Angela Jeffs - The Japan Times

November 22, 2024

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Angela Jeffs

After 26 years in Japan, Angela is currently test driving the Scottish winter. Describing herself as a “people person,” she wrote weekly profiles and features for The Japan Times between 1987 and 2011. For writings since 3/11/2011, see www.embrace-transition.com/. Her first book, "Chasing Shooting Stars – A South American Paper Trail into the Past," was published in paperback in January 2013.

COMMUNITY

Jan 7, 2001

Good manners make comfortable relations

In Japan, there has been much discussion of late of both morals and manners. Indeed, one national newspaper on Jan. 1, in a section devoted to scrutinizing how Japanese have changed in recent years, devoted a whole page to the question: Are good manners a thing of the past?

COMMUNITY

Dec 31, 2000

Michinoku Ginko chief banks on Japanese-Russian relations

Talk about a profitable end to the year. Invited to meet a Taisho man -- that is, someone born in the last year of what many consider to be Japan's most liberal period of the 20th century -- I was met in one location to be maneuvered into a taxi and delivered outside another: a nondescript utility block...

COMMUNITY

Dec 24, 2000

The miraculous manifestation of a man of the cloth at Xmas

T'was 10 days before Christmas, and all through the house . . . complete and utter panic! Who to interview for Christmas Eve? Jim Carey (promoting his seasonal movie "The Grinch") has come and gone -- along with most of the foreign community (for the holiday break). As for the Japanese, they are all...

COMMUNITY

Dec 17, 2000

Naturalist issues guide to Tokyo wildlife

Kevin Short leads two quite distinct lives. In California, he is a husband and father, with a home, a dog and three cars. In Japan -- based in Chiba -- he is a natural history writer and environmental consultant, involved with fieldwork, writing, botanical illustration and lectures, and leading secret...

COMMUNITY

Dec 10, 2000

Iron chef champ's book hailed best in the world

One of Katsuyo Kobayashi's strengths is that she is 100 percent reliable. With 140 books published to date, even the most inept cook can take home her latest compilation of recipes and come up trumps every time. Not only are they easy to make, good to eat and affordable, but joy of joys, some are now...

COMMUNITY

Dec 3, 2000

WHO pushes 'Massive Effort' on disease

Gro Harlem Brundtland has a mission. She said as much in her BBC Reith Lecture on population and health early this year. She will be saying it again this week in Okinawa at the followup meeting to July's G-8 summit.

Japan Times

COMMUNITY

Nov 26, 2000

Visual abstractions in old-fashioned language

Imagine the gentle good humor to be found in the name Michael England but being, say, Scottish. In fact England's mother is Irish and his father Welsh, so quite the national conundrum. "Do I think of myself as Gaelic? Only when drinking and dancing. First and foremost I'm a painter."

COMMUNITY

Nov 19, 2000

Abuse rife in culture with no rights for kids

Newly arrived and living on a "danchi" estate in 1986, I would often hear the heart-rending cries of small children standing outside in the cold and darkness pleading to be let back into their homes. In the West, the worst form of punishment is to be grounded. In Japan, it is the opposite, with children...

Japan Times

COMMUNITY

Nov 12, 2000

Welcome to WVE wines in fertile vintage year

Australian Philippa Davern and New Zealander Sarah-Kate Wilson have a lot in common, despite the difference in their ages. For one thing, they both love wine. For another -- not entirely disconnected -- they both have the capacity to fall with assured delicacy on their own two feet.

COMMUNITY

Nov 5, 2000

Missing piece of puzzle in story of 'Ms.'

It was the American futurologist Larry Taub who rang to ask whether I was interested in writing about Sheila Michaels. So began a three-way conversation by e-mail between Japan, New York and wherever Larry was landing to promote his latest book.

Japan Times

COMMUNITY

Oct 29, 2000

Food Bank Japan to aid homeless

It is hard to imagine how Charlie McJilton makes ends meet as a single father living in Tokyo. He says he does "this and that" to pay the bills. Committed to staying in Japan for love of his daughter, most of his time is spent helping those in the direst need -- foreign residents who have fallen through...

Japan Times

COMMUNITY

Oct 22, 2000

ZERI student volunteer recalls Expo experience

Agreeing to be interviewed but only 18, Ikuko Sato brought along her elder sister Kyoko for support. Actually, Kyoko had her own motive for joining us. Soon to visit a Filipino friend in England, she wanted information on traveling in the U.K.: "Is there a special rail pass for tourists? And what do...

Japan Times

COMMUNITY

Oct 15, 2000

Honesty is JAL president's policy

Entranced by the view from the windows of an executive meeting room on the 24th floor of the headquarters of Japan Airlines in Tokyo's Tennozu Isle, I almost missed the entrance of JAL's president, Isao Kaneko. Luckily he is not the kind of man to take offense. Slightly built, in a pale gray suit, he...

COMMUNITY

Oct 8, 2000

Occupational therapy via 'Women and Socks'

It is a rare thing to find any actress of middle years who has never been out of work for more than six months. Especially one willing to explore both biculturally and bilingually her country's history and the sensitive subject of postwar relations.

COMMUNITY

Sep 24, 2000

Creative outsider paints orderly inside of chaos

Yuji Oki lives in a big house and paints increasingly large paintings -- by Japanese standards at least.

Japan Times

COMMUNITY

Sep 17, 2000

Fusing technology, arts in fabulous future shocks

Omote-sando's cafe-restaurant Las Chicas needs no introduction. But few realize that the two-floor building in which it is situated was once a consulate, designed to wrap around the central courtyard -- one of the nicest places to eat in town. Under the umbrella organization Vision Network, the complex...

Japan Times

COMMUNITY

Sep 10, 2000

East-West cooking talent stirs with a clipping from Chives

My first day back in London, on the Food and Drink page of The Evening Standard, a headline caught my eye: Keep Jun and Beautiful. Below, a color photograph of -- it has to be said -- a truly dishy Japanese 29-year-old clad in whiter than whites with a long striped apron.

Japan Times

COMMUNITY

Sep 3, 2000

Kennedy gives answers with Tokyo Q online

Rick Kennedy loves Tokyo. He has been here for years, yet still can't get over the kindness of its citizens, the flawless attention to detail, the sensory feast to be partaken of at every twist and turn -- much of which can be eaten and drunk! So great is his enthusiasm that we missed our stop, Hamamatsucho,...

Japan Times

COMMUNITY

Aug 27, 2000

SHARE and help the world

SHARE is Japan's version of Medecins Sans Frontieres, a small nongovernment aid organization that sends volunteer doctors, nurses and health workers to assist in stricken areas abroad. It also helps those in need on the domestic front -- women involved in the sex industry and people who have overstayed...

COMMUNITY

Aug 20, 2000

A decade of anecdotes to order

There are books about spending time in Japan, written in the main by Alice-in-Wonderlands who believe a short stretch makes them authoritative on all things Japanese. And there are books about Japan. Bruce McCormack's "Tokyo Notes and Anecdotes: Natsukashi" falls into this second, far more recommendable,...

One of the many entrances to the Kabukicho neighborhood in Tokyo’s Shinjuku Ward.

Kabukicho: Tokyo’s ‘stadium of desire’

Construction takes place on the Takanawa Gateway Convention Center in Tokyo, slated to open in 2025.

A boom for business tourism in Japan?

By Kathryn Wortley

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