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Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Mar 29, 2018

Kiyoshi Koyama: A life lived with jazz

"I have lived a life alongside jazz," says Kiyoshi Koyama, jazz critic, journalist and radio host. This is apparent on a recent visit to his home in Chiba Prefecture, where he and his wife live surrounded by walls of neatly organized records, CDs, books and other archives — a lifetime of research and...
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink
Mar 24, 2018

Good libations: Examining the evolution of Japan's rich cocktail culture

The art of the cocktail is indisputably non-Japanese. The word itself is old American slang for a pick-me-up, referring in modern parlance to any mixed drink containing liquor and at least one other ingredient. Even if you aren't a drinker, chances are you can name quite a few: the martini, the Manhattan,...
Japan Times
Mar 16, 2018

Japanese Animation Using Japanese Denim “denimation”

The Bitchu Bingo region (Ibara City and other parts of western Okayama Prefecture, Fukuyama City and other parts of eastern Hiroshima Prefecture) is known as a production center of high-quality Japanese denim where denim-related businesses are collected together. Here, as the “Bitchu Bingo Japan Denim...
Japan Times
Figure Skating / ICE TIME
Feb 18, 2018

Yuzuru Hanyu's second Olympic title reaffirms greatness

Yuzuru Hanyu's epic performance in the free skate at Gangneung Ice Arena on Saturday was one for the ages.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Feb 1, 2018

Artist Asako Iwama explores the relationship between food and language

Food and the desire to eat has always been mysterious to Asako Iwama. When the artist and cook was a young child, she could not understand why she had to eat. Her earliest memories of food are of her grandmother's cooking in a strange yet fascinating kitchen far away from home.
Japan Times
LIFE / Lifestyle
Dec 23, 2017

'Yokohama Mary': Looking back at the life of one of the city's most mysterious figures

An enigmatic woman wearing a frilly white dress stands silently outside Matsuzakaya department store in Yokohama's Isezakicho district during a local festival. Her face is caked in white makeup and her eyes are lined in black.
Japan Times
WORLD / Politics
Nov 1, 2017

White House chief of staff's Civil War lack of 'compromise' remark draws fire

White House Chief of Staff John Kelly's comment that the U.S. Civil War was sparked by a lack of "compromise" drew criticism and reignited a debate over Confederate monuments and the role of slavery.
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel
Sep 29, 2017

Akizuki: Romantic scenes meet 'Star Wars' lore in picturesque samurai town

The sakura trees that line the main boulevard in Akizuki are far from blooming. That moment is still half a year away, when the trees along the avenue flower to become one of Fukuoka Prefecture's best spots for cherry blossoms.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Sep 18, 2017

The real significance of the Rohingya issue

Asian nations must worry that Myanmar's moves against the Rohingyas won't start untangling all colonial-era boundaries, however illogical in terms of ethnic or religious issues those may have been.
COMMENTARY / Japan
Sep 14, 2017

Moon no obstacle to better ties between Tokyo and Seoul

By writing off South Korean President Moon Jae-in as an anti-Japan radical, Tokyo risks finding an enemy where none exists.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Sep 7, 2017

Nazis and elite hipsters

German Deputy Finance Minister Jens Spahn's apparent bet on the rise of Trump-style populism is risky.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Aug 30, 2017

U.S. protectionism's destructive path

Tariffs subsidize narrow interests and for Americans as a whole the record is one of almost unrelieved failure.
JAPAN
Aug 22, 2017

Osaka's ancient burial mounds eyed for World Heritage status but clear explanations elude

The government's decision in late July to nominate a group of 49 ancient burial sites in southern Osaka Prefecture for UNESCO World Heritage status has raised local hopes for a major boost in international prestige and tourism appeal.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Aug 9, 2017

'Le Moulin' gives a voice to Taiwanese poets who wrote under Japan's colonial rule

