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CULTURE / Art
Oct 14, 1999

It's a grill, it's a mini-kiln, it's a shichirin!

Pottery making is one of the most popular hobbies in Japan. Thousands of amateur potters reach the semiprofessional level, but they seldom fire their works by themselves. Unless they have their own kiln, they have to ask pottery schools or professionals to fire their pieces -- a service for which they...
LIFE / Food & Drink / TOKYO FOOD FILE
Oct 14, 1999

Food dilettantes need not apply

There are so many plants around the entrance of A Tes Souhaits you'd be forgiven for thinking this is one of those feminine restaurants where flowers and fancy frills take precedence over the food. The sight of the sous-chef squatting by the kitchen door plucking a wild fowl should disillusion you of...
JAPAN
Oct 13, 1999

Palestinians to open Japan office

The Palestinian Authority hopes to establish a representative office in Japan in the near future, a minister of the authority said Thursday in Tokyo.
JAPAN
Oct 13, 1999

Chavez, Obuchi talk of Venezuela's reforms

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez arrived Wednesday in Tokyo and met with Prime Minister Keizo Obuchi to explain a list of ambitious reforms he has planned for the oil-rich but poverty-stricken South American country.
JAPAN
Oct 13, 1999

92 million in unsecured loans not favors: Ochi's office

A management organization for political funds of Michio Ochi, who was named financial reconstruction minister in Prime Minister Keizo Obuchi's new Cabinet last week, has received 92.75 million yen in uncollateralized loans from financial institutions, according to a recently released Home Affairs Ministry...
JAPAN
Oct 13, 1999

University not party to Princeton bonds

Princeton University of the United States has issued a statement that the institution has nothing to do with the Princeton bonds at the center of a recent financial scandal.
JAPAN
Oct 13, 1999

Yasuda joins Direct Line on variable-risk auto insurance

Major life insurer Yasuda Mutual Life Insurance Co. and U.K.-based Direct Line Group announced Wednesday they will form a joint venture to sell automobile insurance through direct channels.
JAPAN
Oct 13, 1999

FTC files complaint against 11 oil firms

The Fair Trade Commission filed a criminal complaint Wednesday against 11 oil wholesalers, alleging that they rigged bids on fuel sold to the Defense Agency, in violation of the Antimonopoly Law.
JAPAN
Oct 13, 1999

Regional Special: KYUSHU

Reclamation project splits locals, power elite> Staff writer
LIFE / Digital / CYBERIA
Oct 13, 1999

Not just for kids anymore

I was never much of a video-game player, although I did have a brief infatuation with Missile Command. (It ended when a pal proceeded to stomp me every time we went head to head.) I must be one of the few: Video games are reckoned to be a $20 billion-a-year industry and revenues now outpace movie-ticket...
JAPAN
Oct 13, 1999

GAISF meeting opens; Osaka told to be prudent

OSAKA -- The Monaco-based General Association of International Sports Federations opened its general assembly meeting Wednesday in Osaka with IOC officials cautioning the city, which is bidding for the 2008 Olympics, to be prudent when passing out gifts.
EDITORIALS
Oct 10, 1999

Dishonored by the honors system

Twice a year, the government confers orders and honors on eminent citizens in recognition of their service to the nation or their local communities. This decoration system, which has been in place since the Meiji Era, has been drawing flak from part of the business world. Some business leaders are calling...
COMMENTARY / World
Oct 10, 1999

Breaking the Pakistani link to terrorism

ISLAMABAD -- Suspicsions of a link between a spate of recent terrorist bombings across Russia and Osama bin Laden, the Afghanistan-based Saudi dissident, promise to again draw Pakistan into the issue of global terrorism.
COMMUNITY / How-tos / GETTING THINGS DONE
Oct 10, 1999

Loyalty

A gentleman writes with great affection about his hairbrush. It is, he says, a very nice, heavy hairbrush with a teak back and it is in need of new boar bristles, not surprising since he has used it for 20 years. He hopes to find a shop that can do this kind of work, but where?
COMMENTARY
Oct 10, 1999

Munich and Pat Buchanan

For decades now, the mere mention of the word Munich has invoked an image of craven appeasement. In the name of preventing more "Munichs," the postwar Western world has seen fit to intervene in a variety of conflicts, from Indochina to Kosovo.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Oct 10, 1999

