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BASKETBALL
Jan 14, 2012

Warriors' Tyler making strides in rookie season

Like any NBA rookie, Jeremy Tyler faces a series of huge adjustments in his daily life on and off the court.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Jan 13, 2012

Bearing witness to brutality in 'Devil's Double'

"Should I ask him whether it's true or not?" That's the question I had for my editor regarding my interview with Latif Yahia, the Iraqi exile whose story about being the lookalike body-double for Saddam Hussein's psychotic son Uday has been parlayed into a best-selling book and a movie. "Probably," said...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Jan 12, 2012

Fuyuko Matsui finds vitality in decay

"Japanese culture has become too clean. Our five senses are too blunt," says artist Fuyuko Matsui in a recent interview at the Yokohama Museum of Art. "I think Japan needs some fear to stimulate the sense of pain."
CULTURE / Art
Jan 12, 2012

Fuyuko Matsui finds vitality in decay

"Japanese culture has become too clean. Our five senses are too blunt," says artist Fuyuko Matsui in a recent interview at the Yokohama Museum of Art. "I think Japan needs some fear to stimulate the sense of pain."
Japan Times
LIFE / Digital / TECH_JAPAN
Jan 11, 2012

Cyborg teddy bears, telephonic androids, USB missiles set to stun

Assuming you haven't had your fill of toys already this past holiday season, we have a lineup of three gadgets that look particularly fun.
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE ZEIT GIST
Jan 10, 2012

International education a triple-A investment in your child's — and Japan's — future

Bicultural families are on the rise in Japan. In 1970, less than 6,000 "international marriages" — where one partner is non-Japanese — were registered, or 0.5 percent of the total. In 2000, the Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare reported that one in 22, or 4.5 percent, of all marriages that year...
LIFE / Language / KANJI CLINIC
Jan 9, 2012

The Kanji of the Year for 2011: human ties that bind

Every November, in its Kanji of the Year poll, the Japanese Kanji Aptitude Testing Foundation invites the public to vote for the character that best symbolizes the year drawing to a close. It then announces the winner in mid December.
LIFE
Jan 8, 2012

Stories spiked despite journalism's mission to inform

Olympus isn't the only story that has been or is being ignored or squashed by powerful forces in Japan. Here are three more gems from that rich vein.
BUSINESS
Jan 7, 2012

Woodford ends fight to lead Olympus

Former Olympus Corp. President and CEO Michael C. Woodford said Friday in Tokyo he will give up his proxy fight to regain the top job in the medical equipment and camera maker because of lack of support from Japanese shareholders and trauma suffered by his family.
COMMENTARY
Jan 6, 2012

Russia's mental adjustment

Through the centuries, every people — big or small — has been working out its own approaches to various sides of life that, summed up, predestine its mentality and national character.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Jan 6, 2012

'Himizu'

Violence, director Kinji Fukasaku once told me, is "a pillar of filmmaking." But on-screen mayhem regarded as extreme in Fukasaku's 1970s heyday (see his "Jingi Naki Tatakai [Battles Without Honor & Humanity]" series for examples) looks mild in ours.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Jan 6, 2012

'Good'

As far as movies about Nazi Germany go, "Good" belies its title and sits fidgeting on a terrain somewhere between so-so and inoffensive. But 15 years ago a story like "Good" would have been called daring — even revolutionary — for it ventures beyond caricatured depictions of monstrous Nazis and the...
Japan Times
JAPAN / NUCLEAR AWAKENING
Jan 4, 2012

Mothers first to shed food-safety complacency

The disaster at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant and the threat of radioactive fallout changed the lives of many people, including Mizuho Nakayama and other mothers of young children whose primary goal suddenly became that of keeping their kids out of harm's way.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE ZEIT GIST
Jan 3, 2012

Japanese must tap their 'inner Israeli'

Aimless, Japan has been struggling to find a suitable vision, or model, for its future. Should it strive to be like Finland, small but prosperous? Should it de-emphasize economic growth and focus on sustainability and lifestyle? Should it look to the go-go '80s for inspiration? Or should it withdraw...
CULTURE / Books
Dec 25, 2011

Bubble-wrap novel far from bubble gum

Winner of the Prix Goncourt, Michel Houellebecq, in his latest novel, "The Map and the Territory," takes us into the world of art and the life of Jed Martin, rival of Damien Hirst and Jeff Koons, and fan of a writer called ... Michel Houellebecq.
COMMENTARY / World
Dec 24, 2011

