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Japan Times
Features
May 8, 2005

It's time to get out there and grrrrrrrill!

Years ago, at a friend's house in Kobe, an intense argument broke out between the Americans and Australians present. It turned into quite a searing row, and for a while it threatened to inflame tempers and disrupt the otherwise festive occasion.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / CLOSE-UP
May 1, 2005

Sadako Ogata: Front-line fighter for a better world

Sadako Ogata, formerly United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, is one of Japan's most prominent international figures.
COMMENTARY
Apr 25, 2005

Koizumi policy seeded storm

In recent weeks, mass anti-Japanese protests, the largest since Tokyo and Beijing normalized diplomatic relations in 1972, have occurred in major Chinese cities. As a result, Sino-Japanese relations, already considered cold on the political front, could cool economically.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Apr 24, 2005

Canadian indie scene keeps it together

When the Canadian music collective known as Broken Social Scene arrives in Tokyo next month, they'll be bringing a few members of their family tree along. Found on the group's Web site, the "tree" is actually 40-plus band and artist names scrawled on a paper bag and connected by the squiggly white lines....
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT
Apr 21, 2005

Matters of survival in a 'shattered world'

One of the best things about writing a newspaper column is that I get a chance to meet people whose paths I might otherwise never cross. Last weekend, at the Odaiba waterfront launch of Earth Day Tokyo 2005, I had the rare pleasure of meeting and interviewing two environmentalists I have long admired,...
ENVIRONMENT / OUR PLANET EARTH
Apr 21, 2005

Time to honor the planet, every day

'If the environment is a fad, then it's going to be our last fad," warned Denis Hayes at the first Earth Day on April 22, 1970, having given up his own graduate studies at Harvard only months before to organize this historic event.
JAPAN
Apr 19, 2005

Locksmith who abducted, killed journalist gets 16 years

The Tokyo District Court sentenced a locksmith Monday to 16 years in prison for confining and killing freelance journalist Satoru Someya, who wrote about him in a magazine.
COMMUNITY / LIFELINES
Apr 19, 2005

Pensions, easy credit, freecycling and dogs

Lump Sum payments Following on from last week's Zeit Gist article on the insurance probe involving Japan's eikaiwa, Rob has a question on pension refunds.
COMMENTARY
Apr 18, 2005

Japan, China wasting time

Recent mass anti-Japanese protests in Chinese cities have plunged Sino-Japanese relations to their lowest since diplomatic ties were normalized in 1972. Stones thrown by demonstrators damaged the Japanese Embassy in Beijing on April 9. Japanese-owned businesses in other cities were likewise attacked,...
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Apr 17, 2005

Prime Minister Koizumi smiles in the face of the people's apathy

No matter how alarming the day's news is, you can always count on Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi to put a happy face on it. In the daily press conferences where he sidles up to journalists to field a few softballs he always has a way of making everything sound inconsequential.
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Apr 10, 2005

An English waking of 'Winter Sleep'

WINTER SLEEP, by Kenzo Kitakata. Vertical, 2005, 282 pp., $14.95 (paper). In a recent article for the Society of Writers, Editors and Translators, D. Patrick Dimick has defined the great trade deficit in literary translation between Japanese and other languages: "In 2002 the ratio of foreign books translated...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / CLOSE-UP
Apr 3, 2005

Ryu Murakami: Straight-talking wordsmith wields his pen like a sword

For nearly three decades since his seismic debut with "Almost Transparent Blue," which delved into the sex- and drug-fueled lives of Japanese youths in a town hosting a huge U.S. military base, author Ryu Murakami has often used his trademark explicit, offensive and guiltlessly cheerful language to dig...
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Apr 3, 2005

So much food that we don't know what to do with it

The media didn't quite know what to make of that bizarre story last month about the elderly Sapporo man who allegedly killed his wife following a dinnertime spat. One might expect a husband to become angry over not getting enough food, TV commentators implied, but in this case the situation was the opposite....
COMMUNITY / How-tos / LIFELINES
Mar 29, 2005

Seeking advice on accidents and health

Accidents Not so long ago, Jay had an accident. While riding her bicycle, she hit a woman who had to go to the hospital, where she was given a full check-up by the doctor and emerged with a clean bill of health.
COMMENTARY
Mar 24, 2005

