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September 01, 2025
 

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JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Jan 25, 2004

Japan's culture dictates: Thou shalt eat meat

On Jan. 15, the animal rights organization, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, announced that CBS had refused to accept a 30-second TV spot from the group for the network's Feb. 1 Super Bowl broadcast. CBS explained that its policy is not to accept "advocacy advertisements." PETA, which would...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Dec 31, 2003

A river of creativity runs through it

Art is breaking out all over Kamiyama in Tokushima Prefecture. Mysterious arrangements of rocks are appearing in the verdant hills of this northeastern Shikoku town. Small wooden huts -- equipped with artistic stamps and ink pads for visitors to document their passage -- are dotted about the town. An...
COMMENTARY
Nov 28, 2003

No resting on laurels in Asia

SEOUL -- This is a remarkable moment in international relations. Despite a nuclear crisis on the Korean Peninsula, there are no doubts about the U.S. commitment to East Asia. Despite widespread criticism of U.S. policy, Washington currently enjoys "the best relations ever" with both Japan and China....
Japan Times
CULTURE / Stage
Nov 26, 2003

Everything you needed to know about 'Hamlet'

What is it about "Hamlet," Shakespeare's most famous drama, that obsesses Yukio Ninagawa, Japanese theater's global standard-bearer? The innovative director has already staged the play four times -- and his fifth take on the tragedy of the Prince of Denmark opened last week at the Bunkamura Theater Cocoon...
CULTURE / Books / THE BOOK REPORT
Nov 6, 2003

'Grotesque' cuts too close to the bone

Do the suffocating pressures of Japanese society produce monsters? Does trying to live by men's rules drive women crazy? These are two of the questions posed by Natsuo Kirino in her powerful new novel, "Grotesque."
COMMENTARY
Oct 30, 2003

Europe rues decline amid shift to Asia

PARIS -- Officially, we were discussing Russia's place in Asia. It was hard to tell whether the French senator/historian on the panel was warning of Moscow's return to great-power status or urging it on. He was no crypto-communist, however: For him, Russia's resurgence would signal the return of multipolarity...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Oct 5, 2003

Reviewing reviews of Richie

JAPANESE LITERATURE REVIEWED, by Donald Richie. ICG Muse Inc, 2003, 490 pp., 2,800 yen (cloth). Like photographers, writers who stick at their trade long enough may find themselves in possession, without having realized it, of a substantial body of work, one that has accumulated silently like a snowdrift....
COMMENTARY / World
Oct 2, 2003

Few know but many fear where the U.S. 'road map' leads

BEIRUT -- By the summer of 2002, U.S. President George Bush had firmly set his new course: "regime change" and reform in the Muslim and Arab worlds, and, where necessary, American military intervention to achieve it.
COMMENTARY
Sep 20, 2003

Liberal ideals gain ground in the Asia-Pacific region

MANILA -- In past decades, liberal democracy and economic freedom have made great advances in all parts of the world. This general trend also applies to Asia, as is documented in the annual "Freedom in the World" surveys published by the Washington-based Heritage Foundation and the "Economic Freedom...
EDITORIALS
Sep 15, 2003

Looming specter of tax hikes

The government's budget deficit continues to swell at an ominous pace. According to an estimate by the Finance Ministry, the total amount of bond issues in fiscal 2004 may exceed 41 trillion yen -- a sum roughly half the size of the budget. The figure could be revised downward, possibly to less than...
Events
Sep 14, 2003

KANSAI: Who & What

Demonstration of flower arranging set for Kyoto: The Kyoto chapter of Ikebana International will hold a demonstration of the art of Japanese flower arranging from 1 p.m. on Tuesday at the Brighton Hotel Kyoto, in the city's Kamigyo Ward.
COMMENTARY
Aug 24, 2003

Beijing betting that a better economy will calm restless Hong Kong democrats

HONG KONG -- China's strategy for dealing with the political situation in Hong Kong in the aftermath of the massive rallies last month -- when more than half a million people took to the streets -- is two-pronged: On one hand, Beijing is waging a massive economic campaign to prop up the Hong Kong economy....
Japan Times
LIFE / Lifestyle / ON THE BOOK TRAIL
Aug 21, 2003