Foreign residents and religion

This month, two common questions were heard among many foreign residents here: "What are you doing for Christmas?" and "Are you going home or staying here?"
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Dec 23, 2011

"Ueda Souko: Busho Chajin no Sekai Ten"

During the feudal times of the Momoyama Period (1573-1615), samurai culture had come under the influence of the then growing Zen Buddhism. Buddhist art in the form of rock gardens, the tea ceremony and ikebana thus became an important part of samurai life.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Dec 23, 2011

'Restless'

Gus Van Sant's "Restless" is a film about love, an ode to doomed but pure teenage infatuation. But it's also about love of a film, in this case Hal Ashby's cult classic "Harold and Maude." It's one of those cases where the lift (or "homage") is so overt and massive that it's hard to consider "Restless"...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Dec 22, 2011

Seeking solace in artistic responses to March 11

What can art do? What role can it play when the whole world seems suddenly unstable, unsure?
COMMENTARY / World
Dec 22, 2011

F-35 fighter deal brings Japan multiple benefits

With its Dec. 20 decision to purchase Lockheed-Martin's Joint Strike Fighter F-35 Lightning II as Japan's next generation fighter aircraft, the Japanese government gets to have its cake and eat it too. What Japan wants is simple: the most advanced military technology available (or at least better than...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Stage
Dec 22, 2011

Japan's dramatists take on the 'nuclear village'

The place to start when reviewing this year's highlights in contemporary Japanese theater, has to be The Great East Japan Earthquake of March 11. That day led to a nation in mourning, an ongoing nuclear crisis and an awakening among dramatists, who saw the importance of their role to stimulate debate...
BASKETBALL / NBA / NBA REPORT
Dec 21, 2011

Support helps Jackson take first coaching steps

Five minutes before Mark Jackson was to conduct his initial rehearsal as a head coach at any level — ahem, exempting a brief AAU fling — he sat in the Warriors' locker room by himself and let his wired emotions guide him.
COMMUNITY / How-tos / LIFELINES
Dec 20, 2011

Replacing your alien card; blasts from the past

Anita recently lost her alien registration card and is planning to leave on New Year's Day for an overseas trip, so she needs a replacement right away:
COMMUNITY / THE ZEIT GIST
Dec 20, 2011

Gaba 'contractor' status under fire from staff, courts

As an 8-year-old in Indiana, William first became curious about Japan when he made friends with a Japanese guy called Hideki who introduced him to Super Mario and the magical world of Japanese video games.
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Dec 20, 2011

Family ties spur spending sprees

Hiromi Komatsu is hitting Tokyo department stores in search of Christmas presents this year for the first time in her life, as she prepares for a rare visit by family members for the holiday season.
COMMENTARY / COUNTERPOINT
Dec 18, 2011

Their spirit seems willing but young Japanese are hesitant to get hitched

Back in the days of "there's gold in them thar hills," one of the prospectors' doleful refrains boasted the title "My Girlfriend's a Mule and a Mine." Across the Pacific and some 150 years on, I wouldn't be surprised if an echo of that plaintive air were not about to catch on among young Japanese males...
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT / WILD WATCH
Dec 18, 2011

There's more to Christmas colors than meets the eye

The rotenburo (outdoor hot spring) that I most regularly frequent creates an excellent illusion of there always being a full moon bathing in its glow those soaking beneath.
Japan Times
JAPAN / Media
Dec 18, 2011

How The Japan Times saved a foundering battleship, twice

Mikasa! The name of the mighty Japanese battleship will be as familiar to the world's naval historians as it is now to viewers of NHK's Sunday evening drama "Saka no Ue no Kumo" ("Clouds Over the slope"). It was the Mikasa that all but decided the fate of the Russo-Japanese War of 1904-05, when it led...
Japan Times
MORE SPORTS / ICE TIME
Dec 14, 2011

Mao was blessed with a mother who gave it her all

The past few days have been very difficult. I'm fairly confident a lot of other folks share my sentiments.
Japan Times
LIFE / Digital / TECH_JAPAN
Dec 14, 2011

Perfect toys for retro gamers and karaoke fans

People who were kids during the early days of console gaming often look for ways to recapture the the excitement of that time. Those who spent hours playing the Famicom here in Japan, for example, still have a weakness for retro gaming. And while there are many ways to relive gaming glorydays (Famicom...

Longform

After the asset-price bubble crash of the early 1990s, employment at a Japanese company was no longer necessarily for life. As a result, a new generation is less willing to endure a toxic work culture —life’s too short, after all.
How Japan's youth are slowly changing the country's work ethic