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Japan Times
Events / Events Outside Tokyo
Mar 16, 2007

Full-color business and pleasure

If there's one thing that's drawing the eyes of the world toward Japan, it'sanime. From "Akira" to "Spirited Away," through years of moving, high-concept beauties and "video nasties," and right down to the plethora of sprawling half-hour cartoon series, animation is widely regarded as Japan's key artistic...
COMMENTARY / World
Mar 15, 2007

EU defies pessimists' dire predictions

PRAGUE -- As the European Union prepares to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Treaty of Rome later this month, the EU is widely perceived to be on its knees. European integration, is felt to have, somehow met its Waterloo in 2005, when Dutch and French referendums unexpectedly torpedoed the draft...
COMMENTARY / World
Mar 15, 2007

Dark clouds over Shangri-La

Yunnan Province in southwestern China, a formerly poor and clandestine region, is now experiencing rapid growth due to tourism and rural development. Mountainous northwestern Yunnan is home to the headwaters of three great river systems that run in parallel within about 30 km -- the Salween, Mekong and...
Japan Times
JAPAN / Science & Health / NATURAL SELECTIONS
Mar 14, 2007

What's 'separate' about humankind?

In a sense, I'm a mind reader. In writing this, I believe that you think that I want you to think that I intend to persuade you of something I believe. Got that?
COMMUNITY
Mar 13, 2007

Coaching helps women avail of new opportunities

Ritsuko Hatano, an energetic sales manager, has steadily climbed the career ladder after she graduated from university a decade ago.
COMMENTARY
Mar 13, 2007

Dealing with climate change

This year marks the 10th anniversary of the adoption of the Kyoto Protocol, and the 20th anniversary of the publication "Our Common Future," by the United Nations Brundtland Commission, the landmark report that called for "sustainable development" -- meeting the needs of the present without compromising...
Japan Times
LIFE / Style & Design / ON: FASHION
Mar 13, 2007

COSMIC WONDER, Shibusei and Monocle magazine

Cosmic reconceptualization
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Mar 8, 2007

Confusing the categories

Maybe it's just as well that the Museum of Modern Art, Kamakura was as deserted as it was, because the sculpture of Wakiro Sumi is art that whispers rather than shouts. At one of Tokyo's busier museums or galleries, with your head still abuzz with the screech of traffic, the blitz of advertising, and...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art / NEW ART SEEN
Mar 8, 2007

The Germans come to play

In most all of the world's larger cities, traditionally the grandest buildings have been religious in orientation. As places of congregation, they were necessarily characterized by large open spaces. As conduits to the spiritual, their design included surging spires, pagodas or minarets. The current...
Japan Times
LIFE / Digital
Mar 7, 2007

Air-conditioned masks and other gadget goodies

Gadgets are like chocolates -- they might not always be good for you but indulging in them is one of life's rare guaranteed pleasures and Japan is to gadgets what Belgium is that other guilty pleasure.
COMMENTARY
Mar 5, 2007

To move without U.S. cues

In their talks Feb. 21, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and visiting U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney reaffirmed the "unwavering" Japan-U.S. security alliance. This raises a question: Why did Abe have to reaffirm an alliance that is said to have already benefited from the long honeymoon between former Prime...
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / CLOSE-UP
Mar 4, 2007

Nanae Aoyama: Office worker takes exalted literary status in her stride

Nanae Aoyama only turned 24 in January, but already she has won literary prizes for each of the two books she has published.
COMMENTARY / World
Mar 4, 2007

Europe sleeping through a cocaine siege

NEW YORK -- European leaders need to get serious about Europe's cocaine problem. The "white lady" is seducing a steadily growing number of Europeans, and remaining in a state of denial will only worsen the consequences.
JAPAN / WHEN A CITY GOES BUST
Mar 2, 2007

Once Tokyo's spa playground, Atami fading fast

ATAMI, Shizuoka Pref. -- Tamae "Meme" Ono remembers fondly the late 1980s when the hot spring resort of Atami was a glamorous place to be.
JAPAN
Mar 1, 2007

It's official: Whale hunt over for year

The government Wednesday confirmed earlier reports by saying this year's whale hunt has ended early and the fleet off the coast of Antarctica was heading home, after weeks of struggling to recover from a deadly fire on board the mother ship.
JAPAN
Mar 1, 2007

Japan, Russia agree to discuss nuke pact

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and his Russian counterpart, Mikhail Fradkov, agreed Wednesday to negotiations on a nuclear cooperation pact and inked accords to boost bilateral economic ties, a Japanese government official said.
EDITORIALS
Feb 24, 2007

Still stuck in the Middle East

A trilateral summit between the U.S., Israel and Palestinians held this week yielded no statement and no progress apart from a pledge to keep talking. In the diplomatic morass of the Middle East, even the United States is willing to consider the mere fact that a summit was held to be "useful and productive."...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY
Feb 24, 2007

In Harlem, living on a prayer

On a chilly Saturday afternoon in a narrow, unassuming Harlem church, three sopranos fill the room with the first reluctant notes of a gospel hymn. "Lord, I will lift mine eyes to the hill," they sing.
Japan Times
JAPAN
Feb 23, 2007

Workers seek raises as firms plead need for competitiveness

Eager to share in the swelling profits of Japan Inc., unions are growing more aggressive in this year's "shunto" annual wage negotiations, seeking pay raises higher than those won a year ago.
BUSINESS
Feb 23, 2007

Honda tries to reverse sales decline with Crossroad SUV

Hoping it has found the answer to declining domestic sales, Honda Motor Co. on Thursday unveiled its new Crossroad sport utility vehicle.
Japan Times
JAPAN
Feb 23, 2007

Mag on foreigner crimes not racist: editor

"Now!! Bad foreigners are devouring Japan," screams the warning, surrounded by gruesome caricatures of foreigners who look like savages, with blood red eyes and evil faces.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Feb 23, 2007

'The Secret Life of Words'

There are some things that defy and/or reject the use of words, some occurrences in life that just refuse to be caged within the frames of meaning and logic. Still, philosophers and writers stake their faith in words and its cathartic effects; Jean-Paul Sartre once wrote that to "speak and express oneself...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Feb 23, 2007

'Sakuran'

How did "Memoirs of a Geisha" ("Sayuri" here in Japan) get it so drearily wrong -- and Mika Ninagawa's new film, "Sakuran," get it so gloriously right?
EDITORIALS
Feb 22, 2007

'Secrets' with a public interest

The Self-Defense Forces' investigation of an SDF member in connection with a news report of an accident in a Chinese Navy submarine in 2005 raises concerns regarding people's right to know and the freedom of the press. It could lead to limits on basic rights and freedoms guaranteed by the Constitution....

Longform

Dangami House is a 180-year-old former samurai residence of the Kato clan, who ruled over Ozu, Ehime Prefecture, until the Meiji Restoration.
A house, a legacy and the quiet work of restoration in rural Japan