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CULTURE / Stage
Sep 30, 2000

Puppetry for the people

In Western countries puppetry is a form of entertainment aimed at children. From Punch and Judy to the Muppets, Western puppet theater has been small scale, emphasizing broad, slapstick humor and simple, if any, plots.
ENVIRONMENT
Sep 27, 2000

The jade vine's home away from home

Tsukuba National Botanic Gardens in Ibaraki, part of the Tokyo National Museum, were opened to the public in October 1983. The garden, which covers 14 hectares, was constructed primarily for experimental research and for botanical education. Divided into 14 different plant zones, it contains approximately...
CULTURE / Art
Sep 24, 2000

The powerful influence of Japan

Western artists of the mid-19th century were both entranced and distracted by their turbulent times. Many sought fresh ways to see the world around them, "savoir voir" as distinct from "savoir faire."
CULTURE / Books
Sep 19, 2000

A fascinating figure of 13th-century Japan

CHARISMA AND COMMUNITY FORMATION IN MEDIEVAL JAPAN, by S.A. Thornton. Ithaca: Cornell University East Asia Series, 1999, 290 pp., unpriced. The "charisma" of the title of this carefully researched and impressively thorough work of scholarship refers, in the first instance, to the medieval Buddhist...
CULTURE / Art
Sep 16, 2000

Pointing a laser at a detached future

Marcel Duchamp, the supreme artist's artist, was often asked about his role in the making of art. The line of inquiry was inspired largely by the enigmatic Frenchman's series of "ready-mades," store-bought objects such as shovels or coat racks he exhibited under his name.
OLYMPICS
Sep 13, 2000

What's new in Sydney? How about taekwondo, triathlon and keirin

A total of 300 gold medals will be up for grabs in Sydney as athletes from over 30 different sports take to the various arenas, stadiums, diamonds, pools, lakes -- even beaches -- that will play host to Olympic events at the 2000 Summer Games.
JAPAN
Sep 10, 2000

Shibuya residents furious with graffiti seen as art

Some call it the latest art trend, but others lambaste it as an ugly symbol of present-day Japanese society.
COMMENTARY / World
Sep 7, 2000

China blocks disarmament

NEW DELHI — U.S. President Bill Clinton's weekend announcement to delay a decision on deployment of the U.S. national missile defense system will do little to end the gridlock at the United Nations' main disarmament body, the Conference on Disarmament in Geneva. The CD has been without work for four...
ENVIRONMENT / WILD WATCH
Aug 30, 2000

Feeling the pulse of the seasons

Recently, and for the first time, I flew right across Australia. Heading northwest from New Zealand, I crossed Australia's southeast coast somewhere south of Sydney and traversed the country northwest to the coast near Broome.
COMMENTARY / World
Aug 10, 2000

U.S. forces remain critical to Northeast Asian security

WASHINGTON -- There has been a sea change in the political landscape in Northeast Asia, particularly on the Korean Peninsula. In South Korea, the success of multiparty democracy is changing how the United States interacts with its ally. President Kim Dae Jung must deal with voters who increasingly question...
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Jul 23, 2000

Baffling Japanese mysteries solved at last

There are many myths about Japan. Let's look at some of them and see whether they're true or false.
JAPAN / History
Jun 28, 2000

China's Korean War POWs find you can't go home again

BEIJING — In a hotel room in the Yangtze River port of Wuhan, a dozen elderly Chinese men fight back tears to sing a song written almost 50 years ago in a U.S. prisoner-of-war camp in South Korea. At the end of the song, their tears flow freely, for friends lost in the conflict and for their own harsh...
JAPAN
Jun 27, 2000

Coalition parties stand by Mori

Despite the setback that the ruling bloc suffered at the hands of the public in Sunday's election for the House of Representatives, top leaders of the Liberal Democratic Party and its coalition allies agreed Monday that Yoshiro Mori should stay on as prime minister.
COMMENTARY / World
Jun 24, 2000

Korean summit remains a blank sheet

HONG KONG -- Perhaps it is in the nature of joint declarations that their merits tend to be exaggerated. The British did it with their joint declaration with China regarding Hong Kong, the Indians did it with their joint declaration with Pakistan at Lahore. Now the South Koreans, plus many foreigners...
COMMUNITY / How-tos / GETTING THINGS DONE
Jun 14, 2000

Winding down

In Sunday's column, I told readers why I will be leaving Japan while, appropriately, explaining what is required for foreigners to get married in Japan, which is what we did. I also said I would explain what would replace this column. Actually, I can't do that. It is up to you. I know there are a lot...
CULTURE / Books
Jun 6, 2000

