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Japan Times
OLYMPICS / ICE TIME
Feb 23, 2014

Mao's inflexibility hurt medal chances

"If things continue as they are, it could all end in tears without a silver medal this time. Maybe without any medal."
Japan Times
OLYMPICS
Feb 21, 2014

Sotnikova stuns Kim to win Olympic gold in Sochi

Russia's Adelina Sotnikova pulled off an upset of epic proportions by defeating Yuna Kim for the gold medal at the Sochi Games on Thursday night at the Iceberg Skating Palace.
Japan Times
OLYMPICS
Feb 16, 2014

Long wait ends as Kasai takes silver medal in large hill jump

Noriaki Kasai put years of frustration behind him by capturing the silver medal in the invidual large hill jump at the Sochi Games on Saturday night.
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel
Feb 15, 2014

Dazaifu dalliance reveals curious case of a plum-struck deity

It's all thanks to the Spanish ambassador, really. Angeles and I were at the Spanish Consulate in Fukuoka, Kyushu's biggest city, to pick up her new passport. By midday, we'd done the business, slurped our way through the obligatory bowl of Hakata ramen, and were looking for a way to fill a few hours...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Feb 13, 2014

'Iya Monogatari: Oku no Hito (The Tale of Iya)'

Cycling in the mountains near Tokyo, I often have two thoughts: First, I feel sorry for big-city denizens missing all the natural beauty so near. Second, I wonder how the locals can wrest a living from their tiny fields and orchards, perched precariously on the slopes.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink
Feb 11, 2014

Greenhouse CoLLabo: A peaceful retreat in Umekoji Park

Umekoji Park, near Kyoto Station, has in recent years been through more makeovers than a beauty queen. The park is already home to the Umekoji Steam Locomotive Museum and Kyoto Aquarium, and now the builders are working on an enormous playground. Occupying a quiet corner of the park, Greenhouse CoLLabo...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Jan 29, 2014

Once admired from afar, now enjoyed up close

Billed as an exhibition of masterpieces from the Cleveland Museum of Art (CMA), 'Admired from Afar' is the latest in a number of exhibitions of Japanese art from American collections.
Reader Mail
Jan 29, 2014

Japan drives a dangerous road

I was disturbed but not surprised to read in the Jan. 27 front-page article "NHK chief gets with the program" that the new chairman of NHK (Japan's national broadcaster), Katsuto Momii [appointed to the position by the NHK Board of Governors after Prime Minister Shinzo Abe had packed the board], states...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Jan 29, 2014

It’s ‘otherness’ that helps define ‘self’

For better or worse, in contemporary art it is common to see male photographers tend toward featuring landscapes and objects, and female photographers working on problems of shifting identities, family and the body. In this respect there is a strong lineage for Ayaka Yamamoto's first Tokyo solo exhibition...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Jan 29, 2014

'The Beautiful: Art for Art's Sake — The Aesthetic Movement 1860-1900'

In reaction to the Industrial Revolution (1760-1840), the Pre-Raphaelites embarked on a second phase — the Aesthetic Movement headed by avant-garde artists who believed that beauty, rather than the sociopolitical, should be the objective of art. This led to the popularity of decorative art, the innovative...
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel / BACKSTREET STORIES
Jan 25, 2014

History and humor lap Hamamatsucho's shores

Tokyo hosts plenty of pint-size public sculptures, but none so "wee" as the brazen boy standing on the platform between lines 3 and 4 at Hamamatsucho Station in Minato Ward. Just back from a trip to Brussels, I am stunned to glimpse there a bronze replica of the Belgian capital's most cheeky landmark,...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Jan 23, 2014

'Before Midnight'

Richard Linklater's "Before Sunrise" was the most deliciously romantic film of the 1990s. A young, devilishly handsome Jesse (Ethan Hawke) meets bohemian beauty Celine (Julie Delpy) while both are on a train bumming around Europe; he talks her into spending a day with him in Vienna, and the next 90 minutes...
Japan Times
JAPAN / Science & Health / NATURAL SELECTIONS
Jan 18, 2014

Cooperation vs. competition in space

Shadows of winter clouds
COMMENTARY / COUNTERPOINT
Jan 18, 2014

Lexicon for today's Japan: Reading between the lies

Plowing through the news, one is often struck by the proliferation of acronyms, jargon, new names and terms. It can be a baffling experience, so I thought I would provide some explanations, keywords, synonyms, associative notions and interpretations to aid comprehension — even at risk of differing...
Reader Mail
Jan 15, 2014

