Search - 2005

 
 
BASEBALL / Japanese Baseball
Dec 9, 2005

Serafini, Franco set for Japan return, maybe not to Marines

Both Dan Serafini and Matt Franco will play in Japan next season, but they may not return to the Japan Series champion Chiba Lotte Marines, agent Myles Kahn said.
JAPAN
Dec 9, 2005

Over decade after accident, Monju may be reborn

channel 9 and through 26 public address towers set up inside the city limits," said Fumiyoshi Kato, an official in the municipal nuclear power safety section. The evacuation areas are mostly elementary schools and public halls. However, Kato said they do not contain much in the way of emergency supplies....
Events / Events Outside Tokyo
Dec 9, 2005

Armchair critics get own online film festival

Fancy being the next Pauline Kael or Roger Ebert? International short film festival, Con-Can Movie Festival, is giving the perfect opportunity to budding film critics, and of course regular movie fans, by inviting the public to view films submitted by directors from all over the world. The films, all...
COMMENTARY
Dec 8, 2005

Crisis behind Arroyo, for now

MANILA -- Some observers of Philippine affairs view political crises in this country as a permanent phenomenon. Just the other day, I joined a group of foreign correspondents for a meeting with a visiting American reporter who has covered the Philippines since the late '60s. While this journalist, who...
COMMENTARY
Dec 8, 2005

Opportunities seized, missed

HONOLULU -- U.S. President George W. Bush, during his recent visit to Asia, seized the opportunity to reaffirm Washington's commitment to the promotion of democracy, free and fair trade, and political and especially religious freedom. But other opportunities were missed in terms of better defining America's...
BUSINESS
Dec 6, 2005

Capital spending up 9.6% for quarter

Capital spending grew 9.6 percent in the July-September quarter on an all-industry basis to 12.56 trillion yen for the 10th straight quarter of expansion, the Finance Ministry said Monday.
BUSINESS / JAPANESE PERSPECTIVES
Dec 5, 2005

Privatization hurdles: Japan Post should compete with banks on level playing field

The government bills drafted to privatize the state-run postal services were finally enacted into laws in mid-October, but there will be two major challenges ahead as privatization is carried out.
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Dec 4, 2005

Between life and death stands culture

FINAL DAYS: Japanese Culture and Choice at the End of Life, by Susan Orpett Long. Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press, 2005, 288 pp., $45 (cloth). This book asks how the final days might be different for Japanese patients and for those in the United States. Both Japanese and Americans state that they...
COMMENTARY / World
Dec 4, 2005

HIV prevention programs need to grow

BANGKOK/MANILA -- In a region that is home to two-thirds of the world's population, an HIV prevalence rate of 0.4 percent -- significantly lower than sub-Sahara Africa -- translates into more than 8 million adults and children living with HIV. More than 1 million people were newly infected with HIV in...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Dec 4, 2005

Complexity drawn from emptiness

THE ANCIENT CAPITAL OF IMAGES by John Mateer. Fremantle, Australia: Fremantle Arts Centre Press, 2005, 61 pp., A$22.95 (paper). The poet John Mateer has published previously in South Africa, where he comes from, Australia, where he now lives, and Indonesia, which he has traveled in. A group of his poems...
SOCCER / J. League
Dec 2, 2005

Verdy to play K-League champs

Recently relegated Tokyo Verdy will face the South Korean K-League's champion team in the group stage of the 2006 Asian Champions League, the Japan Football Association said Thursday.
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel / THEN AND NOW
Dec 2, 2005

History rises up in Shibuya

The accompanying wood-block print is a panoramic view of Shibuya about 180 years ago, seen from the top of Dogenzaka hill.
BUSINESS
Dec 2, 2005

Government nudging BOJ to introduce inflation target

The Cabinet Office on Thursday effectively called on the Bank of Japan to introduce an inflation target if it terminates its quantitative monetary easing policy.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music / THE SECOND ROOM
Dec 2, 2005

Psychedelic radar 12.02

Saturday, Dec. 3
BASEBALL / MLB
Nov 30, 2005

Matsui returns home after his 'disappointing' season

New York Yankees outfielder Hideki Matsui returned to Japan on Tuesday and said he feels disappointed with his performance this year despite posting career-best numbers in some key batting categories.
BUSINESS
Nov 30, 2005

OECD expecting steady 2% growth in economy

Japan could grow steadily by 2.0 percent in both 2006 and 2007 because the world's second-largest economy is now less dependent on exports and its expansion is spreading to domestically oriented activity, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development said Tuesday.
COMMUNITY / How-tos / LIFELINES
Nov 29, 2005

Bird flu, same-sex, posting

Bird flu With all the panic flying around on the subject of bird flu, several readers have asked where to get down to-earth information and advice. Sascha Hewitt's online store and resource center Natural Healing Center has a well-grounded article with a link to its home page on the subject: naturalhealingcenter.com/...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Nov 27, 2005

The Jesuit boys' tour of Europe

THE JAPANESE MISSION TO EUROPE, 1582-1590: The Journey of Four Samurai Boys Through Portugal, Spain and Italy, by Michael Cooper. Global Oriental, 2005, 262 pp., xix black and white plates, $85 (cloth). Michael Cooper, a former editor of Monumenta Nipponica, has contributed significantly to our knowledge...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Nov 27, 2005

The Indianapolis Museum of Art takes some tradition back to Japan

JAPANESE MASTERWORKS: Paintings From the Indianapolis Museum of Art; edited by Heisaku Harada and John Tadao Teramoto; foreword by Anthony Hirschel; introduction by Christine M.E. Guth; and essays by Tae Nishida, Shiji Hashimoto, Takeshi Nagai and Yumiko Kuniga. Seattle: University of Washington Press,...
SOCCER / PREMIER REPORT
Nov 26, 2005

Keane's baggage may scupper his dream move to Celtic

LONDON -- In August, you would probably have been able to name your own odds against both Manchester United manager Sir Alex Ferguson and captain Roy Keane seeking new employment midseason. One half of any such bet has already come up trumps, and unless United beat Benfica in Lisbon on Wednesday week,...
BUSINESS
Nov 26, 2005

Digital players killing off MDs

Global sales of recordable MiniDiscs are expected to total 144 million units in 2005, down 25 percent from the previous year, due to the widespread use of portable digital music players, an industry association said Friday.
BUSINESS
Nov 26, 2005

Commission backs cutting tax breaks

While the government must slash its wasteful spending, taxes still need to be raised to support the aging society, the Tax Commission said Friday in its fiscal 2006 tax-reform proposals.
BASKETBALL
Nov 25, 2005

AND1 crew puts on good show in Tokyo

Known better as a hallowed sumo venue, Tokyo's Ryoguku Kokugikan transformed into a hoops hotbed on Nov. 13.
EDITORIALS
Nov 25, 2005

Press on with territories issue

Russian President Vladimir Putin visited Tokyo this week for the first time in five years for a summit meeting with Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi. They and their ministers signed 12 documents, ranging from joint efforts to counter international terrorism to economic cooperation, including a Russian...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Nov 25, 2005

Can you keep up with Autechre?

It's pretty much a character-defining kind of thing: Either you think the seminal U.K. electronic act Autechre are taking the ball and running with it to places you didn't know existed, or you're convinced that they've gone bleak, technical and chaotic, and you just want them to write some damn melodies...

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