Some rules were made to be broken

THE IRON BOOK OF BRITISH HAIKU, edited by David Cobb and Martin Lucas. Iron Press, 1998, 112 pp., 6.50 British pounds. A NEW RESONANCE: Emerging Voices in English-Language Haiku, edited by Jim Kacian and Dee Evetts. Red Moon Press, 1999, 201 pp., $14.50. Reading these anthologies of English-language...
JAPAN
Mar 22, 2000

Leprosy victims demand compensation for injustices

For the past 60 years, 76-year-old Koji Suzuki's life has been contained within a sanitarium for sufferers of leprosy in Kusatsu, Gunma Prefecture.
JAPAN
Mar 6, 2000

Japan needs juggling act to secure future in Asia

With China expected to assume a greater presence as a regional power both economically and militarily early next century, Japan appears groping for a way to get along with its giant neighbor without disrupting its decades-old security partnership with the United States.
CULTURE / Books
Feb 16, 2000

The essence of Japanese film

FROM BOOK TO SCREEN: Modern Japanese Literature in Film. By Keiko I. McDonald. Armonk, NY: M.E. Sharpe, 2000, 326 pp., with b/w photos. $62.95 (cloth); $25.95 (paper) Keiko McDonald's 1994 "Japanese Classical Theater in Films" (Associated University Presses) has become an indispensable text. Anyone...
CULTURE / Music
Feb 11, 2000

G. Love and Gomez have got them blues and got 'em new

Every 15 years or so we seem to get another blues revival. Revivals imply something dead being brought back to life, which means the blues isn't considered a living, breathing musical form, but something frozen in time, and each successive generation that revives it is further removed from the cultural...
CULTURE / Art
Jan 29, 2000

Marubeni Collection not to be blinked at

Department store exhibitions are the butterflies of the art scene: blink and they're gone!
JAPAN
Jan 21, 2000

Workers bullied out amid restructuring

Staff writer For a 32-year-old company employee in Tokyo's Edogawa Ward, the past two years have been a nightmare. And still, he does not know how to end it. Ever since he rejected his employer's request two years ago to voluntarily quit, he has been constantly harassed by bosses and colleagues. "The...
JAPAN / Media
Jan 20, 2000

Of the people, for the people: the mass appeal of konbini

Though Japan is famous for importing technology from the West and then sending it back in cheaper and better form, business practices remain homegrown. The shining exception is convenience stores, an American concept that has been so successful here that one could say it subsidized the rest of the Japanese...
ENVIRONMENT
Jan 19, 2000

Visit to Toad Hall: hip-hop as a way of life

I have a friend, an exceptional naturalist, who has traveled this country widely from Iriomote-jima to Hokkaido, yet who swears that he will never visit the Ogasawara Islands.
CULTURE / Books
Jan 10, 2000

Getting under a tattooist's skin

TATTOOING THE INVISIBLE MAN: Bodies of Work, 1955-1999, by Don Ed Hardy. edited by Francesca Passalacqua. Santa Monica, Calif.: Smart Art Press/Hardy Marks Publications, 1999, 300 pp., profusely illustrated, color and b/w, $90. In 1972 Don Ed Hardy, already a tattoo artist of note, made his first trip...
LIFE / Travel
Dec 8, 1999

American tycoons leave lush legacy

In Acadia National Park near Bar Harbor, Maine, the National Parks Service just completed flossing "Mr. Rockefeller's teeth," the nickname given to the large chunks of granite edging roads built by John D. Rockfeller Jr. The "teeth" were in desperate need of a cleaning to remove vegetation that had grown...
CULTURE / Music / HOGAKU TODAY
Dec 4, 1999

Innovative star takes the stage

Those who appreciate the finest koto and shamisen music will be familiar with the name of Satomi Fukami. Fukami is considered to be one of the most innovative of all mid-career hogaku performers. She developed a highly disciplined style based on classics combined with a modern sensibility. This enables...
LIFE / Travel / ON THE ARCHIPELA-GO
Sep 1, 1999

Soul searching with yamabushi of Dewa Sanzan

MOUNT HAGURO, Yamagata Pref. -- Three days trekking deep into the mountains with no money, makeup, jewelry, bath, toothbrush or razor is definitely not your average walk in the hills. Add on agreeing to endure a grueling series of self-suffering ancient rituals and sacred rites, and obey every utter...
JAPAN
Aug 20, 1999

LDP, New Komeito plan policy accord by September

The ruling Liberal Democratic Party and New Komeito agreed Friday to form a basic agreement on five key policy areas by the end of the month, taking another step toward a tripartite alliance, officials of the two parties said.

Longform

A small shrine perched atop rocks braves the waves hitting the shoreline during a storm in Shimoda, Shizuoka Prefecture. The area is under threat of a possible 31-meter-high tsunami if an earthquake strikes the nearby Nankai Trough.
If the 'Big One' hits, this city could face a 31-meter-high tsunami