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COMMENTARY
Jul 17, 2001

Political parties prepare for judgment day

Political parties in Japan are in the midst of a campaign to lure voters in the July 29 Upper House contest. The election, officially called last Thursday, the first nationwide poll since Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's goverment was formed in late April, will be the first chance for the nation to...
LIFE / Travel
Jul 17, 2001

Peak experiences hiking the Japan Alps

KAMIKOCHI, Nagano Prefecture -- In his novel "The House of Nire," Morio Kita writes, "In the already fading light the linked peaks of the Alps were solid and harsh, all ranged there in the early dusk like a huge folding screen."
COMMENTARY / World
Jul 16, 2001

Can Japan's 'pied piper' pull it off?

In July 2001, two very different people offer hope to the people of Japan. One is baseball player Ichiro Suzuki, the star of the Seattle Mariners. His cool looks and great hits suggest the possibilities of the sporting dream across the sea. The other is Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi, with his wavy...
COMMENTARY
Jul 16, 2001

Just concerns over jurisdiction

LONDON -- In the light of the recent rape case in Okinawa, I have some sympathy for the Japanese wish to extend further their rights to exercise full criminal jurisdiction in cases involving American forces in Japan. The American authorities need to understand the historical background to Japanese sensitivities...
COMMENTARY
Jul 16, 2001

Avoid temptation of populism

The July 29 Upper House election is effectively a national referendum on the "reform without sacred cows" program of Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's administration. The central question is whether "Koizumi reform" will jump-start Japan's stalled economy and put it back on the long-term recovery course....
COMMENTARY / World
Jul 15, 2001

U.S. fear of bilingualism is unfounded

In Quebec, French signs by law have to be twice as big as their English translations. The top spot in the Los Angeles radio market belongs to KSCA-FM, a Spanish language station.
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Jul 15, 2001

A spoonful of Koizumi helps the medicine go down

The continuance of Junichiro Koizumi's administration beyond the summer seems like a sure bet: Support for his Cabinet is over 80 percent, his e-mail magazine is being read by hundreds of thousands of subscribers, and every time the opposition questions one of his pronouncements, they are deluged with...
CULTURE / Music / JAZZNICITY
Jul 15, 2001

In praise of the honest approach

Huddled over a back table at the Roppongi jazz club Alfie, out of earshot of her manager and new record company reps, Akiko confessed.
COMMUNITY
Jul 15, 2001

For the sake of sake

Every winter and spring for the last 10 years, Philip Harper reckons he has had no more than a few nights of uninterrupted sleep, but he's more than willing to sacrifice some shut-eye in pursuit of the perfect glass of sake.
CULTURE / Books
Jul 15, 2001

Hunting for justice in the Tokyo war tribunal

JUDGMENT AT TOKYO: The Japanese War Crimes Trials, by Tim Maga. University Press of Kentucky, 2001, 200 pp., $25 (cloth). Fifty-six years since Japan's surrender, World War II's legacy continues to make headlines: Compensation sought by sex slaves; Controversy rages over history textbooks; Prime minister's...
COMMENTARY / World
Jul 15, 2001

Heading off the MD disaster

BRUSSELS -- The argument for missile defense is based on a series of misunderstandings and exaggerations. The claimed threat is neither real nor credible. Yet U.S. President George W. Bush is using it to underpin the United States' deployment of MD in the interests of the arms industry and to the detriment...
COMMUNITY
Jul 15, 2001

So much to learn, so little time . . .

To learn a new skill, try the following schools and classes. (Unless otherwise specified, all organizations have information in English on their Web sites but accept telephone inquiries only in Japanese.)
EDITORIALS
Jul 14, 2001

The U.N. fails to get smart

The United Nations Security Council failed last week in its attempt to impose "smart sanctions" against Iraq. Fourteen of the 15 Security Council members agreed on a new scheme to monitor imports to Iraq. Unfortunately, the holdout was Russia, and Moscow used its threat of a veto to torpedo the new program....
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Jul 14, 2001

All set ot sail -- and then the wind blew

On July 1, the sea opened in an annual event called "umibiraki" (opening of the sea). My island celebrates umibiraki with the annual Shiraishi Yacht Race. This year, I and a couple of friends decided to enter the race. Since we all had limited sailing skills, we thought this would be a lot of fun. Our...
BASEBALL / MLB
Jul 13, 2001

Eto smashes 300th HR as Giants romp

Akira Eto belted a three-run dinger and Yoshinobu Takahashi homered for the third straight night as the Yomiuri Giants avoided a three-game sweep with a 13-1 trouncing of the Yakult Swallows at the Tokyo Dome on Thursday.
EDITORIALS
Jul 12, 2001