Northern Territories dispute highlights flawed diplomacy

Japan is now in serious territorial disputes with all of its neighbors -- Taiwan, China, South Korea and Russia. True, this could prove there is something wrong with all of Japan's neighbors. But it could also prove that there is something wrong in the way Japan handles territorial problems with its...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art / NEW ART SEEN
Mar 23, 2005

Drawing circles is the secret to a new visual language

It is exceedingly rare for a contemporary art show to sell out at the opening reception, and especially so in Japan. It is rarer still to arrive at a vernissage to discover that the show has sold out even before it opened. But that was the case with the Keegan McHargue exhibition that debuted at the...
Japan Times
JAPAN / Media
Mar 23, 2005

Duty calls

Special to The Japan Times In the United States, it's said that the Vietnam War was lost on TV. As the first armed conflict to receive graphic coverage on nightly news shows, the war seemed closer than it was. Consequently, questions surrounding its legitimacy eventually came to the fore and, for many...
Japan Times
Features / WEEK 3
Mar 20, 2005

Samba viva samba! Matsudaira style!

With the mercury rising to 17 degrees, March 8 was unusually warm for the time of year in Tokyo. Spring was in the air. At Tokyo Dome that evening, though, it was distinctly subtropical as 20,000 people broke out into a midsummer-style sweat.
COMMENTARY
Mar 18, 2005

China flaunts wish to control

HONG KONG -- At the very moment that the world is captivated with the promise of China rising economically, China itself has provided two vivid examples of the danger that it is plunging politically.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE ZEIT GIST
Mar 8, 2005

Creating laws out of thin air

With terrorists striking fear into governments worldwide, Japan too is currently considering its own version of America's Patriot Act, to be passed in a year or two.
COMMENTARY
Mar 6, 2005

Trashing liberties we die for

LONDON -- At the end of last year, 69 men, it is thought, were being held in British prisons as terrorist suspects. Only 11 of these had been convicted of any offense. Twelve were being held in Belmarsh prison without trial (since then, one has been moved to Broadmoor, a high security mental hospital)....
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE ZEIT GIST
Mar 1, 2005

Past the pain and language barriers

Even for a sumo wrestler, Kaido Hoovelson looks big. The 20-year-old Estonian, who goes by the ring name of "Baruto," stands 197-cm tall, making him one of sumo's tallest wrestlers.
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Feb 20, 2005

Ah-choo! Picked up an allergy to the hay-fever industry

Last week the pharmaceutical company Riken announced that it was developing a new desensitivity treatment for serious allergy sufferers. The treatment program would entail fifty or so injections over a three-year period, which is quite a reduction in time. I should know. I received biweekly or monthly...
COMMENTARY
Feb 17, 2005

Racist banner looks frayed

Understanding Japan and the Japanese was never meant to be easy. This is especially true for the Japanese attitude to foreigners -- at times exclusivist and at other times extremely open. There is an answer to the seeming contradiction, but it requires outsiders to accept that the Japanese might have...
COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM NEW YORK
Feb 13, 2005

Iraq election exposed two faces of China

HONG KONG -- One unintended consequence of the Jan. 30 election in Iraq was that it exposed the hypocrisy and shortsightedness of China's policy toward Hong Kong and reunification with Taiwan. China not only expressed support for the rushed national election in its controlled press; it also donated $1...
COMMUNITY / How-tos / LIFELINES
Feb 8, 2005

Wills, holistic dentistry and cash

More on wills "To quote your column from some time ago," writes MJ, " 'Japanese inheritance law states that at the death of one spouse, half the estate goes to the remaining partner and half to the children of the marriage.'
COMMENTARY
Feb 6, 2005

Boundary that won't stretch

LONDON -- Recent ceremonies at Auschwitz to mark the 60th anniversary of the liberation by Russian forces of Nazi Germany's main death camp have rightly made us think about man's inhumanity to man and ponder how such horrific acts could have taken place. The Nazi attempt to exterminate the Jewish race...
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 27, 2005

Foggy North Korean shuffle

BRUSSELS -- Recent events in North Korea have been interpreted in various ways and, generally, the wish has been father to the thought. The truth is difficult to discern, but indications are that North Korean leader Kim Jong Il has placed himself firmly behind a reform program that may finally bring...

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