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LIFE / Language
May 23, 2006

Opening up to difference: The dialect dialectic

Many people in Japan lead a double life -- linguistically speaking, that is. In their community, they speak the hogen (dialect) of their city, town or village, while outside it they may be accustomed to use hyojungo (standard Japanese). Their native language, in the true sense of that word, is their...
COMMENTARY / World
May 23, 2006

Guard against obsolescence

NEW HAVEN, Connecticut -- As a college professor, I hear a lot of career concerns. As my students prepare to enter working lives that will last 50 years or more, practically all of them try to be futurists in choosing the skills in which to invest. If they pick an occupation that declines in the next...
COMMUNITY / How-tos / LIFELINES
May 23, 2006

Air con fury and posting

What? AH in Hokkaido wonders if I have been in Japan too long.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WORDS TO LIVE BY
May 23, 2006

Yoshimasa Saito

Chef Yoshimasa Saito, 85, is the founder of Kitchen Country, a Hungarian restaurant in Tokyo's Jiyugaoka area. His goulash was once so famous that even celebrities were happy to stand in line for a place at one of his tables. Saito is a true optimist: Neither five years of hard labor in Siberia's notorious...
BUSINESS
May 23, 2006

Banks target women's purse strings amid growing interest in investment

Banks are targeting women in their strategies to expand their customer base as they grow more inclined to buy homes and invest in stocks and other financial products.
BUSINESS
May 23, 2006

Nipponkoa expands overseas ties

Nipponkoa Insurance Co. has struck tieup deals with Moscow's Ingosstrakh Insurance Co. and Hanoi-based Vietnam Insurance Co., known as Baoviet, with a view to better serving its corporate customers operating in those two countries, the nonlife insurer said Monday.
BUSINESS
May 23, 2006

Daihatsu drops Otaka as auditor

Daihatsu Motor Co. said Monday it will name Hiroyuki Watanabe, senior technical executive at Toyota Motor Corp., as its new corporate auditor, dropping a plan to select former Toyota Motor North America Inc. President Hideaki Otaka, who has resigned over a sexual harassment scandal.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Voices / VIEWS FROM THE STREET
May 23, 2006

What is your opinion on boycotting "The Da Vinci Code"?

Colin Swainson Teacher, 34 There must be something in it if they have upset the Catholic Church so much. I'm sure they have lots of secrets in the vaults. By boycotting they are saying people will find out something they don't want them to know.
Japan Times
LIFE / Style & Design
May 23, 2006

Hanabi light, Kai series of pots and kettles, 60VISION bags, Sharp cordless phones

Anyone who follows this column regularly might accuse me of being a slave to all that is white -- and with a name like "Snow," that criticism does seem justified. So in order to get it all out of my system (at least for a few months), this month I'm covering all things white. There is a zen-like satisfaction...
BUSINESS
May 23, 2006

MUFG Securities, Perella tie up

Mitsubishi UFJ Securities Co. said Monday it will provide merger and acquisition advisory services in collaboration with an investment-banking boutique recently set up by the famous U.S. investment banker Joseph Perella.
JAPAN
May 23, 2006

'Pool fever' outbreak a big worry

Officials at the National Institute of Infectious Diseases warned Monday that this summer could see the worst outbreak in a decade of a virus-induced fever that often strikes young children who swim in public pools.
BUSINESS
May 23, 2006

Profits up for megabanks

Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group Inc. earned a net profit of more than 1 trillion yen in the 2005 business year while competitor Mizuho Financial Group Inc. booked a record-high net profit, according to earnings reports released Monday by Japan's top two banks.
BUSINESS
May 23, 2006

Insurer to sell 'typhoon derivatives'

Mitsui Sumitomo Insurance Co. said Monday it will offer "typhoon derivatives" contracts to protect client companies from typhoon-related losses this year.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE ZEIT GIST
May 23, 2006

Making certain of a positive I.D.

Last weekend, I visited three major retail outlets in Shinjuku, Tokyo, to inquire about the purchase of a cell phone.
BUSINESS
May 23, 2006

Government, ruling parties talk tax reform

The government and the ruling bloc held their first meeting Monday aiming to overhaul the tax system and government spending in an effort to shore up public finances.
SUMO
May 22, 2006

Mongolian Hakuho claims first Emperor's Cup

Ozeki Hakuho of Mongolia defeated sekiwake Miyabiyama in a playoff Sunday to win the Summer Grand Sumo Tournament and his first Emperor's Cup.
MORE SPORTS
May 22, 2006

Kawakami Princess captures Oaks

Kawakami Princess turned the tables on the two top picks Sunday for a three-quarters-of-a-length win of the grade I Oaks at Tokyo Racecourse.
JAPAN
May 22, 2006

LDP may try to take away tax deduction for 'NEETs'

The Liberal Democratic Party's tax panel will consider proposing that households with young people not in employment, education or training -- the so-called NEETs -- be excluded from income tax deductions for dependents, panel sources said Sunday.
EDITORIALS
May 22, 2006

Repairing a lifelong ideological rift

The top leaders of the pro-Seoul and pro-Pyongyang groups of Korean residents in Japan met last week, ending almost 60 years of hostilities and marking the start of reconciliation. Mr. Ha Byeong Ok, president of pro-Seoul Mindan (Korean Residents Union in Japan) and Mr. So Man Sul, chairman of pro-Pyongyang...

Longform

Figure skater Akiko Suzuki was once told her ideal weight should be 47 kilograms, a number she now admits she “naively believed.” This led to her have a relationship with food that resulted in her suffering from anorexia.
The silent battle Japanese athletes fight with weight