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November 22, 2024
 

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Amy Chavez

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Amy Chavez
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Dec 22, 2007
Preparing for . . . the Christmas that never comes
You think Christmas celebrations start too early in your country? So that when Christmas finally comes, you've already had enough of it? Where do you think "Season's Greetings" comes from?
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Dec 15, 2007
Becoming one with the chair
I am a chair. I am a big, soft comfortable chair, fluffy and overstuffed like the ones that when you sit down in, they swallow you whole. And it did swallow me, which is how I became one with this chair.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Dec 8, 2007
Baby boy body parts and the next big, uh, 'thing'
The Japanese are fascinated with big body parts. Got a big foot? This will throw the Japanese into fits of laughter and exclamations of "Ooki, desu ne?" ("It's big, isn't it?"). The Japanese often refer to their own faces with amusement because they are generally bigger and rounder compared to the smaller...
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Dec 1, 2007
Hasta la vista, pink bunny!
This column is for all the Nova teachers out there who have lost their teaching jobs. And should you be packing up to go back home, I wish you all the best of luck.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Nov 24, 2007
Inside and out
On the day of my operation, a nurse who had previously introduced herself to me as "Miyuki of the Nurse" helped me put on a hospital gown and I was then put under anesthesia.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Nov 17, 2007
Hospitals — just no place for prudery
Two weeks ago I would have said that very few people in this world had ever seen my private parts. Now, I can say plenty have — mostly doctors and nurses.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Nov 10, 2007
Bowled over by one very, happy day
If National Toilet Day is not a happy day for you, perhaps you need a new toilet.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Nov 3, 2007
The joys of being 'one with nature'
While the other six people on board were sleeping down in the cabins, I was sleeping outside on the deck under the canopy in the cockpit of the boat. This is my favorite place to sleep because I can see the stars and the moon while being lulled to sleep by the gentle rocking of the boat in the ripples....
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Oct 27, 2007
Sitting on the dock of the . . . sea station
We were sailing through the Akinada island chain off Hiroshima Prefecture in the Seto Inland Sea looking for a place to drop anchor for the night. A secluded beach would be nice, or just a quiet cove.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Oct 20, 2007
Getting to the bottom of the mystery of the moving pier
I was sitting in the back of my pickup truck talking to Mrs. Amano at the ferry port. My husband was driving and I was sitting in the back. As we passed the ferry terminal, Mrs. Amano flagged us down.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Oct 13, 2007
Mammograms — with a little bit of sunshine
My neighbor Kazu-chan came over to my house for dinner the other night and while she was here said, "Amy, zannen. The hospital boat was just at the island next door giving free mammograms to women." We will have to go all the way to the mainland to get ours.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Oct 6, 2007
Jumping mullets, it's the season for fire prevention!
Ahh, autumn on Shiraishi Island when I wake up to quacking ducks paddling around in the port in front of my house waiting for me to open the Duck Cafe.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Sep 29, 2007
The encroach of empty-nest syndrome
Japan has taught me tolerance: I've become far too comfortable living with cockroaches. And they have gotten used to me too. I'd come home from work too tired to care about the dark configurations on the kitchen counter. When I turned the light on, they wouldn't even run. I'd then turn off the light,...
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Sep 22, 2007
The stars come out on Sports Day
In Japan "Fall is for reading," but on this island where there are no large print books, most people are too old to read anymore. This doesn't mean, however, that we are not healthy.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Sep 15, 2007
All the dirt on life's ins and outs
This summer has been hotter and longer than most. But rather than fight it and hide indoors in the air conditioning, I just put on my bikini.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Sep 8, 2007
Japanese-English holds key to Japan
I sleep with a purple hippo, a cow, and a dog. And now, Japan is finally making sense to me. For years this country had eluded me with its cute characters and mascots made to resemble animal-like something or others, and creative blobs with eyes and fuzzy ears representing new species of thingamajigs....
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Sep 1, 2007
Adding insult to hot air at the Japanese BBQ
Some people blame global warming on farting cows, others blame it on farting vehicles. I blame it on Japanese BBQs.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Aug 25, 2007
A sprint to keep up with the slow life
The people who work in our post office are, to use the politically correct term, "a little slow." Long before I moved to this island, the government had a plan that worked. They sent those workers who were "a little slow," to work on a small island where hardly anyone one lived and where they could do...
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Aug 18, 2007
Are island people an endangered species?
The passing of O-bon (the festival of the dead), seems an appropriate time to reflect on the declining population in Japan. While the population continues to decline, depopulation is also occurring in farming communities and on Japan's small islands. As an islander myself, I am confronted with the question:...
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Aug 11, 2007
Laughing it up for the Mountain God
I woke up at 6 a.m. to laughter coming from outside my window. Why would people get up so early to laugh? Then it hit me — I was supposed to be out there too.
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.
Tokyo Metro’s overseas efforts begin in earnest with London deal
Tokyo Metro will soon have a role in the running of London's Elizabeth Line, a major train route serving the U.K.’s capital city and environs.
Russia fired experimental ballistic missile at Ukraine, Putin says
Ukrainian firefighters work on a spot following an airstrike in Dnipro on Thursday.
Ex-yokozuna Kitanofuji dies at 82
Yokozuna Kitanofuji enters the ring during the May 1970 grand sumo tournament in Tokyo.
Man charged with murder allegedly made victim date other men for money
A car carrying suspect Ryotaro Masuda, who was indicted for allegedly beating his 25-year-old girlfriend to death, leaves the Shibuya Police Station in Tokyo on Thursday.
The slow-burn success of ‘A Samurai in Time’
A 19th-century warrior gets struck by lightning and wakes to find himself in 21st-century Kyoto in Junichi Yasuda’s surprise hit “A Samurai in Time.”
Around a quarter of Japan married couples in their 20s met through dating apps
A survey released by an organization promoting “Good Couples Day” shows that 24% of couples in their 20s met their marriage partner through a dating app.
'Tokyo Swindlers': Get deep into the minds of real estate con artists
In Ko Shinjo's "Tokyo Swindlers," a group of con artists manipulates real estate giants into falsified deals within the highly competitive, quick market.
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.

Podcast

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

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

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