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November 22, 2024
 

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C.W. Nicol
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT / OLD NIC'S NOTEBOOK
Jan 3, 2015
Talking tanuki — or whatever you call them
After deer, easily the most commonly seen wild mammals up here in the Kurohime hills where I live, and in northern Nagano Prefecture in general, are the furry, short-legged burrowing creatures called tanuki in Japanese.
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT / OLD NIC'S NOTEBOOK
Dec 6, 2014
Oh deer, what a waste of food and fashion
In summer this year, my photographer chum Conan Morimoto brought a fashion-designer friend of his by the name of Teruki Uchise to talk to me and visit our Afan Trust woods outside Kurohime in the Nagano Prefecture foothills of the Northern Alps.
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT / OLD NIC'S NOTEBOOK
Nov 1, 2014
What's 'weasely' about wonderful weasels?
One of the mammals we're most likely to see in our Afan woods up here in Kurohime in the Nagano Prefecture hills is the Japanese weasel (Mustela itatsi). These wonderful little animals, known as itachi in Japanese, are master hunters that can run, climb trees, swim and dive and take down birds or other...
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT / OLD NIC'S NOTEBOOK
Oct 4, 2014
The bear cheek of our woodland friends
When I came to live here in Kurohime in the hills of northern Nagano Prefecture almost 35 years ago, I got a gun licence and joined the local hunter's association — not because I wanted to kill things, but to help me learn about the mountains, rivers, woodlands, plants and wildlife in this area.
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT / OLD NIC'S NOTEBOOK
Sep 6, 2014
A tale of two parks, and their preservation
As I sit in my study here in Kurohime in the hills of northern Nagano Prefecture, through the window I can see 2,053-meter Mount Kurohime, a dormant volcano that's forested to the top.
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT / OLD NIC'S NOTEBOOK
Aug 2, 2014
Toxic gypsy moths — a most unpleasant infestation
Living in the countryside, the usual casual greetings include an observation about the weather, but for the last six weeks around my home in northern Nagano Prefecture, everybody mentioned the caterpillars. Now it's the moths. I've never seen such a plague of them in the 34 years I've been here.
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT / OLD NIC'S NOTEBOOK
Jul 5, 2014
Entertaining guests with a little horseplay
I had returned from a three-month trip to the Canadian Arctic and was in Vancouver, meeting up with family and friends before returning to Japan.
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT / OLD NIC'S NOTEBOOK
May 31, 2014
When industry works in step with nature
It was about 15 years ago when an old friend, Yoshito Umezaki, invited me to dinner in Tokyo to meet a friend of his named Masayoshi "Mike" Ushikubo — "a really great guy who loves mountains, travels all over the world and is a company president who has a little problem."
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT / OLD NIC'S NOTEBOOK
May 3, 2014
Oysters offer pearls of wisdom within
Since the Great East Japan Earthquake on March 11, 2011, our C.W. Nicol Afan Woodland Trust, based in Kurohime, Nagano Prefecture, has been helping to relocate an elementary school in Miyagi Prefecture that was destroyed by the huge tsunami that followed.
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT / OLD NIC'S NOTEBOOK
Apr 5, 2014
Horses power across time and places
As a wee nipper I'd sometimes be treated to donkey rides on our local beach at Port Talbot in South Wales, but the first time I sat astride a pony was near my home in Neath when I was 8. Around then, the old dairyman occasionally let me join him as he made his daily rounds with his horse-drawn cart collecting...
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT / OLD NIC'S NOTEBOOK
Mar 1, 2014
Going back to the Simien's future
On Saturday, Jan. 18, I set foot in Addis Ababa for the first time since I left Ethiopia in late October 1969.
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT / OLD NIC'S NOTEBOOK
Feb 1, 2014
Japan: Why kill whales off Antarctica?
The Japanese whaling fleet — this year just a factory ship, three catchers and what is being called a "surveillance" vessel — left Shimonoseki in Yamaguchi Prefecture in secret on Dec. 9, 2013 bound for the Southern Ocean and its annual hunt that will keep it away from home through March.
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT / OLD NIC'S NOTEBOOK
Jan 4, 2014
To the Simien and back — 47 years on
By the time you read this I should be in the Simien Mountains of northern Ethiopia. I have been asked to go back there to tell the nation's current generation what the forests and wildlife were like in 1967, '68 and '69 when I served the government of Haille Selassie as the country's first game warden...