It's a wonder more letter writers don't go postal

Everyone in Japan is worried about unemployment but islands like mine are suffering from overemployment.
EDITORIALS
Oct 9, 1999

A resounding win for Mr. Vajpayee

Political stability has been a rare commodity in India of late. In the last three years, the country has had five governments and three general elections. The cycle seems to have been broken in the national elections held five weeks ago, however. As the final results come in, it looks as if Mr. Atal...
COMMENTARY / World
Oct 9, 1999

Toward a leaner, meaner defense budget

WASHINGTON -- U.S. Republicans and Democrats alike claim to support fiscal responsibility, but you wouldn't know it from the defense budget. The House-Senate Conference Committee has approved $8 billion in budget authority for next year -- $8.3 billion more than requested by the Clinton administration,...
COMMENTARY / World
Oct 9, 1999

Skeletons in Yeltsin's closet

The debate over who lost Russia is intensifying as the U.S. presidential election draws near. Although the United States' policies toward post-Soviet Russia have been bipartisan, politicians sense that Vice President Al Gore is especially vulnerable because of his cochairmanship of the Gore-Chernomyrdin...
CULTURE / Art / ARTS AND ARTISANS
Oct 9, 1999

Whisked away by an age-old tradition

IKOMA, Nara Pref. -- "It is totally handmade and finely crafted work, but no matter how well it is made, chasen (a bamboo tea whisk) is a commodity with a limited life span," says Keizo Kubo, 59, who has been manufacturing the tea-ceremony utensil for 36 years.
LIFE / Travel
Oct 9, 1999

Beijing throws new light on Silk Roads

BEIJING -- As China celebrates the 50th anniversary of communist society and evolves toward a more prosperous future, it is once again recognizing the value of its rich past.
COMMENTARY / World
Oct 9, 1999

China's canny strategy in East Timor

China supported the U.N. Security Council resolution clearing the way for the deployment of an International Force for East Timor and also offered to send a civilian police contingent to be part of the U.N. peacemaking operation. Given China's advocacy of the principle of noninterference in internal...
COMMENTARY / World
Oct 9, 1999

Chongqing leads the next China boom

Japan is poised to lead foreign investment in the next important phase of China's development, centered on Chongqing, an inland city whose name most outsiders have never heard.
CULTURE / Art / CERAMIC SCENE
Oct 9, 1999

Different stokes for Iowan folks

I never thought my interest in Japanese pottery would lead me to Iowa.
JAPAN
Oct 8, 1999

Cabinet Interview: Usui adamant on Aum-restraint law

Staff writer
JAPAN
Oct 8, 1999

Kono pines for Yeltsin's Japan visit

Foreign Minister Yohei Kono reiterated Tokyo's earnest hope Friday that a date can be set soon for Russian President Boris Yeltsin's visit to Japan -- a long-delayed bilateral summit expected to take place by the end of this year.
JAPAN
Oct 8, 1999

Mitsubishi, Volvo form bus-truck alliance

In the latest realignment in the global automotive industry, Mitsubishi Motors Corp. and AB Volvo of Sweden will form a strategic alliance in the field of trucks and buses that includes a capital tieup, top officials of the two firms announced Friday.
JAPAN
Oct 8, 1999

Takatsuki plane went into 'graveyard spiral'

A September 1998 plane crash in Takatsuki, Osaka Prefecture, that killed all five people aboard was the result of the aircraft going into a "graveyard spiral," a Transport Ministry task force concluded Friday.
JAPAN
Oct 8, 1999

Realtor charged in murder of Tokyo temple guard

A 51-year-old real estate broker in custody on a gun-possession charge was served a new warrant Friday in connection with the fatal shooting of a security guard last month at Kuhonbutsu Joshinji Temple in Tokyo's Setagaya Ward.
JAPAN
Oct 8, 1999

State won't appeal case of thrice-acquitted teacher

OSAKA -- The Osaka High Public Prosecutor's Office formally decided Friday not to appeal the case of a former nursery school teacher acquitted three times of murdering a boy in her care in 1974.

Longform

Traditional folk rituals like Mizudome-no-mai (dance to stop the rain) provide a sense of agency to a population that feels largely powerless in the face of the climate crisis.
As climate extremes intensify, Japan embraces ancient weather rituals