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COMMENTARY / World
Feb 12, 2006

A yen to help a dictatorship

LONDON -- So Google, Yahoo and Microsoft are now working to help support the dictatorship of the people in China -- as managed on their behalf by the Chinese Communist Party. So are most of the world's multinational companies -- as well as you (and me).
COMMENTARY / COUNTERPOINT
Feb 12, 2006

Building scandals expose society's uncaring foundation

Japan is in the throes of two scandals that highlight a stunning flaw in the social order. For all its much-trumpeted national cohesion and the lip service paid in Japan to the people's sense of nasake (compassion, sympathy, mercy), these scandals are stark reminders that public welfare and the common...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Feb 10, 2006

The man who couldn't quit

With "Hoop Dreams" having just been inducted into The National Film Registry (of the Library of Congress), Steve James is clearly one of America's most respected documentarians. And with good reason: The 43-year-old, Virginia-born filmmaker brings a sensitivity and sustained focus to his films that few...
LIFE / Food & Drink / TOKYO FOOD FILE
Feb 10, 2006

Shaping 'neo-classic' cuisine

It is a measure of Tokyo's hidden depths that many of its top restaurants remain so little known, at least among the city's expatriate population. That is certainly the case with L'Osier. Founded in 1973, it established its heavyweight reputation under French master chef Jacques Borie, winning a devoted...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / CLOSE-UP
Feb 5, 2006

Fashionista with attitude

Raised on the mean streets of Brooklyn's Brownsville district, Gene Krell is a self-proclaimed tough guy who cites as one of his heroes a little-known but highly colorful "Dadaist professional boxer" called Arthur Cravan.
JAPAN
Jan 4, 2006

Income disparities rising in Japan

During the period of high postwar economic growth, most people in Japan came to consider themselves part of a middle class.
JAPAN / FRAMING THE FUTURE
Jan 1, 2006

Elderly of tomorrow can count on technology, researchers say

Poor eyesight and hearing, and reduced physical strength often discourage elderly people from going out alone or visiting unfamiliar places where they can easily get tired or lost.
Features
Dec 25, 2005

Haruki Kadokawa: Spirits of the Yamato

Haruki Kadokawa is the closest Japanese equivalent to fabled Hollywood moguls like Sam Goldwyn or Howard Hughes in their glory days as master promoters and unrepentant egotists.
EDITORIALS
Dec 16, 2005

Advocate for the elderly

Next year Japan will take another step forward toward strengthening the protection of the weaker members of society. The Diet has passed a law to prevent cruel treatment of the aged and to assist those taking care of them. Preparations are being made for implementing the law in April. Enactment of the...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY
Dec 1, 2005

The reign of Vivienne

From being prosecuted under Britain's obscenity laws for her risque punk fashions to twirling pantyless after receiving an honor from the Queen whose image she once defaced with safety pins, Vivienne Westwood has always had a habit of causing controversy.
COMMENTARY / World
Oct 30, 2005

Gun control loses yet again

LONDON -- Last Sunday in Brazil, a country with the second-highest rate of gun deaths on the planet, almost two-thirds of Brazilians voted against a total ban on the sale of firearms. Explain that.
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Oct 16, 2005

No point in going if you can't wait in line

The next time you go to Tokyo Disneyland and find yourself waiting an inordinate length of time for five minutes of thrills on Space Mountain, spare a thought for Hung Wah-fung, who is certainly thinking of you -- or, more precisely, your situation.
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE ZEIT GIST
Sep 27, 2005

Time well spent

Living in the world's second largest economy, it's often tempting to forget that there are people and organizations in Japan in dire need of help.
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Sep 25, 2005

Help the disabled, but don't deny them

Several years ago, the government discussed state-sponsored care for people with disabilities. The idea was to assist mentally and physically disabled people in leaving publicly-funded facilities and entering society; or, at least, that was how it was presented.
Japan Times
JAPAN / Society
Sep 11, 2005

Assemblywoman puts sex on the agenda

In April 2003, 28-year-old Kanako Otsuji became the youngest person ever elected to the Osaka prefectural assembly when she won the seat for Sakai City. It was a distinction made more special by the fact that there were only six other women in the 110-member assembly at the time. However, another distinction...
EDITORIALS
Sep 1, 2005

A light on senile dementia

In April the Welfare and Labor Ministry began a nationwide one-year campaign to help others better understand senile dementia. The campaign targets the mental disorder as a top-priority issue to tackle as the graying of the nation's population progresses. The core organization established for the campaign...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Aug 31, 2005

