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JAPAN
May 18, 1999

Diet session may run to early September

The government and the Liberal Democratic Party decided Monday to seek an extension of up to 85 days for the current Diet session to accommodate a supplementary budget for fiscal 1999 as well as other legislation to finance industrial competitiveness measures.
JAPAN
May 18, 1999

Volunteers struck by refugees' fortitude

Staff writer
CULTURE / Music
May 18, 1999

Alec Empire's mission: disturb and offend

At first glance Alec Empire, in black leather from head to foot, appears the archetypal rocker, but his short clean hair and his drug-free, no-drinking, no-smoking stance hardly screams "sex, drugs and rock 'n' roll."
CULTURE / Books
May 18, 1999

Half a biography of Fujimori

THE PRESIDENT WHO DARED TO DREAM: Alberto Fujimori of Peru, by Rei Kimura. Worcester, U.K.: Eyelevel Books, 184 pp., $14.90 (paper). Peru and Japan just celebrated the 100th anniversary of the first Japanese immigrants' arrival in Peru on April 3, 1899. President Alberto Fujimori, himself the son of...
CULTURE / Music / FUZZY LOGIC
May 18, 1999

Holy big beat funk, Captain!

Check him out now, the funky captain. Check him out now, the F-U-N-K-Y captain. Ch-ch-ch-ch-nu-nu-na-na. (cue big drums) . . . . There's a new superhero in town, folks. His name is Captain Funk. He's touching down in a disco den near you. His manifesto is simple:
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
May 18, 1999

Culture: mirror or straitjacket?

THE WORLDS OF JAPANESE POPULAR CULTURE: Gender, Shifting Boundaries and Global Cultures, edited by D.P.K. Martinez. Cambridge University Press, 1998, 212 pp., unpriced. THE WORLDS OF JAPANESE POPULAR CULTURE: Gender, Shifting Boundaries and Global Cultures, edited by D.P.K. Martinez. Cambridge University...
JAPAN
May 18, 1999

Restrictions on chemical exports to ease

The government plans to ease controls on exports of general-purpose high-tech communications equipment, cryptographic products and chemicals in accordance with deregulation undertaken by two multinational watchdogs on arms and chemical transfer worldwide, officials said Monday.
CULTURE / Books
May 18, 1999

Tracing a profile of the new Japan

REGIME SHIFT: Comparative Dynamics of the Japanese Political Economy, by T.J. Pempel. Ithaca and London: Cornell University Press, 1998, 263 pp. I'm confused. On the one hand, we're told Japan has undergone tumultuous change since the beginning of the '90s. The Liberal Democratic Party lost its 38-year-long...
JAPAN
May 18, 1999

Matsushita, Microsoft plan Internet portal

OSAKA -- Matsushita Electric Industrial Co. and Microsoft Co. will create a joint Internet portal site to be launched in October, the two companies said Monday.
CULTURE / Books
May 18, 1999

Progress is fleeting in the fight for sexual equality

THE MOUNTAIN IS MOVING: Japanese Women's Lives, by Patricia Morley. Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 1999, 240 pp., $39.95 (cloth). The mountain is moving, according to Patricia Morley, but mountains are, by nature, difficult to budge, and this particular one is demonstrating a firm...
JAPAN
May 18, 1999

Toyota parts affiliates connect in U.K.

In a move to its auto parts operations to Europe, Toyoda Gosei Co. has set up a joint venture with fellow Toyota affiliate Toyota Tsusho Corp. in Rotherham, England, to produce weatherstripping, it announced at a Monday news conference at the British Embassy in Tokyo.
EDITORIALS
May 16, 1999

'Star Wars' in their eyes

The lines started forming outside theaters in Hollywood in early April. By last week they had sprouted all over America, despite the fact that with just a few days to go fans can now get advance tickets online or by phone. Tickets for what? What event could possibly be worth waiting in line for six weeks...
COMMUNITY / How-tos / GETTING THINGS DONE
May 16, 1999

So long ago

A woman writes of a quest, not hers but a friend's. This friend is looking for a man she knew many years ago. He was born in Hokkaido in 1913. He was a Christian and was active with the Young Men's Christian Association. He traveled widely in foreign countries in connection with that work.
ENVIRONMENT
May 16, 1999

Korakuen: a cultivated present from Edo

Koishikawa Korakuen Garden is a well-seasoned piece of greenery. This nearly 370-year-old heirloom of vegetation is at the top of Tokyo's historical hierarchy of parks and gardens. Were it wine it would be vintage; were it a soldier, it would be battle-scarred and covered with war decorations.
CULTURE / Art
May 16, 1999

Doors of modest home open to lessons of the past

Slide open the door to a two-story wooden house in Tokyo's Ota Ward and enter into the life of an ordinary family in the mid-Showa Era, when people lived in homes with mostly tatami rooms, wooden furniture, traditional cooking tools and fetched their water from a well.
COMMENTARY
May 16, 1999

Does NATO really have justice on its side?

