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Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Mar 11, 2014

NYC fans of Kyary Pamyu Pamyu share 'zest for life'

Two hours before the doors even opened, the line outside New York's Best Buy Theater snaked around several streets in the middle of Times Square. Fans lined up early for pop star Kyary Pamyu Pamyu's second-ever New York concert, the finale to her recent North American tour.
COMMENTARY / World
Mar 11, 2014

Ukraine batters a broken world

Surely the prize for the most cynical news item of the month should go to the announcement from Oslo that Russian President Vladimir Putin has been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize 2014.
COMMENTARY / World
Mar 11, 2014

Tatars are reason enough to care about Crimea

Put aside the cries of 'Munich' and 'Sudetenland' that surround Russia's ongoing annexation of Crimea. In human terms, Crimea's Tatars are the reason to care.
Japan Times
JAPAN
Mar 11, 2014

Reactors still feared despite new rules

The cost of restarting Japan's nuclear power plants: ¥1.3 trillion and counting.
COMMENTARY / World
Mar 10, 2014

Contradictions over Ukraine

Western criticisms of Russia's move into Ukraine's Crimea region reek of double standards. Much of what is Ukraine today would not have existed if not for the creation of the Soviet Union.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Issues / LEARNING CURVE
Mar 9, 2014

Clarify your role, prepare before a disaster strikes

When she first arrived in Japan from Ireland in 2008, Sarah Hickey was mostly concerned with adjusting to her new life in Fukushima Prefecture. The Japan Exchange and Teaching (JET) Programme placed her in Iwaki, which is itself a large city, but she found herself near the coast in less metropolitan...
LIFE / Language / COMMUNICATION CUES
Mar 9, 2014

Thousands cut off by snowfall

The record snowfall that hit eastern Japan over the Feb. 15-16 weekend continued to leave thousands of people stranded in remote towns in the Kanto, Tohoku and other regions on Feb. 17.
Japan Times
JAPAN / WEDGE
Mar 9, 2014

Nursery school push hobbled by lack of workers

Many government-certified nursery schools are scheduled to open in April, but some are questioning whether some of them actually will open their doors on time.
Japan Times
WORLD / Politics
Mar 9, 2014

Crimea crisis leaves Ukraine troops in limbo

The two Ural trucks, full of troops, arrived under cover of darkness and a thick blanket of fog at the Ukrainian missile defense base outside Sevastopol late Friday night, and rammed their way through the gates. Once inside, the Russian troops fanned out and screamed that they would shoot to kill if...
JAPAN
Mar 7, 2014

Radiation checks clear most food items

Three years after the meltdowns at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant, fears and rumors still circulate among people both inside and outside of Fukushima Prefecture over radiation contamination of food.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Stage
Mar 5, 2014

Nomura's 'Don Quixote' enlists comedy to counter today's real foes

"Whenever I am creating a new play here at Setagaya Public Theatre, I aim for something that's as universal as all those kyōgen (traditional comic theater) or noh classics that are as vivid now as when they were first staged 600 years ago. If it isn't like that, it won't reach an international audience,...
Japan Times
WORLD / Politics
Mar 5, 2014

Tide of opinion turns against Russia in Ukraine's east

More than 1,000 demonstrators with Ukrainian flags took to the streets of the eastern Ukrainian city of Donetsk on Tuesday, for the first time outnumbering pro-Moscow youths who have seized its government building, which flies the Russian flag.
Japan Times
BUSINESS / YEN FOR LIVING
Mar 3, 2014

Tax structure encourages getting wasted

Alcohol manufacturers have figured out ways to use the tax system to their advantage.
Japan Times
JAPAN / GENERATIONAL CHANGE
Mar 2, 2014

Composer Shibuya tests limits of music

One November evening in Paris, Theatre du Chatelet was packed with people who came to see the French premiere of a new opera by a Japanese composer.
Japan Times
JAPAN / Media / BIG IN JAPAN
Mar 1, 2014

Why marry, or worry, when we can be alone together in ohitorisama Japan?