The nature of the mind

Shunmyo Masuno calls his works "expressions of my mind," and they have the power to stir up depths of emotion and even tap into the subconscious. They are not psychedelic paintings, however, nor are they virtual reality installations -- they are gardens. And the man who creates them is a Buddhist priest....
EDITORIALS
Aug 22, 2005

For safer travel over 65

The National Police Agency chose "Striving for the World's Safest Road Traffic" as the main theme of its 2005 white paper made public recently. This is the first time in about a quarter-century that traffic safety has been the main feature of the annual report, thus denoting the agency's enthusiasm for...
COMMENTARY / COUNTERPOINT
Aug 21, 2005

All together now, as yesterday's no-no becomes the status quo

When I first arrived in Japan in the 1960s, I was friends with a Western sociologist who was genuinely frustrated. When he went around surveying public opinion, he said that he found Japanese people to be stubbornly reserved and conservative. Apparently, those who responded to his questions about social...
JAPAN
Aug 16, 2005

Honoring the war dead is a hot, heated affair

Tens of thousands of people braved a sweltering Monday in Tokyo to pay their respects to the nation's war dead on the 60th anniversary of Japan's World War II surrender.
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Aug 7, 2005

Mao was closer to seventy percent bad

An elegant Georgian terrace house in London's Notting Hill Gate, perhaps the most upmarket area for Britain's chattering classes now that Prime Minister Tony Blair and his friends have deserted Islington, may seem an unlikely venue for a counter-revolution against Mao Zedong's revolutionary claims. Yet...
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Aug 7, 2005

No turning back the clock when the walls come tumbling down

Because earthquakes are unpredictable, people who live with them are fatalistic: There's nothing you can do except hope you're in a place that doesn't fall down on top of you. This attitude only covers naked survival, which to most people means everything, but experts predict that in a worst case scenario...
JAPAN / 60 YEARS,AND ONWARD
Aug 3, 2005

Youth here yet to pick up the peace torch

Their appearances belied the seriousness of their gathering on a hot Friday night last month in Tokyo.
Japan Times
Features
Jul 24, 2005

Mama Calcutta

Emiko Dhar moved to Calcutta (now renamed Kolkata) in 1962 after she married an Indian engineer whom she met through her job in Japan. She has lived there ever since.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Stage
Jul 20, 2005

The Bard on the hanamichi

With his characters given samurai names and clad in kimono, whatever would the Bard make of this "Twelfth Night" by Japan's foremost Shakespeare dramatist, 69-year-old Yukio Ninagawa? This veteran theatrical explorer long vowed never to tackle kabuki, but is doing just that with "Twelfth Night" to packed...
EDITORIALS
Jul 15, 2005

Preventive care for the elderly

A revision in the nursing-care insurance law, which passed the Diet in late June, will go into effect in April 2006, representing a significant turn in the direction of the government's approach since the insurance system was introduced in fiscal 2000.
EDITORIALS
Jul 4, 2005

The increasing threat of AIDS

The Seventh International Conference on AIDS in Asia and the Pacific (ICAAP), which opened in Kobe on Friday, comes at a time when the HIV/AIDS epidemic is spreading rapidly from Africa to Asia. The message is loud and clear: Without stepped-up efforts to combat the crisis, it could reach serious proportions...
COMMENTARY / COUNTERPOINT
Jun 19, 2005

Media conspiracy of concealment costs social progress dear

What do these Japanese people have in common: A neighbor of people whose house has burned down; an uncle or aunt of someone who has been the victim of a crime; a person who has had food poisoning?
Japan Times
Features
May 22, 2005

Retirees lead the way back to nature

Yoshishige Nagayama started farming when he retired nine years ago at age 60.
COMMENTARY / World
Apr 22, 2005

CCP smacks of hypocrisy

LONDON -- At the end of his visit to India last week, China's Premier Wen Jiabao made a strong political attack on Japan. With respect to Japan's bid for a seat on an expanded U.N. Security Council (UNSC) Wen opined that "Only a country that respects history, takes responsibility for history and wins...

Longform

Tetsuzo Shiraishi, speaking at The Center of the Tokyo Raids and War Damage, uses a thermos to explain how he experienced the U.S. firebombing of March 1945, when he was just 7 years old.
From ashes to high-rises: A survivor’s account of Tokyo’s postwar past