Tokyo is urging Beijing to accept U.S. explanations that the bombing of its Belgrade embassy was a genuine mistake. Maybe it was. But why automatically rule out the possibility it was a devious scheme by rogue hawks in the powerful U.S. military/intelligence machine to encourage China to veto any U.N.-backed...
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
May 16, 1999

Hate is a many-booted creature that bites

The word in Japanese politics these days is reform. Japan is faced with an aging population, a weakened yen and a less-than-thriving economy.
COMMUNITY
May 16, 1999

Yokota base gives Fussa its multicultural charm

Living next to a foreign military base may not seem like an ideal situation, given the antibase rallies in Okinawa, antinoise lawsuits elsewhere and new Tokyo Gov. Ishihara's calls for the return of Yokota Air Base.
COMMENTARY
May 16, 1999

Enhancing regional security

In recent months, South Korean President Kim Dae Jung and Prime Minister Keizo Obuchi have separately called for the creation of a formal, governmental Northeast Asia Security Forum, to bring key regional states together to discuss common security interests and concerns. Russian President Boris Yeltsin...
EDITORIALS
May 15, 1999

More legal help for Japanese citizens

Critics have charged for years that government policies deliberately aimed at discouraging the public from resorting to the courts to resolve disputes have also worked to artificially limit the number of lawyers and judges in this country. Now, in a welcome if belated step aimed at increasing the number...
CULTURE / Stage
May 15, 1999

Theatre Olympics: Let the performances begin!

High on a mountain top covered with tea bushes in Shizuoka Prefecture, Kim Itoh is dancing his solo piece "Nerve Maze Garden 2" in one of the most aesthetically pleasing venues in Japan. Designed by architect Arata Isozaki as part of the Shizuoka Performing Arts Park, Daendo Hall is a small oval theater...
CULTURE / Art
May 15, 1999

Perfect fit of craft and design

Sashimono is a traditional Japanese joining technique for wooden cabinetmaking. It also refers to the furniture made with the technique, such as desks, wardrobes, dressers and chests.
COMMENTARY / World
May 15, 1999

The problem of India's 'untouchables'

It is a great paradox that India, one of the world's oldest democracies, is still unable to eliminate a deep-rooted social problem: the widespread violence and discrimination against the Dalits, a name that means literally "broken" peo ple. The Dalits, or "untouchables," are a segment of Indian society,...
CULTURE / Music
May 15, 1999

Korean rocker carries on the family business

Go to Korea and you feel like everyone's got a chip on their shoulder. It's like everyone wants to pick a fight with you. On this occasion, someone did.
ENVIRONMENT
May 15, 1999

Desert dome fosters research into arid climes, desertification

TOTTORI -- A huge glass dome structure near Japan's largest sand dune houses a research institution to combat desertification -- a serious threat to the global environment. Tottori University's Arid Land Research Center is also developing ways to promote sustainable agriculture in arid areas.
EDITORIALS
May 14, 1999

Mr. Rubin moves on

Mr. Robert Rubin, the U.S. secretary of the Treasury, will step down from his post this summer. The move was expected. Mr. Rubin had talked to confidants about his desire to return to Wall Street. Still, the announcement surprised markets. The dollar, bond prices and the Dow Jones Industrial Average...
JAPAN
May 14, 1999

South Korean divers arrested over visa violations

NAGOYA -- Immigration authorities arrested 11 South Korean women Friday for allegedly violating the Immigration Control and Refugee-Recognition Law by overstaying their visas and working as divers for abalone and other fish in Kii-Nagashima, Mie Prefecture.
JAPAN
May 14, 1999

Miyazawa wants economic bills in June

Finance Minister Kiichi Miyazawa on Friday called for drawing up a comprehensive package of measures by mid-June to strengthen industrial competitiveness and tackle growing unemployment.
JAPAN
May 14, 1999

Symposium eyes stricter laws to curb animal abuse

More than 300 people gathered Thursday at a Tokyo symposium calling for a legal revision to better protect animal rights.
JAPAN
May 14, 1999

First heart recipient under '97 law goes home

OSAKA -- The patient who received a heart from a brain-dead donor in February left Osaka University Hospital Friday, 75 days after the operation -- the first such transplant under the Organ Transplant Law of 1997.

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