As people increasingly choose to live and do things alone, is Japan evolving into an 'ohitorisama' nation? Time will tell.
Japan Times
JAPAN / History / JAPAN TIMES GONE BY
Mar 1, 2014

Fat men frolic, Jews to be treated equally, U.S. ambassador stabbed, new sales tax a headache

Twenty-five fat members of the House of Representatives with two Government delegates and two journalists, each of whom weighs more than 165 pounds (75 kg), sat at a dinner at the Fukuiro, Yanokura, Ryogoku, on Monday evening.
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT / OLD NIC'S NOTEBOOK
Mar 1, 2014

Going back to the Simien's future

On Saturday, Jan. 18, I set foot in Addis Ababa for the first time since I left Ethiopia in late October 1969.
COMMENTARY
Feb 28, 2014

China uses Ukraine unrest as argument for stability

China's Communist Party-controlled media appear to be using the unrest in Ukraine as a teaching moment to point out the pitfalls of clamoring for more rapid reforms in a large, multi-ethnic society — one like China's.
Japan Times
BUSINESS / Companies
Feb 28, 2014

Harley-Davidson aims trikes at Japan's drivers

Harley-Davidson Inc. has hit on what it thinks is a rich trove of untapped demand in Japan: four-wheel drivers who can't ride two-wheel motorcycles.
Japan Times
WORLD / Politics / FOCUS
Feb 28, 2014

Alienated Crimea defies Ukraine's new order

Waving the Russian flag and chanting "Russia! Russia!" protesters in Crimea have become the last major bastion of resistance to Ukraine's new rulers.
COMMENTARY / Japan
Feb 27, 2014

Japan's strange narcissism

In today's Japan, the government's affected show of adapting to globalization and the rise of exclusionist nationalism are two sides of the same coin.
LIFE / Digital
Feb 27, 2014

Don't be taken in by Amazon's friendly face

When corporate types gather to schmooze at expensive watering holes they talk about competition as an unalloyed public good. It's seen in Darwinian terms: companies engaged in a ceaseless battle for survival, with only the fittest emerging triumphant. But generally the discussion is couched in agreeably...
Japan Times
WORLD / Politics
Feb 26, 2014

'Hero of the Maidan' prompted leader's exit

When the history of the bloody turbulence in Ukraine is written, a 26-year-old who learned combat skills in the army cadets may be recorded as the man who made up President Viktor Yanukovych's mind to cut and run.
EDITORIALS
Feb 24, 2014

A regime of unparalleled brutality

Sadly little will come of the report on a U.N. human rights inquiry that has concluded that the brutality of the North Korean government 'does not have any parallel in the contemporary world.'
COMMENTARY / World
Feb 24, 2014

Crisis of water scarcity continues to stalk China

While much attention is paid to the consequences of environmental pollution in China, a separate crisis of water scarcity is brewing with equally dangerous consequences for people's health and for the country's development.
BUSINESS / JAPANESE PERSPECTIVES
Feb 22, 2014

Return of shunto is hollow triumph for unions

Shunto is in full swing. Or so it should be. Or so they say. Shunto is the Japanese word for the annual spring round of wage negotiations conducted between big business and trade unions. This "spring offensive" used to feature large in the annual economic calendar. As the deflationary 1990s and beyond...
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Feb 22, 2014

Tokyo 2020: only as old as the medalists you field

The motto of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics is 'Discover Tomorrow,' which organizers hope will help distract sport fanatics from the reality of Japan being the fastest-aging country in the world.
COMMENTARY / Japan
Feb 21, 2014

Golden opportunity to put the spotlight on Fukushima

Olympic gold medalist Yuzuru Hanyu, whose hometown is Sendai, should demand that the government stop ignoring Tohoku.
COMMENTARY / World
Feb 21, 2014

The return of 1980s rhetoric in Russia

Today's Russia may be a wealthier, more open nation than the Soviet Union in the early 1980s, but President Vladimir Putin's propaganda machine is working hard on restoring the stifling moral climate of 30 years ago.

Longform

Members of the nonprofit group Japan Youth Memorial Association search for the remains of dead soldiers in a cave in Okinawa Prefecture in February.
The long search for Japan’s lost soldiers