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JAPAN
Apr 2, 2001

Cheap long-distance calls launched

Fusion Communications Corp. on Sunday launched its Internet-based domestic long-distance telephone service that charges users a uniform rate of 20 yen per three minutes for calls made to anywhere in Japan.
COMMENTARY / World
Apr 2, 2001

Hope: Afghanistan's scarcest resource

JALLOZAI, Pakistan -- With the release last week of photos confirming the destruction of the giant Buddha statues of Bamiyan, Afghanistan's Taliban leaders lost their last remote hope for a reconciliation with the world over the act.
COMMENTARY
Apr 2, 2001

Close the book on censorship

Since the end of World War II, the censorship of history textbooks in Japan has raised political and diplomatic issues. Recently, a social-studies textbook edited by a nationalist group again stirred controversy, offending the Chinese and South Koreans.
COMMENTARY / World
Apr 2, 2001

Shattering the myth of a leaderless Japan

Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori's term in office is just about finished. He has had his summits, the budget has been passed, and he has completed one year in office. Gaffes notwithstanding, Mori can now step down with a clear conscience and some tangible accomplishments. Attention now focuses on picking...
COMMENTARY
Apr 2, 2001

Japan's economic 'kuroko'

For more than a decade, Japan's financial authorities have been trying to treat the growing mountain of bad loans at Japan's banks as a "kuroko" of the Japan economy.
CULTURE / Film
Apr 1, 2001

A month of the early years of Chinese cinema

The National Film Center in Tokyo will this week launch a monthlong series of screenings exploring the early years of Chinese cinema.
COMMENTARY
Apr 1, 2001

Banks offer no miracle cures

LONDON -- This is a tale of two banks, combined with a large dose of blind faith and credulity.
COMMENTARY / World
Apr 1, 2001

A time of hopeful change in the Philippines

MANILA -- Political life is always exciting in this fascinating country of over 7,000 islands, be it in periods of great upheavals, as with the two famous "EDSA" popular movements or during subsequent periods of transition in search of calm and stability, as at the present moment.
COMMENTARY / World
Apr 1, 2001

Should English be forced on immigrants?

The looks on my uncle's and his customer's faces clearly suggested they were talking about me while I was standing next to them. I had no idea what they were saying. Nothing bad I am sure, but although I was 16, I felt powerless as a baby might feel as she tries to reach for an object and the hand does...
EDITORIALS
Apr 1, 2001

A crime for the times

Italy, a country we are celebrating this year in Japan, is at the cutting edge of all sorts of things: food, fashion, fast cars, films and some interesting criminal practices. Oh, and bizarre opera plots. Sometimes it seems as if those last two get a bit entangled.
LIFE / Food & Drink
Apr 1, 2001

Takoyaki wars shift to Tokyo

There was a time when takoyaki (octopus dumplings) were dismissed by Tokyoites as festival fare or a snack for kids. In recent years, though, takoyaki has found fans outside its birthplace of Osaka and joined the ranks of other Kansai-Kanto crossovers such as okonomiyaki and Yoshimoto-style comedy (think...
CULTURE / Music
Apr 1, 2001

Modern gagaku: Experiments with tradition

In the late 1960s, the National Theater of Japan made a decision to commission new music for gagaku (court music) orchestra and changed the destiny of traditional Japanese arts.
BASEBALL / BASEBALL BULLET-IN
Apr 1, 2001

Time for fans to pick 'em

As promised, this week's column is devoted to predictions sent in by Baseball Bullet-In readers offering their hunches on how the 2001 Central and Pacific League pennant races will play out. Ten people responded and, since I offered to accept the picks by e-mail, there were even a few entries from outside...
LIFE / Food & Drink / NIHONSHU
Apr 1, 2001

Just how much will a field yield?