Evaluating Japan's defense needs

This year's defense white paper, released last week, specifically calls for both quantitative and qualitative improvement in SDF capabilities, including weapons replacement and modernization under the midterm defense-buildup program. More significantly, it points to a need to enact contingency legislation...
BASEBALL / MLB
Jul 12, 2001

Oh, Nagashima fill out All-Star series rosters

Seibu Lions star Daisuke Matsuzaka and the Iriki brothers earned their places in the upcoming All-Star series Wednesday as the managers' picks rounded out the 32-man rosters for the Central and Pacific Leagues.
JAPAN / Science & Health / NATURAL SELECTIONS
Jul 12, 2001

Jaws was born a rambling shark

A dark dorsal fin breaks the surface of a gleaming seascape. A ghost-faced killer glides silently through the water . . . the theme tune to "Jaws" automatically plays in the brain.
LIFE / Digital / SURFERSPUD
Jul 12, 2001

Cars, clothes, a bat and the new prozac

www.bmwfilms.com/site_layout/splash.asp Now that companies have realized the Internet, the great conduit that it is, fails as a business model unto itself, the buzz is all about lifestyle sites. BMW's is an emerging warehouse of short films. Well-polished short films. The first, "Ambush," is a near-six-minute...
BASEBALL / MLB
Jul 12, 2001

Consecutive HRs spark Swallows to win Atsunori Inaba, Roberto Petagine and Atsuya Furuta slammed back-to-back-to-back home runs, highlighting Yakult's four-run first inning while starter Satoshi Iriki tossed five-hit ball over six solid innings as the Swallows topped the Yomiuri Giants 7-1 at the Tokyo Dome. Central League

WonLostTied Pct.GB Yakult 44 28 2 .611 - Yomiuri 44 37 2 .543 4.5 Hiroshima 34 33 5 .507 7.5 Chunichi 37 40 2 .481 9.5 Yokohama 34 41 1 .453 11.5 Hanshin 32 46 0 .410 15.0 Pacific League WonLostTied Pct.GB Kintetsu 45 37 2 .549 - Daiei 44 38 1 .537 1.0 Orix 41 37 4 .526 2.0 Lotte 40 39 2 .5063 3.5 Seibu...
CULTURE / Film
Jul 11, 2001

From Here To Inanity

After you've sat through three hours of "Pearl Harbor" -- 90 minutes' worth of passionless romance, 45 minutes of incessant explosions and then a seemingly endless 45-minute coda -- while your butt is screaming to get off that seat and out the door, the final bomb drops. As the credits roll -- including...
CULTURE / Film
Jul 11, 2001

Screenwriting by remote control

Stereo Future Rating: * * Director: Hiroyuki Nakano Running time: 111 minutes Language: JapaneseNow showing Filmmaking is about putting images on the screen. It is also, if not always, about telling a story. Hollywood has long subordinated images to story, the classic ideal being the "seamless" style...
CULTURE / Art / CERAMIC SCENE
Jul 11, 2001

Pottering in a forest of memory

"A magnificent sunset burns beyond the horizon. Trees are ablaze against the fiery sky. The beauty of the dark silhouettes left an everlasting sensation." These are the words of potter Moriyoshi Saeki from a book published in 1995 titled "The Vibrant Potters of Tochigi."
CULTURE / Art
Jul 11, 2001

Kusuma's demonic dots, in glorious monochrome

Two years after the triumph of "Love Forever," the large-scale American-curated retrospective that earned Yayoi Kusama long-overdue recognition here at home, Japan's premier visual artist is back with an intimate and wonderful Tokyo gallery show.
CULTURE / Music / HIGH NOTES
Jul 11, 2001

Nick Currie

Nick Currie looks like a B-movie villain with his wicked black eye patch and ever-so-slightly menacing gaze. For a certain segment of Japan's music-buying public, however, he is a hero.
CULTURE / Art
Jul 11, 2001

Where dreams of the future met the feminine zeitgeist

According to a song popular during World War l, every cloud has a silver lining. In the case of that exercise in mechanized butchery, the silver lining may have been the improvement in women's social position. With so many men going off to fight and die in the trenches, women played a key role by replacing...
EDITORIALS
Jul 10, 2001

Northern Ireland trembles

The Northern Ireland peace process is in crisis following the resignation of Mr. David Trimble, the province's first minister. Mr. Trimble gave up his office earlier this month, blaming the Irish Republican Army, which has failed to give up its weapons. Mr. Trimble is not alone in blaming the terrorist...
COMMENTARY
Jul 10, 2001

Breaking the Kyoto impasse

At the Japan-U.S. summit held June 30, Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi reportedly told President George W. Bush that to curb global warming it was important to respect the spirit of the Kyoto Protocol. Koizumi also said Japan and the United States should continue discussions on the issue.

Longform

Sumadori Bar on Shibuya Ward's main Center Gai street targets young customers who prefer low-alcohol drinks or abstain altogether.
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