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July 17, 2024
 

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Philip Brasor
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Aug 30, 2009
War over whaling takes to Japan's airwaves
In early August, director Louis Psihoyos told The Toronto Star that his documentary, "The Cove," had been submitted to the Tokyo International Film Festival and rejected. In the article he quoted an unnamed TIFF "director" who said that the festival receives funding from the Japanese government, which...
Japan Times
BUSINESS / YEN FOR LIVING
Aug 29, 2009
Goodbye Work
With unemployment rates at an all-time high, it's easy to see an incoming wave of newly homeless.
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Aug 23, 2009
Sling some mud and have some election fun
Nothing I've read exemplifies the misdirection of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party's campaign for the Aug. 19 Lower House elections better than a letter that appeared in last Tuesday's Asahi Shimbun from a reader who said he had to look up sekinin-ryoku after seeing it used in various LDP ads.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Aug 21, 2009
Aimee Mann clicks into a disturbed world
The title of Aimee Mann's latest album, "@#%&*! Smilers," does a good job of conveying the tone of the singer-songwriter's output, not to mention her wry sense of humor; which isn't to say Mann has nothing to smile about. After years of hassling with major record labels about the direction of her...
Japan Times
BUSINESS / YEN FOR LIVING
Aug 18, 2009
Got those rental blacklist blues
It's a buyers market in Japan but “yachin hosho kaisha” (rental guarantee companies) tried to flex their muscle by attempting to blacklist of rent scofflaws.
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Aug 16, 2009
Sakai's twin personalities were falling apart before bust
The advice column in the Aug. 1 Asahi Shimbun ran a letter from a 30-year-old woman who despaired over her obsession with male idols, wondering if it was the reason she didn't have a boyfriend. The guest adviser was University of Tokyo Professor Chizuko Ueno, who told her to relax. She'd survived 30...
CULTURE / Music
Aug 14, 2009
Summer Sonic: 10 years zoom by
Japan's biggest urban rock festival, Summer Sonic (SS), held simultaneously in Chiba and Osaka, marked its tenth anniversary last weekend by expanding from two days to three. All three-day tickets for the Chiba end at the Chiba Marine Stadium and Makuhari Messe complex in Chiba were sold out before the...
Japan Times
BUSINESS / YEN FOR LIVING
Aug 12, 2009
Option to owning
Owning a car in Japan isn't cheap, but these days, renting has become a smart and reasonable option.
Japan Times
BUSINESS / YEN FOR LIVING
Aug 10, 2009
Free java, no jive
Step back Starbucks. McDonald's is making a power move on the coffee market in Japan with free java.
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Aug 9, 2009
Enter a fantasy world of Zen-like bedroom gymnastics
A few weeks ago, BBC News ran a report on how love hotels were one of the few business sectors in Japan doing well in the current recession. The report stressed the unique trappings of these hotels and actually raised more questions than it answered about their socioeconomic significance.
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Aug 2, 2009
No brains when it comes down to transplants
The bill to revise the Organ Transplant Law, which cleared the Upper House on July 13 and thus gained full Diet passage, is a rare example of bipartisan agreement. Known as Plan A, the new law has three significant features: It recognizes brain death as legal death, allows the harvesting of organs from...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Jul 31, 2009
Going to the country for a bit of Fuji Rock
Whether or not you believe Kiyoshiro Imawano, who died in May, was Japan's King of Rock, he was the Mayor of Fuji Rock, having appeared almost every year until he was diagnosed with cancer in 2006.
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Jul 26, 2009
Japan's maglev on track for financial crash
About 40 people are crowded onto the observation deck of the Yamanashi Linear Test Line Center, holding their cameras at the ready and waiting for the world's fastest train — an experimental maglev model that's called a "linear motor car" (LMC) — to make its appearance.
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Jul 19, 2009
Questions over degree of child abuse remain in Japan
Last April, a 34-year-old woman and her 38-year-old live-in boyfriend were arrested for allegedly burying the corpse of the woman's 9-year-old daughter in a Nara graveyard. Osaka police believe that the child had been a victim of abuse at the hands of the boyfriend. School authorities had earlier suspected...
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Jul 12, 2009
'Campaign' star no longer life of the party
