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April 30, 2024
 

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WORDS TO LIVE BY

Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WORDS TO LIVE BY
Jun 27, 2006
Tadanobu Tsunoda
Tadanobu Tsunoda, MD, 79, is the author of "The Japanese Brain" (now in its 38th Japanese edition), and the inventor of the Tsunoda Key Tapping Machine. He developed this simple analog system in the 1960s, and claims it is still the most accurate machine in the world for measuring the brainstem's switch mechanism, which determines which side of the brain processes sounds. He first presented his findings about connections between the brain, language and culture to an international audience at the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) Meetings of Experts on the Concept of Race in History, held in Montreal in 1978. Still researching, he is as mesmerized by the beauty of the brain as ever.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WORDS TO LIVE BY
Jun 13, 2006
Suzue Akashi
Suzue Akashi, 74, is a folk musician who plays traditional Japanese songs on shamisen with taiko drum accompaniment. Her insatiable desire to learn took her from a Tokyo dairy to the education center at Haneda Air Force Base, to university in Tennessee and work in Texas during the 1950s. Back in Japan, she sold Avon cosmetics before deciding to commit herself to playing shamisen, which she ultimately did at the prestigious Matsubaya restaurant. A winner of countless music competitions, and the 2002 recipient of the Prime Minister's Award, she is proudest of having always done the right thing, even when it was painful to do so.
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 war camps nor the past five years of battling throat and lung cancer have broken his strong spirit.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WORDS TO LIVE BY
May 9, 2006
Kae Wakita
Kae Wakita, 35, is a dermatologist and owner of Skin Solution Clinic in Shintomicho, not far from Tokyo's Ginza area. A confessed workaholic, she is perfectly happy with her life but not with the state of the Japanese medical system. She does, however, have a few good ideas about how to treat this ailing patient.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WORDS TO LIVE BY
Apr 25, 2006
Toshie Kobayashi
Toshie Kobayashi, 76, has been working six days a week, since she was 14 years old. As a highly skilled typesetter, she made a good living until the 1980s, when digital systems replaced her and analog typesetting machines. At 54, she registered with a cleaning service, and ever since then she has been mopping and sweeping and emptying garbage at department stores, publishers, insurance companies and so on. Currently, she works at a luxury high-rise in Tokyo. In her free time, she is an enthusiastic gourmet, and on most afternoons she can be found roaming department-store food sections, searching for tasty new treats.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WORDS TO LIVE BY
Mar 28, 2006
Takao Tsue
Takao Tsue, 80, is the Honorary Chief Priest of Osaka City's Imamiya-Ebisu Shrine, famous for the Toka Ebisu festival held every January, which attracts over 1 million people over three days. According to legend, the shrine was established in AD 600 by Shotoku Taishi, and written records show that Tsue's ancestors have been priests here for the past 800 years. Recently his son, Akihiro, became the 19th-generation master of the shrine, which is dedicated to the worship of the Sun Goddess, Amaterasu-Omikami, and Ebisu-sama, the sea bream-carrying god of business, and three other deities.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WORDS TO LIVE BY
Mar 14, 2006
Minori Kitahara
Minori Kitahara, 35, is the owner of Love Piece Club, Japan's first sex-toy shop owned by a woman and catering exclusively to women. She believes that women deserve their sexual fun and games and she has just the right toys for them.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WORDS TO LIVE BY
Feb 28, 2006
Masaru and Katsutoshi Arai
Masaru Arai, 58, and his son, Katsutoshi, 28, from Tokyo's Asakusa are carpenters from a long line of master craftsmen. Katsutoshi, who has three sisters, is the youngest child. The father and son love working together and always strive for perfection. Although their yearly income can fluctuate dramatically, their pocket money -- and their lifestyle -- changes very little.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WORDS TO LIVE BY
Feb 14, 2006
Nobuko Mitsumori
Nobuko Mitsumori, 37, works with her mother in their small accounting office in Tokyo's Chuo Ward. With one assistant and myriad clients, the three are always happily overworked. Nobuko studied classical literature and didn't think that math was her strength, but thanks to her talent, the numbers somehow always add up.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WORDS TO LIVE BY
Jan 24, 2006
Hisayo Takano
Hisayo Takano is the owner of Club Akasaka, a hostess bar in Tokyo that many of her customers call the best "clinic" they've ever known. It's where they come to regain their strength. Others compare it to the Shoukasonjuku, because, just like at that famous 19th-century school for young leaders, clients here can learn from each other. She's had several careers, including being a flight attendant, but she is happiest to be called a "counselor" and a good mother to her three boys, ages 15, 26 and 29.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WORDS TO LIVE BY
Jan 10, 2006
Kazuhiko Hachiya
Artist Kazuhiko Hachiya, 39, is president of PetWORKs, a small company with nine employees. According to him, they "do big things in a funny and cute way." His company is behind the popular mail software PostPet, in which animated characters deliver the mail; the hit doll Momoko; and it is now venturing into the wild blue yonder with Open Sky, a "personal flying machine" with a jet engine that is based on Nausicaa's plane in Hayao Miyazaki's book and film "Nausicaa of the Valley of Winds." Obviously, Hachiya's imagination knows no bounds.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WORDS TO LIVE BY
Dec 27, 2005
Donald Keene
