA -- A Korean translation of "Hadashi no Gen" ("Barefoot Gen"), a long Japanese comic book about the U.S. atomic bombing of Hiroshima, has been completed by a lecturer at Kinki University in Osaka.
BUSINESS
Sep 17, 2002

Tepco set to release results of voluntary inspections

Tokyo Electric Power Co. will soon release the results of its voluntary nuclear reactor inspections in an attempt to appease local communities and restore its recently battered credibility, Tepco officials said Monday.
JAPAN
Sep 17, 2002

Koizumi to go in fighting

The first item on Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's agenda when he meets with North Korean leader Kim Jong Il will be his demand for information about 11 Japanese believed abducted to the Stalinist state between 1977 and 1983, Chief Cabinet Secretary Yasuo Fukuda said Monday.
COMMENTARY / World
Sep 17, 2002

A role for Japan in Korean peace process

There are high expectations that Prime Minister Junichiro Kozumi's Sept. 18 summit meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong Il will produce a breakthrough regarding the normalization of Japanese-North Korean relations. In addition to achieving this breakthrough in a manner that the Japanese people and...
BUSINESS
Sep 17, 2002

Electric toothbrush sales increase as prices decay

Sales of electric toothbrushes are booming in Japan following a significant decline in product prices.
LIFE / Travel
Sep 17, 2002

Scientists lobby, governments demur, on Kurils international peace park

Ever since transboundary biosphere reserves were first launched, scientists in East Asia have dreamed of setting up border-straddling nature sanctuaries in both the Korean demilitarized zone and in the Kuril Islands, which encompass the long-contested Northern Territories occupied by Russia but claimed...
LIFE / Travel
Sep 17, 2002

Breaking down the barriers

SEOUL -- A merican presidents, soccer stars, paying tourists and the occasional squad of Dallas Cowboy cheerleaders airlifted in to boost U.S. troop morale regularly bus through select checkpoints in the Korean demilitarized zone, but otherwise this 246-km-long, 4 km-wide strip of land is one desolate...

Longform

Visitors walk past Sou Fujimoto's Grand Ring, which has been recognized as the largest wooden structure in the world.
Can a World Expo still matter? Japan is about to find out.