Did you ever look at a field of rice, and wonder how many bottles of sake could be made from it? Maybe not. Regardless, it is not an easy question to answer, because there are way too many variables in the brewing process that affect yield. One is how much the rice was milled before brewing. Obviously,...
LIFE / Food & Drink
Apr 1, 2001

The word on the street is croquettes are hot

In Harajuku, the holy land of Tokyo's young people, the "king of street cuisine" has long been the crepe. Rolled around a filling of whipped cream, fruits, chocolate and/or other sweets, the thin pancake is a favorite among suburban girls who flock to the area to shop and be seen among the trendsetting...
CULTURE / Music / FUZZY LOGIC
Apr 1, 2001

Only rock 'n' roll, but I loathe it

If you are gagging in disgust at the thought of Fuzzy Logic from now on contaminating your Sunday with lurid tales of sex, drugs and rock 'n' roll . . . fear not.
LIFE / Food & Drink
Apr 1, 2001

Squid tentacles draw the crowds

OSAKA -- If asked to name Osaka's local specialties, most outsiders would say okonomiyaki (meat and vegetable pancakes) and takoyaki (octopus dumplings, or, as former Gov. "Knock" Yokoyama once introduced them to visiting world leaders, "samurai balls"). While it's true that these dishes originated in...
LIFE / Food & Drink
Apr 1, 2001

Depachika build a boom from the bottom up

Misako Kaneko, a Tokyo office worker, likes to have dinner at home while watching her favorite TV dramas. But as a single woman who works full-time, it's not easy for her to find time to prepare a healthy meal every night after work.
EDITORIALS
Apr 1, 2001

Not-so-brilliant green tea

Green-tea drinkers have been a little blue this past month in the wake of bad news from a group of Tohoku University researchers: Green tea, according to the Japanese scientists' recent report in the New England Journal of Medicine, may not be such a panacea after all. But consumers should not feel either...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Apr 1, 2001

Ohkura brings kabuki to life

KABUKI TODAY: The Art and Tradition. Photographs by Shunji Ohkura, text by Iwao Kamimura, translated by Kirsten McIvor. Introduction by Donald Keene. Tokyo: Kodansha International, 2001, 194 pp., profusely illustrated. 5,800 yen. This lavish volume, as extravagant as the kabuki itself, is devoted to...
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Apr 1, 2001

The courage to air dirty laundry

Problems can't be solved until they're acknowledged, and it is considered the job of the media to bring hidden social problems into the open. The media, however, can't be counted on to provide perspective, which means that what are often perceived as new problems are actually old ones.
LIFE / Food & Drink / KISSA KULTUR
Apr 1, 2001

Tea fit for royalty glows at L'Epicier

For the last three months, I have been inexplicably drawn to tea shops with yellow color schemes. Is there a magical connection? Maybe only in a subliminal desire for the very best.
JAPAN
Mar 31, 2001

Animal shelter caring for Miyake Islanders' pets

An animal shelter run by volunteers opened this week in Hino, western Tokyo, to shelter for free pets evacuated last year with their owners from volcanic Miyake Island, south of Tokyo.
COMMENTARY
Mar 31, 2001

Lack of leaders is destroying the LDP

Earlier this month, Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori announced that the date for electing the next president of his ruling Liberal Democratic Party would be moved up. This was tantamount to him expressing his intention to resign.
CULTURE / Film
Mar 31, 2001

You really don't want to go there

There must be an organization in Hollywood called Bad Sequels Inc. (not to mention Happy Endings.com and Dial-a-Corpse). The people over at Bad Sequels are dressed in gray, carry briefcases and have the furtive look of a nervous salesman. They go up to some successful producer at some 7-ish cocktail...
COMMENTARY
Mar 31, 2001

The power of the camera

NEW DELHI -- For three years as Indian prime minister, the aging Atal Bihari Vajpayee was treated deferentially by the national media and intelligentsia. They portrayed him as a great leader, to whom there was no credible alternative. Even when his physical condition began to slip visibly, no questions...
EDITORIALS
Mar 31, 2001

'Not guilty' is not innocent

Earlier this week, the Tokyo District Court acquitted Dr. Takeshi Abe, the former Teikyo University vice president charged with professional negligence resulting in the death of a hemophiliac. The decision reveals the difficulty in passing legal judgment on medical acts by a doctor, in which effects...

Longform

Sumadori Bar on Shibuya Ward's main Center Gai street targets young customers who prefer low-alcohol drinks or abstain altogether.
Rethinking that second drink: Japan’s Gen Z gets ‘sober curious’