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Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE ZEIT GIST
Dec 7, 2004

Costly crackdown

Prospects of stricter visa requirements on foreign entertainers wishing to enter Japan worry Filipino recruiters and entertainers who say the restricted entry of Filipino workers into Japan may mean less money for families who depend on remittances being sent by relatives.
CULTURE / TV & Streaming / CHANNEL SURF
Dec 5, 2004

TV Tokyo's "Totsugeki! Idobata 7" and more

According to a recent article in weekly newsmagazine Aera, 8,158 Japanese women are married to non-Japanese men (the largest national group is American), while 27,881 Japanese men are married to non-Japanese women. The article says that the divorce rate among these "international couples" is rising faster...
BUSINESS
Dec 2, 2004

Subscribers get first view of BBC Japan channel

BBC Worldwide Ltd., the commercial arm of the British Broadcasting Corp., and digital data broadcaster Japan MediArk Co., launched BBC Japan on Wednesday.
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Nov 28, 2004

Light remains green for Filipinos in Japan -- well, kind of

The announcement of a basic free-trade agreement between Japan and the Philippines at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation Forum in Santiago, Chile, was met with a positive response in the Japanese media. Japan, after all, clearly came out ahead: Tariffs on Japanese imported steel products will be substantially...
Japan Times
Features
Nov 28, 2004

WATCHING THE DETECTIVES

On a rainy Saturday night in the neon-drenched streets of Shinjuku, Kenji Shimura looks like 1,000 other salarymen: off-the-rack black suit, sensible shoes and a face made for anonymous middle-management in an insurance firm.
JAPAN
Nov 19, 2004

LDP wants tougher requirements for entertainer visas

A Liberal Democratic Party panel has proposed making entertainer visas more difficult to get in order to curb the problem of human trafficking.
BUSINESS
Oct 9, 2004

Household spending inches upward

Household spending remained virtually unchanged in August from a year earlier, with families spending an average 302,657 yen, up 0.6 percent.
BUSINESS
Oct 9, 2004

New Nintendo console analysts' choice

The PlayStation Portable is the talk of the town, after basking in the limelight at a recent game show.
Japan Times
Features
Oct 3, 2004

Teddy bares all

Long before baseball's Ichiro Suzuki or soccer's Hidetoshi Nakata became stars overseas, in 1987 a 15-year-old boy from Asahikawa in Hokkaido flew to London on his way to taking the ballet world by storm just a few years later.
SOCCER / PREMIER REPORT
Sep 26, 2004

Mourinho's method wins many games, not many friends

LONDON -- Returning from Chelsea's 3-0 Champions League win over Paris Saint-Germain in France last week this correspondent was the last passenger to leave the team's plane. A police officer at Gatwick Airport asked: "Did they win?"
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Sep 19, 2004

9/11 conspiracy theories enthrall Japanese audiences

Only three years after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, American mainstream media are providing scant coverage of ceremonies to mark the tragedy, according to Japanese reporter Akihiko Reizei on the Internet news service Japan Mail Media. A resident of New Jersey, Reizei said that unlike the...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Jul 28, 2004

Director has whale of a time making experimental 'Mind Game'

Now an animation veteran, with 17 years in the business, Masaaki Yuasa still looks young enough, acts deferential enough and dresses down enough to be mistaken for a rank-and-filer. Instead, he is a rising industry star hailed for his work on the "Crayon Shinchan" franchise, the nearest Japanese animation...
BUSINESS
Jul 21, 2004

Sony-Bertelsmann deal approved

BERLIN The European Commission has approved unconditionally a merger between the music units of Sony Corp. and Germany's Bertelsmann AG to create the world's second-largest music company, with a 25 percent market share, the two companies said Monday.
CULTURE / Film
Jul 14, 2004

A 'Steamboy' timeline

1995 After enjoying international success with his debut feature "Akira" (1988), Katsuhiro Otomo comes up with the idea for his second feature, "Steamboy," from an animated short, "Cannon Fodder." One of three segments in his 1995 animation omnibus "Memories," "Cannon Fodder" tells an Orwellian tale,...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives
Jun 13, 2004

Cops and citizens bid to blitz street sleaze

In an ideal society, various branches of the state interact to put criminals behind bars. Talk to those involved in law enforcement, though, and most will say there's only so much they can do without the cooperation of private citizens.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Stage
Jun 2, 2004

The lush samurai

Take a cast of stars, any of whom could fill a theater on their own, add a couple of Oscar winners -- costume designer Emi Wada ("Ran," 1985) and songwriter Ryuichi Sakamoto ("The Last Emperor," 1987) -- garnish with an A-list director (Kazuya Yamada), scriptwriter (Nozomi Makino) and art director (Yukio...
JAPAN
May 29, 2004

Locals take crime-prevention into their own hands

At the beginning of May, six security company workers started late-afternoon patrols of the Isezaki-cho district of Yokohama's Naka Ward.
JAPAN
May 29, 2004

Locals take crime-prevention into their own hands

At the beginning of May, six security company workers started late-afternoon patrols of the Isezaki-cho district of Yokohama's Naka Ward.
Features
May 9, 2004

When wrong can be right

At the beginning of "Showgirls," suspicious that a kind seamstress might be physically attracted to her, aspiring chorine Nomi (Elizabeth Berkley) asks: "Are you hitting on me?" The Japanese subtitle reads: "Are you making fun of me?"
COMMENTARY
Apr 26, 2004

Democracy, Filipino style

MANILA -- Before I moved to Manila two years ago, a Filipino parliamentarian told me about election-related violence in his country. At that time I could hardly believe my ears. Now I have come to understand that ballot snatching, intimidation of voters and even assassinations are a sad reality in many...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Stage
Apr 14, 2004

Lessons still unlearned

Timely or what! Just as Japan's autocratic leaders appear to have junked war-renouncing Article 9 of the Constitution -- with news last week of SDF aircraft even having transported armed U.S. soldiers into Iraq -- along comes "Taiko Tataite Fue Fuite (Playing Drum and Flute)," which vividly portrays...
Japan Times
Features
Apr 11, 2004

Zen for all to see

A few years ago, I went to see "Izutsu (The Well Curb)" at the old Kongo Theatre in Kyoto. A key scene in this noh classic comes when the shite (principal character), a beautiful woman played by a man, offers prayers at the little grave mound beside a well in a dilapidated temple. In answer to the waki...
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / PERSONALITY PROFILE
Apr 3, 2004

John Berg

This month a respected and well-loved Englishman leaves Japan. Known for his humor, humanity and quick wit, the Rev. John Berg is retiring from Yokohama Christ Church, where he has been rector since 1968. Three years ago, he retired from Yokohama's Mission to Seamen, where he was concurrently chaplain....
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Mar 28, 2004

A subversive sampler of the future

Since the '80s -- when the first samplers came on the market -- sampling in music has evolved from a revolutionary and barely understood practice to become a standard tool in the production of even the most mundane pop song. It's all in the hands of the user -- and when those hands belong to Coldcut,...
SOCCER / PREMIER REPORT
Mar 26, 2004

Chelsea management showing classy Ranieri no respect

LONDON -- When Roman Abramovich took over at Chelsea last July the club was on the verge of administration.
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Mar 5, 2004

Easy-to-play Donkey Kong, Pac-Man find new favor as gamers seek fast fix

Major video-game manufacturers are releasing new versions of old hits as users are increasingly becoming turned off by the growing complexity of the latest productions.

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