"Toad Heaven," "Ada Lovelace"

"Toad Heaven," Morris Gleitzman, Puffin Books; 2002; 192 pp. Humans are always complaining about how unfair life is. Limpy is a cane toad, but he thinks it's unfair, too. For starters, no one likes him (except his family). Female cane toads don't think he's much of a looker. (Cane toads are ugly enough,...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Stage
Aug 13, 2003

Hotshot terrorist comedy just misses target

Though only in his early 30s, Martin McDonagh already has a 1998 Tony Award under his belt for his worldwide hit, "The Beauty Queen of Leenane." What's more, his works have been staged in 38 countries -- Japan among them.
COMMENTARY / World
Aug 10, 2003

Chaotic images of Indonesia

HONOLULU -- Turmoil in Indonesia was underscored Tuesday when a terrorist bomb exploded in a hotel in Jakarta killing at least 14 people and wounding about 150 more. It has added to the already surging concern of American officials in Washington and at the U.S. Pacific Command's headquarters in Hawaii,...
COMMENTARY / World
Aug 1, 2003

Too rich, too complex to be run by slaves

HONG KONG -- China's new premier, Wen Jiabao, on his first visit to Hong Kong in his new job gave a resounding speech, declaring that local people were in charge of their own destiny. The question now is whether he meant it and whether the leaders in Beijing are prepared to trust the maturity of Hong...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Jun 29, 2003

A hot-headed female voice

EMBRACING THE FIREBIRD: Yosano Akiko and the Birth of the Female Voice in Modern Poetry, by Janine Beichman. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 2002, 352 pp., $23.95 (paper). Vivid, rich, suggestive, imaginative -- with these words, writer Janine Beichman aptly describes the extraordinary early poetry...
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WHEN EAST MARRIES WEST
Jun 28, 2003

Extinction ahead for odd Japanese beasts

A news item earlier this year cited the upcoming extinction of the banana, giving the slippery fruit a life expectancy of but 10 more years.
JAPAN / Science & Health / NATURAL SELECTIONS
Jun 19, 2003

Men stripped to their Ys

Edward Lambert, born in the 1700s in England, was to all appearances a normal boy until he entered puberty, whereupon his skin turned black and thickened, hardening into scales, solid like the shafts of feathers.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music / HIGH NOTES
Jun 11, 2003

Junkie XL: "RADIO JXL: A Broadcast From the Computer Hell Cabin"

Given Junkie XL's successful dance remix of Elvis Presley's "A Little Less Conversation," his appearances on MTV and recent high-profile shows at the Liquid Room in Tokyo, it's difficult to ignore the arrival of his new album, "RADIO JXL: A Broadcast From the Computer Hell Cabin." Not that he's a new...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music / HIGH NOTES
Jun 11, 2003

Radiohead: "Hail to the Thief"

According to Radiohead vocalist Thom Yorke, the cover art of the new album, "Hail to the Thief," is a road map made up of blocks of words that "rang bells" in his head whenever he listened to commentary about 9/11 and its political aftermath. Radiohead has always invited as much interpretation as the...
JAPAN / History
Apr 30, 2003

Japan Occupation turned foes into friends

Before Gen. Douglas MacArthur landed at a small airstrip outside Tokyo to begin the U.S.-led Occupation of Japan in 1945, Americans were the object of intense hatred, portrayed by propagandists as rapacious foreign devils.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music / PLAY BUTTON
Apr 27, 2003

The wandering laptop minstrel

With his long black hair pulled back in a tight, neat ponytail and his pale complexion, electronica musician Nobukazu Takemura has an otherworldly quality somewhere between a computer geek and a monk.
ENVIRONMENT / OUR PLANET EARTH
Apr 24, 2003

Feedback

Dear readers, as you rarely get the last word, this week's column aims to put that right. Two weeks ago, I wrote about the dangers of our society's addiction to oil, and noted that much of the world still believes the primary purpose of the U.S. invasion of Iraq was to dominate its oil supplies and establish...
MORE SPORTS
Apr 21, 2003