The word "nisshiki" (Japanese style) can often be seen on storefront signs in Taiwan to indicate chic, high-end products. It's a little similar to what we in Japan associate with luxury items from France, though "nisshiki" is a holdover from the days when Taiwan was under Japanese rule (1895-1945).
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Jul 30, 2017

It's high noon on the roof the world

The two nuclear powers have to come to terms with the fact that no one will come out a winner if they resort to military action.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / Japan
Jul 10, 2017

Japan on the wrong side of nuclear weapons ban treaty

The Japanese government's stance on the U.N. nuclear ban treaty is a deeply flawed misreading of international sentiment and a deep betrayal of Japan's own history, legacy and people.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Jun 19, 2017

Remembering Helmut Kohl's unfinished business

The late German Chancellor Helmut Kohl was the man who put German history to bed, and helped lay the groundwork for the current confrontation between Russia and the West.
COMMENTARY / World
Feb 23, 2017

Trump's assault on the liberal international order

It is an irony of history that the president with the least previous foreign policy interest and experience could end up having the biggest impact on global affairs in a century.
JAPAN / Media / BIG IN JAPAN
Feb 11, 2017

Defiant Apa paints a target on its back

"The Japanese airplanes attacked, and a total of 1,200 men, roughly half the victims of Pearl Harbor, died in action on the USS Arizona. ... In general, the powder magazine at the ship's bottom is not induced to explode in a bombing and it would not have caught fire and blown up six minutes after the...
Japan Times
BASKETBALL / NBA / HOOP SCOOP
Feb 4, 2017

Barnett recalls legends Russell, Wilt, Barry

Second in a two-part series
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 18, 2017

Obama: more war than peace

Obama has handed down to Trump more theaters of war than he inherited from Bush.
Japan Times
JAPAN / Politics / ANALYSIS
Dec 28, 2016

Leaders' Hawaii remarks include veiled message for Trump: experts

Two mavens say the speeches of Abe and Obama contain a message for the incoming leader about the Japan-U.S. relationship.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Dec 20, 2016

Raku: A traditional contemporary art form

At the opening of "The Cosmos in a Tea Bowl: Transmitting a Secret Art Across Generations of the Raku Family" at The National Museum of Modern Art, in Kyoto, the current head of the Raku family, Kichizaemon XV (b. 1949), explained that the event would be "an unprecedented and once-in-a-lifetime exhibition...
COMMENTARY / Japan
Dec 7, 2016

Setting the record straight on war's start

Startling evidence has been unearthed revealing machinations by the Japanese military to shift blame after the war over the surprise attacks that started the conflict.
COMMENTARY / Japan
Nov 29, 2016

Use Trump as opportunity to shake Japan's status quo

Like many others, I was stunned by the results of the recent presidential election in the United States. Whatever you think of Donald Trump, he certainly demonstrated political genius in connecting with millions of Americans, tapping into widespread sentiments and defying the conventional wisdom of polls...
COMMENTARY / Japan
Oct 26, 2016

Japan scores tragic own goal

The Abe government's position on 'comfort women' is damaging Japan's international reputation and playing into China's hands.
Japan Times
BASKETBALL
Oct 11, 2016

Aoki leaves lasting legacy on Japan hoops

Whenever he stepped on the court during 11 distinguished seasons as a special ambassador for Japan pro basketball, Cohey Aoki increased the visibility of the sport.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Aug 30, 2016

Recalling the staggering cost of Mao's misrule

His policies resulted in the deaths of an estimated 45 million Chinese, yet Mao Zedong remains the symbol of both the party and the state 40 years after his passing.
COMMENTARY / World / THE VIEW FROM NEW YORK
Aug 28, 2016

The longest U.S. conflict and defining a war

Figuring out when wars start and end isn't always as obvious as it might seem.

Longform

After the asset-price bubble crash of the early 1990s, employment at a Japanese company was no longer necessarily for life. As a result, a new generation is less willing to endure a toxic work culture —life’s too short, after all.
How Japan's youth are slowly changing the country's work ethic