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Japan Times
JAPAN
Mar 13, 2003

Debts, loan sharks and culture of shame a recipe for suicide

Yuki Saito should have known something was wrong when his dad quietly walked into their steaming home tub that night -- they hadn't taken a bath together in years, although it is the Japanese custom to do so.
COMMENTARY / World
Mar 9, 2003

Glimpses of Indochina life 330 years ago

CHIANG MAI, Thailand -- Against the current drama of the Iraqi issue, other national and regional developments seem to fade out of focus. One such "minor event" that is heading toward oblivion concerns the tiny landlocked country of Laos. At the beginning of the year, unexpected news from there made...
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WHEN EAST MARRIES WEST
Mar 8, 2003

The Diaper Lady makes stink over stamp

Each month my house is the site of a battle.
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT / WILD WATCH
Mar 6, 2003

Fun guys can always find long-lasting allies

A coworker of mine in the Galapagos takes great delight in corny cracks and groan-inducing jokes, but as learning aids they are indeed memorable. Take his way of teaching the partnership involved in the lichen lifestyle and where they live. With apologies to Ron Sjostedt (and whoever he gleaned it from)...
Japan Times
LIFE / Digital / NETWISE
Feb 27, 2003

Avoiding the 'mojibake' bugaboo

Just about everyone uses e-mail today, and many of us in Japan do so in English, Japanese, and other languages as well. But anyone who corresponds in Japanese via e-mail knows that we still have a long way to go in terms of ensuring that our e-mail reaches the intended recipient both intact and readable....
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Feb 26, 2003

Freed jazz

Musicians can be extraordinary in so many different ways. John Coltrane was on a radical quest for enlightenment until the day he died. Bill Evans could voice chords in ways no one else ever imagined. Like a cat, Theolonius Monk could step off an edge and always land on his feet. And Miles Davis? You...
COMMENTARY / World
Feb 23, 2003

Restructuring the U.N. Security Council

CHIANG MAI, Thailand -- Although we live in an era of sad comparisons between the current status of the United Nations and the demise of the old League of Nations, let us hope and assume that the U.N. will survive its immense test without being relegated to "irrelevancy" and substituted by new formations...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Feb 23, 2003

Poet reaches for a world beyond reality

THE VILLAGE BEYOND, Poems of Nobuko Kimura, translated by Hiroaki Sato. Vermont: P.S., A Press, 2002, viii + 54 pp., $10 (paper) Nobuko Kimura has published six volumes of poetry, the first, "Collected Poems of Kimura Nobuko" (Kimura Nobuko Shishu), in 1971, and the most recent, "Going Around the Day"...
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel
Feb 23, 2003

Men among monsters in deep Yamagata

When it comes to ski resorts, Japan has virtually everything you could want. For serious powder, there are the wonderlands of Niseko in Hokkaido or Hachimantai in Iwate. For those looking for Western-style apres-ski, there's the posh Arai Mountain and Spa. And for the day-trippers from Tokyo, there are...
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel / NATURE TRAVEL
Feb 16, 2003

The turbulent isles are tranquil at last

Last of two parts Despite its appearance of timeless peace and tranquillity, the Seychelles has a turbulent history. Originally discovered by the Dutch, this remote archipelago in the Indian Ocean rapidly became a haunt of pirates.
COMMENTARY
Feb 15, 2003

Why hasn't Saddam killed all Americans?

WASHINGTON -- Americans all should be dead. At least, Americans all should be dead if the Bush administration is correct about Iraqi President Saddam Hussein. It believes there is nothing today that prevents a weak and isolated Iraq from striking the United States, the globe's dominant power.
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Feb 14, 2003

Toray Industries chief puts faith in technological research

Sadayuki Sakakibara, president of Toray Industries Inc., is confident there are researchers at his company who have the potential to win a Nobel Prize, just like Shimadzu Corp.'s Koichi Tanaka.
JAPAN
Feb 12, 2003

Nepal man balks at murder rap pinned on brother

The Tokyo High Court in 2000 convicted Govinda Prasad Mainali for the 1997 robbery and murder of a Tokyo woman, but his brother believes he is innocent and is pushing to have him acquitted -- again.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music / HIGH NOTES
Feb 12, 2003

ScoLoHofo: Oh!

