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COMMENTARY
Oct 17, 2002

Face down lobbies, factions

LONDON -- Why can't Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi carry out his promised reforms of the Japanese economy? Some may argue that he never really intended to reform the system and that his promises were all sham designed as a political boost. I don't agree, although I do question whether he and his close...
LIFE / Digital / NAME OF THE GAME
Oct 17, 2002

Honor (and fun) among thieves

American-made adventure games do not typically hit the Famitsu top 10 rankings that determine what's hot in gaming in Japan. "Donkey Kong Country," a British-made Super Famicom game, was Japan's all-time best-selling foreign-made adventure game.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art / NEW ART SEEN
Oct 16, 2002

Educational crazy golf is a hole in one

If life is a crap shoot, then the Japanese educational system is a game of mini-golf, or so reckons Peter Bellars: That's the message behind the English artist's current Yokohama Museum of Art Gallery exhibition.
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Oct 13, 2002

Confessions over a cup of coffee

ON TSUKUBA PEAK: Tanka by Hatsue Kawamura. Five Islands Press: Wollongong, Australia, z2002, 93 pp., $20/1,500 yen (paper) MEMORIES OF A WOMAN: Tanka by Harue Aoki. Mura Press, Tokyo, 2001, 204 pp., 1,800 yen (paper) Women poets have a long and industrious history in Japan, where they have been writing...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Oct 13, 2002

You're never too old to read a good self-help book

The best-seller list currently features three volumes on living and aging well: "Oite Koso Jinsei" (Nothing Is More Human Than Aging), by novelist/politician Shintaro Ishihara; "Unmei no Ashioto" (The Footsteps of Approaching Fate), by novelist Hiroyuki Itsuki; and "Ikikata Jozu" (How to Live Well),...
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Oct 12, 2002

Personal fences and Hello Kitty killer

In the spirit of "benri de ii" (convenient and good) I would like to propose some ideas for making Japan a more convenient country.
COMMENTARY / World
Oct 12, 2002

Success of globalization rests on good business reputations

These are not good times for business ethics in the industrialized nations. In spite of a carefully honed reputation for professionalism and honesty, businesses in the United States, Japan and Europe have seen scandals and problems. In the U.S. it has been the overstatement of profits by and exorbitant...
COMMUNITY / How-tos / LIFELINES
Oct 11, 2002

What's a working mom to do with her kids in Tokyo?

Childcare An entrepreneur in central Tokyo, is up in arms. One of her Japanese assistants is about to have a baby and wants to continue working afterwards. But so far her assistant has been unable to find public child-care facilities for children under the age of 2.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music / J-POPSICLE
Oct 9, 2002

The Captains chart retro course

Nostalgia is a dangerous thing. In the wrong hands, it can be an outlet for excessive sentimentality and out-and-out kitsch.
SOCCER / World cup
Oct 8, 2002

No shocks in Zico's squad

Junichi Inamoto of Fulham, Shinji Ono of Feyenoord, Shunsuke Nakamura of Reggina and Hidetoshi Nakata of Parma are expected to form Japan's midfield against Jamaica in next week's friendly after new Japan coach Zico unveiled the European-based Japanese players as possible starters on Monday in Tokyo....
EDITORIALS
Oct 8, 2002

The U.S. returns to Pyongyang

The visit by Mr. James Kelly, the U.S. assistant secretary of state for East Asian affairs, to Pyongyang yielded no breakthrough in relations between North Korea and the United States. Nonetheless, the two sides are talking and appear committed to a serious dialogue. The U.S., like Japan, should give...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY
Oct 6, 2002

Takafumi Goda: the man at the helm

As director of the university division of the higher education bureau at the Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology Ministry, Takafumi Goda is at the helm of national policy on university education. Recently, one of his chief tasks has been to oversee long-awaited reforms to Japan's university...
CULTURE / Music / J-POPSICLE
Oct 2, 2002

Glay strikes the right chord with Chinese leader Zemin

No word on whether Chinese President Jiang Zemin will embark on a new career as a rock star after the members of Japanese pop-rock band Glay presented him with an electric guitar at his official residence in Beijing on Sept. 10.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Oct 2, 2002

