Search - question

 
 
BUSINESS / JAPANESE PERSPECTIVES
Sep 6, 2004

End-of-summer thoughts

"The harvest is past, the summer is ended, and we are not saved" (Jeremiah 8:22).
CULTURE / Music
Sep 5, 2004

Russian pays tribute to music of motherland

Novelist Leo Tolstoy, poet and novelist Boris Pasternak, dance impresario Sergei Diaghilev and choreographer George Balanchine were all distinguished Russians in their own fields. Although they lived in different times, they are bound together by their deep love for music.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / PERSONALITY PROFILE
Sep 4, 2004

Elizabeth Gardiner

KEELE, England -- The university in Keele in the English Midlands is only 42 years old. Before 1962, it was the University of North Staffordshire, itself a youthful, postwar institution. The programs put into place at the University of Keele turned away from specialized single degrees in favor of bridging...
COMMENTARY
Sep 4, 2004

China favored in cross-strait tug-of-war

HONG KONG -- When Singapore's then Deputy Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong visited Taiwan in July on what was described as a "private and unofficial" trip, China reacted angrily. Among other things, it canceled a visit by its top banker to Singapore and warned darkly of "grave consequences" for which "the...
EDITORIALS
Sep 3, 2004

Sparing banks without spoiling them

For all practical purposes, big banks in Japan have turned the corner in their efforts to clean up their bad loans. For small and medium-size banks, though, no light is yet visible at the end of the tunnel. With caps on deposit insurance due to be fully reinstated next April, smaller lenders have no...
EDITORIALS
Sep 2, 2004

DPJ must shed turf mentality

Mr. Katsuya Okada, president of the Democratic Party of Japan, secured a second term as head of the largest opposition party Monday, the deadline for filing candidacies for president. Since Mr. Okada is the only candidate, he will be formally re-elected without a vote on Sept. 13. That's to be expected,...
Japan Times
LIFE / Lifestyle
Sep 2, 2004

"A Gathering Light," "The Coldest Day in the Zoo"

"A Gathering Light," Jennifer Donnelly, Bloomsbury; 2004; 383 pp. "Tell the truth!" It's not just children who get that all the time: Writers do, too. The only difference is that writers don't have to treat the truth too literally, as Jennifer Donnelly shows us in "A Gathering Light."
BUSINESS
Sep 1, 2004

Koizumi under pressure to raise consumption tax

With the government unable to find further effective ways to cut expenditures, Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's goal of reconstructing government finances is facing a crucial test.
EDITORIALS
Aug 31, 2004

Medal bonanza was not a fluke

The performance of Japanese athletes at the Athens Olympics came as nothing less than spectacular for their compatriots.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE ZEIT GIST
Aug 31, 2004

'I want to clear my name and the name of my country'

One morning Islam Mohamed Himu woke up to find the Japanese media camped outside his home, and plainclothes police officers banging on his front door.
COMMENTARY
Aug 31, 2004

Feeling the enemy's breath

LONDON -- The Americans are going home. Or, to be more precise, after more than 60 years, 70,000 American military personnel are to be gradually withdrawn from the European arena. Since the present number of American troops under "European command" is 116,000, this will leave in the longer term between...
Japan Times
JAPAN
Aug 31, 2004

Okada assured of return to DPJ helm

Katsuya Okada was assured of re-election as president of the Democratic Party of Japan on Monday after no one stepped forward to challenge him.
BUSINESS / JAPANESE PERSPECTIVES
Aug 30, 2004

Financial-sector shakedown afoot

Amid close scrutiny both in Japan and abroad, the integration of Japan's major banks is progressing at a rapid pace -- and triggering unprecedented legal battles in the process.
COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM NEW YORK
Aug 30, 2004

Fear of cultural decline: the next chapter

NEW YORK -- Every August my wife Nancy and I leave New York to go south to spend two weeks at a friend's summer house at Sunset Beach, North Carolina. Driving leisurely, mainly so we can ride ferries on Delaware Bay and on Pamlico Sound, we stop for two nights on the way, usually lodging in Onley, Virginia,...
EDITORIALS
Aug 29, 2004

Another 'Americanization'

A merican consumers have been described as "quick to spend" while Japanese consumers have been "slow to spend." In fact, Americans tend to spend the extra money they get rather than save it. So a tax cut quickly boosts spending, often leading to an overheating of the economy. A culture of overconsumption...
COMMENTARY / World
Aug 29, 2004

Golden efforts belie risk-averse image

WASHINGTON -- A stereotype exists in the United States and elsewhere: Japanese are risk-avoiders while Americans are risk-takers.
JAPAN
Aug 28, 2004

Jobless rate logs biggest increase in six years

Japan's unemployment rate rose to 4.9 percent in July, up 0.3 percentage point from June, the sharpest rise in six years, the government said Friday.
COMMENTARY / World
Aug 28, 2004

Halfway home is far from a China deal

MADRAS, India -- The Dalai Lama is still the leader of Tibet. He may be just a figurehead, but China, which annexed Tibet in 1959 and drove the Dalai Lama and his followers into India, knows that only this monk can convince his people to reconcile to Beijing's control over Lhasa.
JAPAN
Aug 26, 2004

Voice actors win damages for video and DVD products

The Tokyo High Court ordered an animation company and its subsidiary Wednesday to pay approximately 88 million yen in damages to 361 voice actors for converting cartoons they performed on into videos and DVDs without their consent.
Japan Times
JAPAN / Science & Health / NATURAL SELECTIONS
Aug 26, 2004

Thinking aloud

Does language determine thought? Are there concepts in some languages that can't be understood in others because that language doesn't have the word for it?
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Voices / VIEWS FROM THE STREET
Aug 24, 2004

Question to Japanese in Australia: Will you ever go home?

Yumi Sugiyama Retail worker I have no desire to return because Japanese society is very square. Here, everything is more free. We can get Japanese food here, but it's not the same. I miss deep baths.
Features
Aug 22, 2004

Keeping it in the club

On Oct. 16 last year, Hans van der Lugt, a correspondent for the Dutch newspaper NRC Handelsblad, telephoned the Land, Infrastructure and Transport Ministry with a simple inquiry.
COMMENTARY
Aug 22, 2004

Barbaric immigration policy

Japan's current campaign against visa overstayers is both puzzling and cruel.
COMMENTARY
Aug 21, 2004

Bad book with good message

LONDON -- Here's a slightly crazy story for these hot summer days. The book the whole world is reading on its holidays -- or at any rate the whole English-speaking world -- is called "The Da Vinci Code," by the American writer Dan Brown.

Longform

Mount Fuji is considered one of Japan's most iconic symbols and is a major draw for tourists. It's still a mountain, though, and potential hikers need to properly prepare for any climb.
What it takes to save lives on Mount Fuji