Search - 2012

 
 
JAPAN / Media / BIG IN JAPAN
Jul 27, 2013

Tight budgets, food safety and eel inflation

The future promise of Abenomics notwithstanding, Japan's white-collar office workers are still being squeezed in terms of their discretionary spending. Results of the annual survey of salaryman kozukai (allowance), released June 28 by Shinsei Bank, noted that this year the average monthly spending money...
EDITORIALS
Jul 27, 2013

Annulling the Upper House poll

As soon as the results were announced for last week's Upper House election, lawsuits were filed demanding the nullifcation because of vote-vale disparities.
COMMENTARY / World
Jul 27, 2013

China betting on overland energy-supply lines

China's strategy to diversify supply routes for its rapidly rising energy imports has taken a major step forward as natural gas flows through a Myanmar pipeline.
CULTURE / Books
Jul 27, 2013

Multiple perspectives in novel on the Russo-Japanese War

I asked a Japanese friend how he would characterize Shiba Ryotaro's famous historical novel, "Clouds Above the Hill." I've known its immense popularity, but Shiba had started its newspaper serialization after I left Japan in 1968, and the size of the finished work — six volumes in book form — had...
JAPAN / Politics
Jul 27, 2013

Hashimoto, Matsui offer to quit but are persuaded to stay

Nippon Ishin no Kai (Japan Restoration Party) co-leader Toru Hashimoto and Secretary-General Ichiro Matsui offer to step down 'to focus on their political agenda in Osaka' but other party executives persuade them to stay on.
COMMENTARY / World
Jul 25, 2013

China's salami-slice strategy

Beijing's strategy to change the territorial and maritime status quo seems anchored in 'salami slicing,' which centers on a steady progression of small actions.
MORE SPORTS
Jul 25, 2013

Yamagata aims to reach 100-meter final at world championships

Everybody now talks about high school sprinting sensation Yoshihide Kiryu, recognizing the 17-year-old is the fastest current man in Japan.
BUSINESS / YEN FOR LIVING
Jul 25, 2013

Blood pressure medication huge cash cow

Earlier this month Kyoto University revealed that a study one of its researchers carried out to evaluate the effectiveness of the drug Diovan, which lower blood pressure, was probably "erroneous." Though the university did not say the drug itself was ineffective, it did admit that the data of "those...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Jul 24, 2013

Supergroup Muddy Apes get album out just in time to rock Fuji

From the beginning, rock act Muddy Apes set a lofty goal for themselves.
Reader Mail
Jul 24, 2013

Increasing migration pressure

Regarding Gwynne Dyer's July 1 article, "Preposterous population forecasts in Africa": As someone who lives in the United States, I find the outlook for us very troubling. Some have made the argument that a sustainable U.S. population would be around 200 million people. We certainly are not doing particularly...
EDITORIALS
Jul 23, 2013

Smoke and fire on Hokkaido trains

A recent series of fire-and-smoke incidents involving limited express trains of Hokkaido Railway Co. threatens to have an impact on tourism.
COMMENTARY / World
Jul 23, 2013

An invitation to combat today's killer diseases

Noncommunicable diseases like cancer and diabetes lead to 63 percent of annual deaths worldwide. The good news is that they are largely preventable.
Japan Times
BUSINESS / BALANCING INTERESTS
Jul 23, 2013

Food looms large as trading houses plot overseas forays under new pact

Second in a series
BUSINESS / Companies
Jul 23, 2013

Steel maker reaches price hike pact

Kyodo Nippon Steel & Sumitomo Metal Corp. and Toyota Motor Corp. have agreed on a price hike for sheet metal in the April-September period of about ¥10,000 per ton, sources said Tuesday.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE FOREIGN ELEMENT
Jul 22, 2013

Police stonewalling over death of U.S. teen in Shinjuku prolongs family's ordeal

The family of Scott Kang had hoped that the release the autopsy report would shed some light on the U.S. teenager's death in Shinjuku in 2010 and bring them nearer to obtaining closure. Instead, it has reopened old wounds and raised fresh questions about the original police investigation.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / How-tos / LIFELINES
Jul 22, 2013

Think before you ink if you work with kids

I am very interested in getting an irezumi (traditional tattoo) in Japan. Are there any artists that will tattoo a foreigner? If so, who and where? My interviewer for the teaching position tried to warn me that tattoos are a 'no-no.
Japan Times
SUMO / SUMO SCRIBBLINGS
Jul 22, 2013

Hakuho moves past Asashoryu to third on the all-time greatest list

On July 21, yokozuna Hakuho became the third most successful rikishi in the modern era, even if his 26th yusho victory since first holding aloft the Emperor's Cup 42 tournaments ago came with something of a bittersweet aftertaste.
BUSINESS / YEN FOR LIVING
Jul 22, 2013

Golf courses adjust to harsher economics and changing demographics

Golfers in Japan are getting older, with no one to replace them when they're gone.
Japan Times
JAPAN / Politics
Jul 22, 2013

DPJ crashes to another humiliating defeat

The Democratic Party of Japan stumbled to another crushing defeat in the Upper House election Sunday, making it clear the opposition party will continue to face huge struggles to regain voters' trust.
Japan Times
WORLD / Crime & Legal
Jul 21, 2013

Martin rallies across U.S. urge 'justice'

In most places it was too hot for hooded sweat shirts. So they came with T-shirts.
BASEBALL / BASEBALL BULLET-IN
Jul 20, 2013

Teams jockeying for playoff position to battle Giants, Tigers

At the All-Star break for the 2013 NPB season, the Yomiuri Giants and Hanshin Tigers appear to have a lock on finishing in first and second place in the Central League pennant race. Unless there is total meltdown by one of them, we will be seeing them in the postseason Climax Series come October.
JAPAN / Media / BIG IN JAPAN
Jul 20, 2013

Japan's weeklies debate modern man's burden

Pity the declining male in an age of expanding female empowerment!
EDITORIALS
Jul 20, 2013

Malala Yousufzai's weapon of peace

Since being shot in the head by a Taliban extremist in Pakistan in October 2012, 16-year-old Malala Yousufzai has changed the world of girls' education.
Japan Times
BUSINESS / FOCUS
Jul 20, 2013

Detroit renews urban policy debate

A national urban policy would not have saved Detroit, but the city's bankruptcy filing Thursday was a vivid reminder of how the problems of America's cities have long ceased to be a focal point of the political debate in presidential campaigns or on Capitol Hill.

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