If only neighbors were customers

On a light note — without any reference to Yasukuni Shrine, the Senkaku islands, "Abenomics," school textbooks, history, etc. — I'd like to say that after living and working here for more than 17 years, I am always interested to discover a facet of the Japanese character that had been unknown to...
JAPAN / Media / BIG IN JAPAN
Jan 11, 2014

Children are blank slates for truth, or propaganda

Imagine you are a parent whose child is being taught propaganda. What do you do? Teach your children the truth and watch their grades slip as they lose interest in school? Or turn a blind eye, knowing their future careers will depend on their grades?
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Jan 7, 2014

Songwriter James Vincent McMorrow stuns on 'Post Tropical'

When James Vincent McMorrow performs, he squashes himself up behind a keyboard, feet apart and knees together, looking a little like a collapsed laundry rack. The 30-year-old's right hand shakes from the beginning of a song to its end. You give up drink, as the Dubliner did two years ago, and "all of...
LIFE / Language / WELL SAID
Jan 5, 2014

Kono ryokan-no shokuji-wa umai-na

Today we will introduce various meanings and usages of the adjective u3046u307eu3044 (good). In Situation 1, the husband says u3046u307eu3044 to mean delicious, which sounds somewhat blunt and is used mainly by men.
Japan Times
JAPAN / GENERATIONAL CHANGE
Jan 5, 2014

Rebuilding hope, one stitch at a time

Most of the 19 women from the tsunami-hit city of Kesennuma, Miyagi Prefecture, who work for Tamako Mitarai's knitwear company had no professional experience as knitters.
Japan Times
LIFE / Style & Design
Jan 4, 2014

Kenya Hara: the future of design

Sitting at a plain white table in a meeting room high up on the 12th floor of a narrow building in central Tokyo, product designer Kenya Hara asks me to picture a shallow plate in my mind. "Now imagine a slightly deeper plate," Hara says, "that gets deeper and deeper and eventually becomes a bowl."
Reader Mail
Jan 4, 2014

Mandela's dream not fully realized

Regarding Jennifer Kim's Dec. 15 letter, "Can't see Mandela as a 'peace icon," and Jim Makin's Dec. 22 letter, "Mandela halted vengeful politics": Nelson Mandela was a great admirer of Martin Luther King Jr. In his Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech (Dec. 10, 1993, Oslo), he recalled at the very end...
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WHEN EAST MARRIES WEST
Jan 3, 2014

It's the Year of the Horse, so bring on the feedbag

2014 is — according to the Chinese zodiac — the Year of the Horse. Born in a distant year of another cordial horse, we thus celebrate the spin of the 12-year cycle. This year is our year!
Japan Times
COMMUNITY
Jan 1, 2014

The most viewed community stories of 2013

A majority of the most read community stories addressed timeless issues. These were stories about issues that naturally spark debate and will no doubt continue to do so as Japan's multicultural landscape continues to shift and shape.
Japan Times
LIFE
Jan 1, 2014

The most viewed life stories of 2013

From burgers to ballerinas, LINE sending to gender bending, kawaii cute to Nadeshiko adorable, here are the life section stories that caught online readers' eyes in 2013. As a gyaru might say, “Yababa!”
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel
Dec 28, 2013

A garden sanctuary in the city

There is a visible nod to tradition in the shaping and use of natural materials to finish off the exterior of International House, a Modernist building in one of the nicer residential areas of Tokyo's swank Roppongi district.
Japan Times
BASKETBALL
Dec 25, 2013

Aisin's Kanamaru fits in well with new team

The Aisin SeaHorses (24-2) are tied with the Toshiba Brave Thunders for the NBL's best record through Sunday. That alone isn't anything unusual for the powerhouse NBL team.
COMMENTARY / World
Dec 24, 2013

The tragedy of Thailand's politics

For America, the proper question is what, if any, is its role as thousands of angry protesters in Bangkok march not for democracy but, in effect, for an end to it?

Longform

Sumadori Bar on Shibuya Ward's main Center Gai street targets young customers who prefer low-alcohol drinks or abstain altogether.
Rethinking that second drink: Japan’s Gen Z gets ‘sober curious’