The name ScoLoHoFo derives from the names of the four jazz heavies in this quartet: Joe Lovano, John Scofield, Dave Holland and Al Foster. The four musicians converged for tours in the late '90s and again last year, cutting this CD, "Oh!," at the end. The concern with a group like this is that their...
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT / ANIMAL TRACKER
Feb 11, 2003

Stick insect

* Japanese name: Nanafushi * Scientific name: Phraortes elongatus * Description: Stick insects belong to the order of insects called Phasmida, which derives from phasma, the Latin word for phantom. It's easy to identify a stick insect, but it is seeing it in the first place that is difficult, because...
COMMENTARY / World
Feb 9, 2003

U.S. test of U.N. relevance

Time was when those threatening to go to war had to prove their case beyond reasonable doubt. Today we are asked to prove to the powerful, to their satisfaction, why they should not go to war. The U.N. inspectors don't have to prove that Iraq has weapons of mass destruction; Iraqi President Saddam Hussein...
COMMENTARY / World
Feb 8, 2003

Death and despair await Iraqi civilians

NEW YORK -- U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell's forceful presentation to the U.N. Security Council failed to convince key council members of the need for an immediate war against Iraq. Concern for the consequences of another conflict in the region could possibly explain France, China and Russia's...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY
Feb 2, 2003

One-man media airs his views

It's 10 a.m. Sunday, and TBS TV's "Sunday Japon" show is getting under way. American entertainer Dave Spector, a regular panelist, shares the stage with a former porn actress, a Korean journalist and a member of the Diet. After an hour of exchanging ripostes with the others on major international and...
JAPAN
Feb 1, 2003

How long must the guilty wait to hang?

Sentenced to death for killing a farmer to claim an insurance payout in 1963, Tsuneki Tomiyama played his last card in early December when he and his support group filed a clemency plea.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music / HIGH NOTES
Jan 29, 2003

Kocani Orkestar: "Alone at My Wedding"

The Kocani Orkestar is a brass band from Macedonia with a formidable rhythm section of four tuba players and a lone percussionist. Their songs are alternately led by male or female singers, a clarinet, several trumpets or a banjo that's played like an oud. On their new album, "Alone at My Wedding," the...
BUSINESS
Jan 29, 2003

Sony executive Ohga decides to retire

Norio Ohga, Sony Corp.'s chairman of the board, said Tuesday he will step down for health reasons.
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Jan 26, 2003

Stories about the storytellers

FIVE MODERN JAPANESE NOVELISTS, by Donald Keene. New York: Columbia University Press, 2003, 144 pp., $24.50 (cloth) In this new book, the doyen of Western scholars of Japanese literature introduces the writing of five novelists with whom he has worked and reminisces about his relationships with them....
BASEBALL / BASEBALL BULLET-IN
Jan 22, 2003

Can Matsui handle the pressure and avoid the 'cha-cha'?

So far, so good. New York Yankees player Hideki Matsui made it back to Japan, apparently in one piece, after a whirlwind trip to the Big Apple that included evasion of a large Japanese media contingent waiting for him at Newark Liberty Airport, an appearance at Yankee Stadium, the well-attended and media-smothered...
MORE SPORTS
Jan 18, 2003

Snowboarding not just a lifestyle

He's got the looks, he's got the dress -- from baggy jeans to a pierced nose -- but the one thing that makes him different from the rest of the teenagers that walk down the streets of Shibuya is his talent on the slopes.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Stage
Jan 15, 2003

On with the old and in with the new

The kabuki year has kicked off with three striking programs at the Kokaido (Public Hall) in Asakusa, the Kabukiza in Ginza and the Tokyo National Theater in Hanzomon.
MORE SPORTS
Jan 10, 2003

Takahashi setting sights on another Olympic gold in 2004

This is the second and final installment of an exclusive interview with Naoko Takahashi, the gold medalist in the 2000 Sydney Olympic women's marathon.
JAPAN
Jan 7, 2003

New vehicles seep sick-building vapors

The interior of a brand-new vehicle could contain more than 30 times the acceptable level of volatile organic chemicals, known to cause symptoms of illnesses linked with sick building syndrome, according to a recent study by a public health researcher.

Longform

Ichiro Suzuki, one of the most iconic players in NPB and MLB history, was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame with 99.7% of the vote.
With Hall of Fame induction, Ichiro makes himself heard loud and clear