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Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Jan 21, 2011

Bo Ningen

Sporting chest-length, jet-black hair that obscures each of the four members' facial features, Bo Ningen look like what might have happened if Sadako from "The Ring" had crawled out of the well and found herself on stage fronting a psych-rock band. Add in song titles such as "Koroshitai Kimochi," which...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Jan 21, 2011

Okamoto's plot new album release before summer

After being courted by record labels while still in high school in Tokyo, inking a deal with Sony subsidiary Ariola Japan was an easy decision for Okamoto's.
Reader Mail
Jan 20, 2011

No inducement to return islands

Regarding the Jan. 14 Kyodo article "Territory settlement 'impossible' now": This is a very sad situation, especially for those Japanese wishing to return to the place of their birth. If you look at any of the media sites for Russian television, the point of view of the Russian populace is that the "Northern...
JAPAN / Q&A
Jan 20, 2011

Chasm emerges as lawmakers debate tax reform pros and cons

Tax and social welfare reforms will be the administration's priority this year, according to Prime Minister Naoto Kan.
Reader Mail
Jan 20, 2011

Speak out on 'universal' standards

I would like to respond to Greg Hutchinson's Jan. 13 letter, "Americans should avoid lecturing." This discussion began with an exchange of letters in the Dec. 19 and Dec. 26 Readers in Council in which the question was raised as to whether an American should give advice to the Japanese on issues related...
JAPAN
Jan 20, 2011

Key ministers meet to weigh tax hike

Key Cabinet ministers agreed Wednesday to map out comprehensive proposals on social welfare and tax reforms, with an eye to hiking the sales levy, by June as they met for the first time to explore ways to cope with the problems of a rapidly aging society and mounting government debt.
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 19, 2011

Hu's momentous U.S. visit

HONG KONG — The pomp and circumstance marking President Hu Jintao's arrival in Washington could define a dangerous moment in relations between the United States and China. Political hype and pressures could easily poison the atmosphere and prevent progress on the proliferation of business, economic...
Japan Times
LIFE / Digital
Jan 19, 2011

Hackers worldwide Kinect with their creative sides

When Kinect, Microsoft's latest add-on for the Xbox 360 game console, was released worldwide in November 2010, it was the beginning of a success story, but not in the way Microsoft may have been expecting.
Japan Times
LIFE / Digital
Jan 19, 2011

'Tokyo Control': Sony launches its first 3-D drama into the air

If 2010 was supposed to be 3-D's coming-out party, then in 2011 the party is poised to continue as manufacturers do their best to make this trendy technology truly stick.
Japan Times
MULTIMEDIA
Jan 19, 2011

Orix seeks 10% profit on equity by 2014

Financial services firm Orix Corp. is targeting a 10 percent return on equity in three years and a gradual increase in payments to shareholders, after cutting its dividend by 71 percent in the wake of the credit crisis.
LIFE / Language / BILINGUAL
Jan 19, 2011

Paying respect to the Japanese toilet god

One of the mildly disconcerting surprises awaiting the foreign visitor to Japan is the sheer abundance and creativity of its toilet facilities, public and otherwise.
BUSINESS
Jan 18, 2011

Rise of fiscal reformist Yosano good sign for debt

Prime Minister Naoto Kan's decision to bring former Finance Minister Kaoru Yosano into his Cabinet signals a return to fiscal reforms that helped send benchmark bond yields to a seven-year low last August.
COMMENTARY
Jan 17, 2011

Experts worth listening to

Each of the government's ministries and agencies has its own deliberative council. Before the fiscal 2001 ministerial reorganization — on April 27, 2000 — the government adopted the basic plan for abolishing and integrating these councils and the like. (The expression "and the like" was added because...
JAPAN
Jan 16, 2011

Yen may spur shift offshore: Toyoda

Toyota Motor Corp. President Akio Toyoda acknowledged that shifting output abroad may be inevitable to ward off damage from a rising yen, a reversal of course for the carmaker.
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT / WILD WATCH
Jan 16, 2011

A dream comes true with the blues

My last great wildlife adventure of 2010 began in darkness to the sound of waves crashing on an idyllic beach.
CULTURE / Books
Jan 16, 2011

Korean wordsmiths strut their stuff

YOUR REPUBLIC IS CALLING YOU, by Yong-ha Kim. Mariner Books, 2010, 326 pp., $14.95 (paper) INTO THE LIGHT: An Anthology of Literature by Koreans in Japan, by Melissa L. Wender. University of Hawaii Press, 2011, 226 pp., $22 (paper) I didn't expect a novel about a North Korean mole ordered to return to...
JAPAN
Jan 15, 2011

Gates: U.S. presence keeps North in check

North Korea is less able now to invade the South than it was a decade or more ago but has become a more lethal threat to Asia and the world, U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates said Friday in Tokyo.
BUSINESS / ANALYSIS
Jan 15, 2011

New team seen prioritizing TPP entry, sales tax hike

While Prime Minister Naoto Kan's Cabinet reshuffle was not radical, it sent out clear messages on some of the major economic and fiscal issues the new administration faces, including the promotion of a trans-Pacific free-trade pact and a hike in the consumption tax, economists said Friday.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Jan 15, 2011

Facing your unlucky years

If you're hoping that 2011 will be your best year yet in Japan, think again. I hate to be the one to drop the bomb here, but the Shinto odds are against you. As a matter of fact, 2011 may be your most perilous year yet. Here is why:

Longform

Tetsuzo Shiraishi, speaking at The Center of the Tokyo Raids and War Damage, uses a thermos to explain how he experienced the U.S. firebombing of March 1945, when he was just 7 years old.
From ashes to high-rises: A survivor’s account of Tokyo’s postwar past