Takafumi Horie, the former CEO of Livedoor Inc., has nothing to do with the documentary "Campaign," which had a special public screening at the Rise X theater in Shibuya the morning of June 30. However, the subject of the movie, politics, is close to his heart, so he agreed to discuss it with the film's...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Jul 10, 2009
Measuring influence in Funky Meters
Funky Meters is a good name for any band. However, the band that actually calls itself Funky Meters contains two original members of the legendary New Orleans R&B quartet The Meters and basically plays the same repertoire. In that regard, affixing "funky" to Meters is like calling snow "cold."
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Jul 5, 2009
Flashing the cash while the majority suffer
There haven't been many silver linings to the dark cloud of the recession that descended more than a year ago. One is the media's general loss of interest in ostentatious displays of stuff that most of us could never afford anyway. Nowadays, it's easier to boost TV ratings with features about places...
CULTURE / Music
Jul 3, 2009
Japan was Jackson's other Neverland
Last Friday I watched the second half of the two-hour tribute special to Michael Jackson on Fuji TV and after it was over started surfing to see if there were any others. NHK's BS-2 channel was airing a retrospective of performances by the late singer Hibari Misora, and it occurred to me that June 24,...
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Jun 28, 2009
The only bonus you'll get this summer is the sun
One of the cleverest ideas developed by the Japanese business world is the distribution of semiannual "bonuses" to employees. Usually, a bonus is tied to a company's good fortune or an employee's performance. Japanese workers have always deemed them to be part of their salaries and tend to plan their...
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Jun 21, 2009
My son, I give you power over the people
Last Monday, TBS's noontime show "Hiruobi" was covering Kim Jong Un, the son of North Korean leader Kim Jong Il and presumed successor. One commentator on the show, an editor for an entertainment magazine, wondered what the citizens of North Korea really thought of this dynastic system. "In Japan right...
Who needs AI when you have Hatsune Miku?
Over the first six months of 2024, a handful of songs using Vocaloid singer Hatsune Miku’s voice have enjoyed widespread attention, underlining a global interest in the character and the technology she represents.
Yen’s woes seem too big for even a BOJ hike this month to solve
The Bank of Japan headquarters in Tokyo
China’s economic growth comes in worse than expected
Pedestrians in the Wangfujing shopping area in Beijing on July 11, 2024. China's economic growth in the second quarter was lower than forecast, adding pressure on Chinese leaders to lift confidence at the Chinese Communist Party's third plenum this week.
Kansai airports to increase takeoff and landing slots ahead of Osaka Expo
Kansai International Airport in Izumisano, Osaka Prefecture. The upper limit on the number of takeoff and landing slots at the airport as well as Kobe Airport in Hyogo Prefecture will be raised in spring next year ahead of the 2025 World Exposition in Osaka.
Shooter came within inches of killing Trump, but left few clues as to why
An aerial view shows the stage where Republican presidential candidate and former U.S. President Donald Trump had been standing during an assassination attempt the day before, and the roof of a nearby building where a gunman was shot dead by law enforcement, in Butler, Pennsylvania, on Sunday.
The neurological disorder that 'kills culture'
Akiko Trush says her experience with the neurological disorder dystonia left her feeling like she wanted to chop her own hand off.
How to beat Japan’s summer heat in ways better for the planet
Tenugui towels hang up to dry at a dyeing company in Sakai, Osaka Prefecture, on May 8. The durable and versatile tenugui, which many people have in their homes, can be used in many ways to cool one’s body.
After Trump shooting, U.S. presidential race might take a violent turn
United States Secret Service Counter Snipers stand guard on a rooftop during a campaign rally for U.S. President Donald Trump in Avoca, Pennsylvania, in 2020.
No AC this summer? No problem (for me).
Think air conditioning is a requirement for a Tokyo summer? Think again.
She’s paying ¥1 million to help behind the scenes at the Paris Olympics
Mai Tarumi, who previously volunteered at the postponed Tokyo Olympics in 2021, has a travel budget of ¥1 million for her trip to volunteer at the Paris Games.

Podcast

You can often see generations of families enjoying performances together at Fuji Rock Festival.
Japan’s summer music festivals are feeling the heat in more ways than one

Longform

Akiko Trush says her experience with the neurological disorder dystonia left her feeling like she wanted to chop her own hand off.
The neurological disorder that 'kills culture'
By Tomoko Otake

SUSTAINABLE JAPAN

Exploring Japanese culturevia Tohoku’s festivals
Exploring Japanese culturevia Tohoku’s festivals

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