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December 23, 2024
 

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Nick Currie
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / THE UNRELIABLE FOOD CRITIC
Apr 15, 2016
Osaka, give us this day our decent European bread
Encountering strangers on trips back to Europe, I find myself falling into a familiar conversational call-and-response:
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / THE UNRELIABLE FOOD CRITIC
Mar 18, 2016
Osaka's crazed, cheap and cheerful supermarket chain
This is a column about cheap food, and it doesn't come much cheaper than Osaka's Super Tamade supermarket chain. When I first arrived in the city I lived almost exclusively on precooked nikku jagga, a shrink-wrapped beef, carrot and potato bowl retailing at around ¥100. Haute cuisine it isn't, but it...
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / THE UNRELIABLE FOOD CRITIC
Feb 19, 2016
A new ceremony for tea in the rundown heart of Osaka
In Japan — especially in Japan — food and drink have always been about more than merely nutrition or a mere succession of tastes. They have also been a pretext for bringing people together in social rituals that don't have to be ancient, formal or solemn: rituals focused on food and drink can also...
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / THE UNRELIABLE FOOD CRITIC
Jan 22, 2016
Downtown Osaka's faded replica of Korea's kaleidoscopic markets
There's something suspicious about the way Japan and Korea differ so much in the taste and presentation of their foods, as if a kind of sibling rivalry were going on, some struggle for distinction and specialization.
CULTURE / Music / David Bowie in Japan
Jan 15, 2016
Bowie’s portable Japan
I first learned that David Bowie had died while riding the Beetle jetfoil ferry from South Korea to Japan. Of the myriad thoughts that flooded through my mind during the crossing — for Bowie has been my lodestar, an absolutely determinant influence in my life as the musician Momus — was the bittersweet...
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / THE UNRELIABLE FOOD CRITIC
Dec 22, 2015
In the gutter of Osaka, but not looking at the Michelin stars
Cycling through one of the poorer quarters of Osaka, I start feeling peckish. So I park my bike in one of the rundown shopping arcades that crisscross this working-class city and duck, almost at random, into a cheap eatery. The ancient proprietress waves me to the counter and, without even asking, serves...
Bankruptcies and suicides rise as Japanese struggle with mounting debt
Lawyers estimate that personal bankruptcies in Japan are on track to reach the highest since 2012 this year.
Honda and Nissan consider mutual production of vehicles, report says
Honda CEO Toshihiro Mibe at the Japan Mobility Show 2023 at Tokyo Big Sight in October 2023.
The mighty Mekong River's growing plastic problem
A group of elephant keepers in Chiang Saen, Thailand, remove plastic waste from the Ruak River, a tributary of the Mekong River, as a pair of Asian elephants bathe behind them.
Record 78% of people in Japan feel anxious, government survey finds
The public opinion survey on people's lives, conducted by the Cabinet Office, found that 28.1% of respondents think that their standard of living is at a lower-middle level among the general public — the highest percentage to give that response in 35 years.
Nippon Steel alleges undue White House influence on doomed deal review
U.S. President Joe Biden delivers remarks on the economy at the Brookings Institution in Washington on Dec. 10.
Casual workouts, cool living, ‘complete’ food: Japan’s health trends of 2024
In 2024, efficiency trumped effort among Japan's fitness-focused aspirants.
The mighty Mekong River's growing plastic problem
A group of elephant keepers in Chiang Saen, Thailand, remove plastic waste from the Ruak River, a tributary of the Mekong River, as a pair of Asian elephants bathe behind them.
Japanese officials inspect Yokota Air Base over PFAS concerns
The Yokota Air Base in western Tokyo in September 2019. An inspection of the base by Japanese government officials on Friday came amid public pressure to investigate suspected links between the use of PFAS-containing firefighting foam by the U.S. base and contamination of soil and groundwater in western Tokyo.
Crime numbers rise in Japan for second straight year
A police officer stands in front of the residence of a man alleged to have stabbed two junior high school students in Kitakyushu.
A year of Oscar wins and a quiet push for diversity
Ryusuke Hamaguchi’s “Evil Does Not Exist,” released in Japanese theaters in April, sharply dramatizes the clash between rural and urban values. The film won five awards at the 2023 Venice Film Festival, including the second-place Silver Lion prize.

Podcast

One of the many entrances to the Kabukicho neighborhood in Tokyo’s Shinjuku Ward.
Kabukicho: Tokyo’s ‘stadium of desire’

Longform

Yasuyuki Yoshida stirs a brew in a fermentation tank at his brewery in Hakusan.
The quake that shook Noto's sake brewing tradition
By Alex K.T. Martin

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