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT / OLD NIC'S NOTEBOOK
Nov 30, 2013
Christmas in Japan is only lonely if you let it be
Fifty-one years have rushed by since I first spent a winter in Japan, and 33 years since I first spent a Christmas and New Year in Kurohime, northern Nagano Prefecture. We got our first snows in early November, but at the time of writing, although the mountain peaks are dusted with white, the snow around...
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT / OLD NIC'S NOTEBOOK
Nov 2, 2013
Hybrid furniture and the working horse
Right from the outset when we started planning what is now our magnificent Afan Nature Centre that opened three years ago here in the Nagano Prefecture hills outside Kurohime, I insisted it should be built in wood — and that all the wood must be Japanese.
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT / OLD NIC'S NOTEBOOK
Oct 5, 2013
Canadian sojourn helps to shake off Japan malaise
It was really good to escape the summer heat in Japan and spend two weeks in British Columbia with three of my grown offspring and five grandchildren, as well as with lots of friends both old and new.
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT / OLD NIC'S NOTEBOOK
Aug 31, 2013
Hope blooms eternal for the Simien National Park
In 1967, Ethiopia was the last African country south of the Sahara still without any national parks — an embarrassment for a nation then entertaining ambitions to assume leadership of the continent.
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT / OLD NIC'S NOTEBOOK
Aug 3, 2013
School wins prize for paddle power in its paddies
In mid-July, together with a couple of celebrities, a reporter and some staff from Aeon Co., Ltd., Asia's biggest retailer, I took a half-hour bus ride from Nagoya Station to the city of Aisai in Aichi Prefecture to visit Saya High School there.
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT / OLD NIC'S NOTEBOOK
Jul 6, 2013
'Water of life' helps to keep spirits up
Back in 1980, when I first settled in Kurohime, up in the hills of northern Nagano Prefecture, I often had to go to Tokyo to meet editors. They were good times, as those office-wallahs would take pity on young struggling authors and use them as an excuse to visit bars.
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT / OLD NIC'S NOTEBOOK
Jun 2, 2013
Finding ways not to say 'mottainai!' in the woods
The common Japanese term mottainai, meaning “what a waste,” has become an international concept.
Two of America’s biggest debt holders are dumping Treasurys
The U.S. Treasury building in Washington. Investors in Japan and China sold a pile of U.S. debt in the last quarter, just before the U.S. presidential election.
Ishiba aggravates his own political failures with diplomatic faux pas
Prime Minster Shigeru Ishiba is greeted at the APEC summit in Lima by Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau on Friday. The Japanese leader was criticized for remaining seated while meeting several world leaders at the event.
Japan's 3.31 million visitors in October set monthly record
Kiyomizu Temple in Kyoto in December 2023. Famous autumn leaf colors contributed to increased tourism demand last month from many markets across Asia, Europe and North America, the Japan National Tourism Organization has said.
Japan ranks last in romance satisfaction for second straight year
In a survey of 31 countries, Japan ranked last in terms of those who felt loved, with just 51% of respondents saying so.
Ruling coalition and DPP strike last-minute deal over economic policy
DPP policy chief Makoto Mahaguchi speaks at the party's policy gathering in Tokyo on Wednesday.
Japan, U.K. and Italy discuss inviting more countries to joint fighter project
A new concept model of a next-generation fighter jet to be jointly developed by Japan, Britain and Italy is on display in Farnborough, Hampshire, in July.
Haruki Murakami's 'The City and Its Uncertain Walls' gives deep deja vu
For “The City and Its Uncertain Walls,” translated into English by Philip Gabriel, Haruki Murakami confronts the ghosts who won't leave him alone.
Japanese expats in Asia find community through rugby
The Taiwan Fivewoods celebrate their victory at the 2023 Asian Japanese Rugby Cup in December of last year.
In Fukushima, a weekend of prose, poetry and translation
Aomori-based writer JJ Carter presented on tabletop gaming as creative inspiration for building characters and narratives.
For Dr. Nakamats, aging is just experience in action
Though he didn't win the recent gubernatorial election in Tokyo, the 96-year-old Dr. Nakamats' run was seen as inspirational in Japan's aging society.

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Construction takes place on the Takanawa Gateway Convention Center in Tokyo, slated to open in 2025.
A boom for business tourism in Japan?
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