One of the greatest scholars of Japanese literature, 83-year-old Donald Keene has spent the past 52 years in Japan, with the exception of his time spent teaching at Columbia University in New York, where, in 1986, The Donald Keene Center of Japanese Culture was established in his honor. So far he has published about 40 books in English and 50 or so in Japanese, received countless awards and has been named a Person of Cultural Merit (Bunka Koro-sha) by the Japanese government.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WORDS TO LIVE BY
Dec 13, 2005
Ritsuko "Ritzie" Kojima
Ritsuko "Ritzie" Kojima, 53, has worked as a hospital social worker and interpreter. Ten years ago, she quit her hospital job so she could take care of her ailing mother and her own family. A mother of three sons, she's a great chef who loves throwing big parties at her home in Kumamoto Prefecture in Kyushu. Active, powerful and positive, she's up for anything, as long as it's challenging.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WORDS TO LIVE BY
Dec 6, 2005
Kumiko Mori
Since 1997, mezzo-soprano Kumiko Mori, 46, has played Madame Thenardier more than 2,000 times in the hugely successful Japanese stage production of "Les Miserables." A couple of times a week she can be seen on a variety of shows ranging from travel and food specials to talk shows and comedies. She's also published a cookbook of her original recipes, appeared on more than 30 CDs and released two of her own. She says that being in the limelight that much has not blurred but sharpened her vision..
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WORDS TO LIVE BY
Nov 22, 2005
Bob Sliwa
Bob Sliwa, 50, who hails from Massachusetts, has lived in Japan for 22 years. He is the Advance Design Director at COBO Design Co., Ltd., one of the biggest industrial design firms in Japan, and a judge for the Japan Car of the Year Award. He followed the success of his 2004 book "Lexus ga Ichiban ni Natta Wake (The Reason Why Lexus Is No. 1)," written in Japanese and later translated into Korean, with "Brand Design ga Kaisha o Sukuu (Brand Design Can Save Your Company)," in which he offers an irreverent look at the successes and failures of branding around the world.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WORDS TO LIVE BY
Nov 8, 2005
Reiko Ito
Reiko Ito, age 46, is one of the 75 certified AFAA (Aerobics and Fitness Association of America) instructors in Japan, a teacher to other trainers and one of the few qualified to lead SAQ (Speed, Agility, Quickness) classes here. She wants to empower everyone and she knows just how.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WORDS TO LIVE BY
Oct 25, 2005
Shoichiro Satake
At 46, Shoichiro Satake, owner of Galerie Sho Contemporary Art, is Japan's biggest dealer of works by Andy Warhol and Jean-Michel Basquiat. While more than 3,000 Warhols and 100 Basquiats have passed through his hands, their essence has stayed with him.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WORDS TO LIVE BY
Oct 18, 2005
Mika Noguchi
Peach John has been providing women with sexy and cute lingerie via its catalog and retail business since 1994. Leading this company, which had sales of 16 billion yen last year, is President Mika Noguchi, a woman who is not afraid to bare her true feelings.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WORDS TO LIVE BY
Sep 27, 2005
Radical Suzuki
Radical Suzuki's playfully risque illustrations have appeared in books, magazines and advertisements. He's a geek and proud of it.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WORDS TO LIVE BY
Sep 13, 2005
Arihiro and Kimiyo Fujita
Arihiro Fujita and Kimiyo Fujita, owners of the award-winning Takasagoya Pork Shop in Tokyo's Tsukishima, know their pork. These two 65-year-olds also know what makes a relationship work. They've been married and working together for 40 years -- without, they claim, even one argument.
When will Japan intervene to support the yen?
Finance Minister Shunichi Suzuki has reiterated the government's readiness to take an appropriate action as the yen continues to slide against the U.S. dollar.
'So hot you can't breathe': Extreme heat hits the Philippines
A pedestrian cools himself with a folding hand fan as he waits for a ride along a road in Manila on Wednesday, as extreme heat hit the Philippines.
Raising kids in Japan as a single parent? It takes a village.
Making things work as a foreign, single mother in Japan isn't easy, but these tips and tricks can help you through the hardest parts.
Yen rebounds strongly after first slide past ¥160 since 1990
The yen dropped to ¥160.245 per dollar on Monday before heading into the other direction to ¥155.01 amid speculation of an intervention by Japanese currency authorities.
JAL cancels international flight after captain gets drunk at Dallas hotel
A Japan Airlines' flight from Dallas to Tokyo was canceled last week after its captain got drunk at a local hotel.
Climate change, chalky grains and the risks for Japan’s rice farmers
A farmer plants seedlings in Satsumasendai, Kagoshima Prefecture. Japan’s self sufficiency rate for rice is nearly 100%, compared with 38% for food overall, on a calorie basis.
Japan wants you to spend more with ‘luxury tourism’
Performers play a traditional drum unique to Wajima, Ishikawa Prefecture, in the prefectural capital of Kanazawa on March 16 to mark the extension of the Hokuriku Shinkansen line to Tsuruga Station in Fukui Prefecture.
Theaster Gates’ ambitious ‘Afro-Mingei’ brings Black Chicago to Tokyo
Theaster Gates' “A Heavenly Chord” lines up church pews before seven speakers and a Hammond B3 organ, a type of electric organ prevalent in Black American churches.
Casa del Cibo: A thriving jewel born from Tohoku’s harsh past
When chef Ryohei Ikemi moved to Hachinohe, Aomori Prefecture, and opened Casa del Cibo in 2011, it was the first proper Italian restaurant in the city.
Town to block view of Mount Fuji in response to overtourism
The town government of Fujikawaguchiko, Yamanashi Prefecture, decided to set up a 2.5-meter-high screen to prevent tourists from taking pictures of Mount Fuji looming behind a convenience store.

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