Sky's the limit for broadcaster in search of sporting excellence

A recent survey of 1,000 Japanese sports viewers who subscribe to JSky Sports showed that 25-30 percent enjoyed watching or wanted to watch baseball, sumo and soccer, 19 percent favored domestic rugby, 13 percent enjoyed cycling and 12 percent preferred international rugby, NBA and NHL.
EDITORIALS
Apr 13, 2003

In search of the real al-Jazeera

The war in Iraq hasn't been easy for nonparticipants such as Japan to sort out. The most obvious villains were also technically the victims, and the perpetrators of hostilities have looked like invaders one minute, liberators the next. Perceptions and judgments could, and still do, shift like the wind....
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Apr 13, 2003

Matsui, Matsui . . . and a little more Matsui

Because of coverage of the invasion of Iraq, it feels as if we're being spared the all-Matsui-all-the-time media blitz we were promised last fall when the former Yomiuri Giants slugger, Hideki Matsui, signed with the New York Yankees. We aren't. Matsui madness is everywhere, but because the war has engaged...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY
Apr 6, 2003

A legend from Kyoto to Kerouac and way beyond

Gar Snyder is a legendary figure. The real-life original of Japhy Ryder -- traveling companion, friend and spiritual inspiration to the novelist Jack Kerouac -- he appears in that guise in Kerouac's 1959 novel, "The Dharma Bums." There, speaking as Ryder, he announces that, after study in the East, he...
EDITORIALS
Mar 29, 2003

One week into the war

It has been nine days since the United States launched its attack against Iraq. The war has not gone as many expected. The difficulties encountered by the U.S.-led coalition have raised questions about Washington's strategy and the assumptions that undergirded the allied assault. Although those doubts...
Top Japan trade negotiator canceled U.S. trip over rice, report says
Ryosei Akazawa
‘Mount Fuji Lawson’ becomes a symbol of Japan’s overtourism problem
A couple poses for a wedding photo in front of a Lawson in the town of Kawaguchiko, Yamanashi Prefecture, on Aug. 25.
Philippine bid to acquire used Japanese warships gains steam
Tokyo is looking to transfer Abukuma-class vessels to the Philippines as part of broader efforts to boost the defense capabilities of like-minded neighbors amid growing Chinese military assertiveness in the region.
Japan to launch broad review of immigration policies amid rise in foreign nationals
Foreign tourists at Narita Airport in June. A report released Friday stresses that Japan is at a turning point and that current ad-hoc measures on immigration are no longer sufficient.
The Nobel Prize and a testy phone call: How the Trump-Modi relationship unraveled
U.S. President Donald Trump and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi greet one another at the start of a joint news conference in the East Room of the White House in Washington in February.
Japan to launch broad review of immigration policies amid rise in foreign nationals
Foreign tourists at Narita Airport in June. A report released Friday stresses that Japan is at a turning point and that current ad-hoc measures on immigration are no longer sufficient.
Sip a bespoke coffee for ¥4,000
At Kuro Mame, baristas customize the coffee according to the guest's preferences.
Japan is warming up to tattoos — just not permanent ones
Tattoos have a complex history in Japan, but new types of temporary ink are letting locals curious about body art experiment without the commitment.
YouTube Music Weekend is where Japan’s internet-born performers go global
Headlining the second day of YouTube Music Weekend is Vocaloid artist Kikuo, who, with 1.46 million YouTube subscribers, is one of the most popular artists in the genre.
Japan looks to build drone ‘shield’ in record defense budget request
A group of Ground Self-Defense Force service members discuss drone operations and capabilities at a joint static display during the Orient Shield 24 opening ceremony at the Yausubetsu Training Area in Hokkaido in July last year.

Podcast

One of the many entrances to the Kabukicho neighborhood in Tokyo’s Shinjuku Ward.
Kabukicho: Tokyo’s ‘stadium of desire’

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
By Alex K.T. Martin

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