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November 21, 2024
 

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Stephen Mansfield

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Stephen Mansfield
Photojournalist and author Stephen Mansfield's work has appeared in over 70 publications worldwide, on subjects ranging from conflict in the Middle East to cultural analysis, interviews and book reviews. A longtime Japan Times contributor, his latest book is "Japan's Master Gardens: Lessons in Space & Environment."
LIFE / Travel
Jan 3, 2001
Glimpse an older, more harmonious Korea amid the artifice of a 'living museum'
Two centuries of ice, rain, summer heat and a civil war have reduced the ramparts of Suwon, a city just an hour's drive south of Seoul, to heaps of twisted rubble.
LIFE / Travel
Nov 29, 2000
Pilgrimage to Chiba's stone daibutsu
KYONAN, Chiba Pref. -- Finding the perfect, companionable Buddha can become an obsession. Foreigners living in Asia are often struck by this calm, enlightened face; its features contrast sharply with the figures of Western religious art and their often contrived depictions of the ecstasy of Christian...
LIFE / Travel
Nov 15, 2000
Hidden fiefdom of Obi in Kyushu
NICHINAN, Miyazaki Pref. -- There can be very few places of historical or cultural interest in Japan that remain positively underexploited for their tourist potential.
LIFE / Travel
Nov 8, 2000
Blood brothers, blood feuds
"In the year Sakalat 185, year of the Horse, the Thai came to tattoo all the inhabitants of the Lao cities." -- Oden Meeker, "The Little World of Laos"
LIFE / Travel
Nov 8, 2000
Cracked earth: A journey through Thailand's arid and impoverished Northeast
"In a bad year, it is not only the plows that break, but the hearts too." -- Pira Sudham, "People of Isan"
LIFE / Travel
Oct 25, 2000
Bubbling with energy
If you can accept its gimmickry and brazen commercialism, the glitzy, neon-lit hot spring resort of Beppu, a melange of pachinko parlors, love hotels, sleazy bars, night clubs and hot baths visited by over 12 million tourists a year, constitutes an amazing thermal and entertainment roller-coaster.
CULTURE / Books
Oct 24, 2000
Portrait of Laos, Asia's 'forgotten country'
LAOS: Culture and Society, edited by Grant Evans. Chiang Mai, Thailand: Silkworm Books, 2000, 313 pp., $24.95 The colorful volumes of anthropology produced in the past by gifted amateurs, lady travelers of independent means, colonial officers and the like, have been replaced by the works of highly trained...
LIFE / Travel
Oct 11, 2000
In the quiet domain of the stone Buddhas
As you turn into the quiet country road leading to Usuki's Buddhist rock carvings, a stone torii gate, riveted into the earth, deeply corroded by wind and rain, comes into momentary view. Standing in a field of rippling green paddy, it is an unintentional signal that you have entered a different time...
LIFE / Travel
Sep 13, 2000
Of Zen, scriptures and fireflies
If the Yamaguchi post office were looking for an image to place on a commemorative stamp of their prefectural capital, they would probably choose the city's magisterial five-story pagoda, built on the grounds of the Ruriko Temple. Made from Japanese cypress, the pagoda is typical of the Muromachi Period...
LIFE / Travel
Aug 30, 2000
Travel in the company of women
"The challenge is to myself and not to the mountain." -- "Clouds from Both Sides," by Julie Tullis
LIFE / Travel
Aug 30, 2000
'A lippy and lewd bunch of women'
Ten or 15 years ago, it seemed as if women travel writers might have become an extinct species. Manuscripts submitted by women were subjected to a special set of rules. Editors expected their accounts to include record-breaking feats, promotional gimmicks or at least the use of some eccentric mode of...
LIFE / Travel
Aug 30, 2000
In the realm of the accidental tourist
While there are women who work exclusively as travel writers, many women writers, journalists and novelists among them, have chosen at one time or another to temporarily commandeer the travel vehicle to get their ideas or dreams across.
LIFE / Travel
Aug 23, 2000
Among the ghosts of the kamikaze
CHIRAN, Kagoshima Pref. -- An aerial view of the Satsuma Peninsula, glimpsed from a light, low-flying craft such as a glider, would reveal a pastoral landscape of striking warmth, with green volcanic peaks, white stucco-faced houses and time-worn hot-spring inns tucked away down leafy lanes. In this...
LIFE / Travel
Jun 21, 2000
Kumamoto: the fortified city
Like the good residents of Granada in southern Andalusia, notorious for their drastic mood swings, natives of Kumamoto have a reputation for being stubborn and sulky. These durable folk (Kumamoto has one of the country's largest contingents of centenarians) are also reputed to be both easy to anger and...
LIFE / Travel
May 3, 2000
Historic city is picture perfect
A tattered red lantern swings back and forth on a rusty hook outside Densuke, a small, family-run pub-restaurant on Shiokaze Street. The name of the street means salt breeze, and inside Densuke a gregarious, decidedly "salty" bunch of customers sit on sagging tatami mats whose surfaces, like rough hessian,...
LIFE / Travel
May 13, 1999
Myanmar's Chinese connection
To the millions of Myanmar Buddhists who still visit it, Mandalay symbolizes, nominally at least, the Rome of this "Golden Land." It is a royal "City of Gems."
LIFE / Travel
May 13, 1999
The 'red, green and white lines': rubies, jade and heroin
Like most things connected to money and profit in Myanmar, there is a sinister side to the north's resurgent economy, a subtext that generally eludes visitors' attention. Still, at least one travel book, Nicholas Greenwood's original and often very funny "Bradt Guide to Burma," has picked up on it. Not...
CULTURE / Books
Mar 17, 1999
Last glimpses of a vanishing people
THE VANISHING TRIBES OF BURMA, by Richard K. Diran. London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 240 pp., $60. Coffee-table photo books are usually too expensive, space-consuming or indistinguishable in content from the art of the glossy postcard for most of us to consider buying. Every once in a while, however,...
LIFE / Travel / ON THE ARCHIPELA-GO
Mar 3, 1999
Kyoto: The 'City of Flowers' defined by its waterways
Ever since Kyoto was founded by the Emperor Kanmu in 794, its temples, garden sanctuaries, artisan quarters, elegant back streets and superb inns and shops have lent credence to the city's nickname, "Hana no Miyako," the City of Flowers.
Ishiba delays meeting with Trump, citing legal restrictions
Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba waves upon arrival for the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum, in Callao, Peru, on Friday.
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.
Rising sex tourism exposes loopholes in Japan's anti-prostitution law
While financial misfortunes during the COVID-19 pandemic may have driven some women to work the streets, others simply want more money to spend — or want to pay off their debts — at host clubs.
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.

Podcast

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

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