Arto Lindsay: He bangs

Arto Lindsay steps onto the stage. In his late 40s, he still retains the gawkiness of an adolescent boy, all long arms and legs. The image of a geek is completed by large horn-rimmed glasses and a pale complexion.
COMMENTARY
Sep 30, 2002

A theory that doesn't work

For the market economy to function effectively, equal opportunity must be guaranteed in all sectors of society. In today's Japan, however, there is no such guarantee. For example, the opportunity for a Japanese person to become a Diet member is far from equal, because many retiring Diet members have...
Japan Times
JAPAN / WEEKEND WISDOM
Sep 29, 2002

'Kabukicho guide' offers punters a walk on the wild side

Sporting a pinstripe suit, a wiry figure hovers on the main street of Shinjuku Ward's Kabukicho -- Tokyo's busiest and arguably seediest entertainment district.
COMMENTARY / World
Sep 29, 2002

Exactly when does old age really begin?

"Put simply, we are having fewer children and living longer," says Michelle Gunn, an Australian journalist and social-affairs writer. Our time is undeniably the age of longevity.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Sep 29, 2002

Ken Hirai: Soul to soul

We've seen Ken Hirai do it time and time again: mesmerize audiences with his silky tenor voice and those sexily svelte good looks -- kneading the air up on stage as if to squeeze from it any drop of passion that his music has somehow failed to discharge.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / BEST BAR NONE
Sep 29, 2002

Father, son mix it up in Yokohama

Yokohama was once the undisputed headquarters for foreigners in the Kanto region. Its wide accommodating port facilities were the destination for postwar U.S. fleets arriving to establish their presence in Japan. And, as with any port town, many bars and restaurants sprang up to cater to the ebb and...
CULTURE / Music
Sep 29, 2002

Scouting out the Next Big Thing

At this very moment, thousands of young musicians throughout Japan are busy pursuing the same elusive goal: pop stardom. Some are driven by the need to express their artistic vision; others by the perks of stardom; and still more of them by the simple desire to support themselves by playing the music...
JAPAN
Sep 28, 2002

Small boat on 'spy ship' had GPS

The small boat in the hold of the North Korean spy ship salvaged earlier this month from the East China Sea carried a global positioning system that may have stored records of its movements, the Japan Coast Guard said Friday.
EDITORIALS
Sep 28, 2002

Pyongyang must tell the full story

Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's meeting Friday with the families of those abducted by North Korean agents made it unmistakably clear that the understanding and support of those relatives -- and of the Japanese public in general -- is essential to progress in the normalization talks that are expected...
JAPAN
Sep 28, 2002

State's nuclear policy faces big hurdle: regaining public trust

With the nuclear-hazard coverup scandal continuing to swirl around Tokyo Electric Power Co., two advisory panels set up by the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry are stepping up their efforts to douse the controversy.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Sep 28, 2002

Drugstores spread queasy headaches

I'm afraid to go to the doctor in Japan. If I did, he might bring up the bread crusts. You know, those mammoth slices of bread in Japan with crusts that take forever to chew all the way through? If the doctor looked down my throat, he might see into my stomach and say, "Look at all those bread crusts...
Japan Times
JAPAN
Sep 27, 2002

Arimoto may have written her last letter under duress

A letter from Keiko Arimoto to her parents sent from Copenhagen in 1983 suggests she may have been forced to write it, and it was not posted until after she was abducted to North Korea, police sources said Thursday.
JAPAN
Sep 26, 2002

Member of JAL hijacking suspected in abduction

Police obtained an arrest warrant Wednesday for one of the nine Japanese radicals who hijacked a Japan Airlines plane to North Korea in 1970 on suspicion of abducting a Japanese woman in 1983, police officials said.
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE ZEIT GIST
Sep 26, 2002

Neither here nor there: recipe for mayhem

Swimming against the current in Japan has never been a good idea, even if you are armed to the teeth with logic and common sense.

Longform

Koichi Tagawa’s diary entry from Aug. 9, 1945, describes the day of the atomic bombing of Nagasaki.
The horrors of Nagasaki, in first person