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COMMENTARY
Feb 18, 2001

This cup of coffee is on George W. Bush

NEW YORK -- I admit it: The money's already spent. I know, I know. I should have waited until that huge GOP windfall actually hit my bank account before going out on a wild tax-cut bender, but I just couldn't help myself. The mere thought of all that budget surplus loot -- trillions! of dollars! just...
BASEBALL / BASEBALL BULLET-IN
Feb 18, 2001

Rainy days and Mondays won't dampen baseball

"Rainy Days and Mondays (Always Get Me Down)," Karen and Richard Carpenter's hit record out of the 1970s, might have been an anthem for baseball fans in Japan several years ago.
JAPAN
Feb 18, 2001

Osaka leaders' talk fest serves up more than usual platitudes

KYOTO -- When the Kansai region's leaders gather here every year for a two-day seminar to discuss the regional economy, corporate heads, economists and local government officials pontificate on issues ranging from information technology to employment.
COMMENTARY
Feb 17, 2001

Press is partly to blame for Mori's image

On Dec. 10, 1954, Ichiro Hatoyama became prime minister after a long and bitter political struggle with Shigeru Yoshida. In the immediate postwar period, Hatoyama had appeared to be the most promising of the candidates aspiring to head the government. But he was forced to leave the political arena after...
CULTURE / Music
Feb 17, 2001

They came from Zeta Reticuli

Mudvayne are often said to be the "new" Slipknot. Slipknot wear masks and are very famous; Mudvayne wear makeup and are getting there. And they both fit snugly into the new-fangled rock genre known as nu-metal. What's nu-metal? It's old metal but louder, faster and much more pretentious: It makes the...
JAPAN
Feb 16, 2001

Departing Foley believes strength of ties will prevail

The following are excerpts from U.S. Ambassador Thomas Foley's interview with The Japan Times: What do you think the U.S. and Japanese governments should do to prevent overall bilateral relations from being damaged by the Feb. 9 accident in which a Japanese ship sank off Hawaii when it was hit by a...
EDITORIALS
Feb 16, 2001

The Lucie Blackman case

One piece of a sad, grim puzzle was solved last weekend when police confirmed that human remains found in a beach cave in Kanagawa Prefecture were those of a 21-year-old British woman missing since last July. The other piece of the puzzle -- who killed her, how, where and why -- is not quite in place,...
CULTURE / Music / PLAY BUTTON
Feb 16, 2001

Keeping it pure and personal

There are people who have character and there are people who are characters. Coppe, the coolest musician you've never heard of, is both.
CULTURE / Music
Feb 16, 2001

Black Eyed Peas try to bring it all back

Whither hip hop? Since it's still relatively young, a better question might be: When will it become as redundant as rock? I think it already has, and not because, musically at least, hip hop is by definition a pastiche, but because thematically it's stuck in a rut.
BUSINESS
Feb 15, 2001

G7 nations' options limited on Japan's 'financial bomb'

All eyes will be on Paul O'Neill at the upcoming meeting of finance ministers and central bank chiefs of the Group of Seven industrialized nations in Palermo, Sicily.
BUSINESS
Feb 15, 2001

FSA to tighten supervision of insurers

A Liberal Democratic Party panel gave the green light Wednesday to a proposal by the Financial Services Agency to tighten its supervision of insurance companies, starting with the March book-closing.
JAPAN
Feb 15, 2001

Politicians test online waters for votes

Staff writer In a country where nearly 30 million people out of the 120 million population use the Internet, about 400 out of 732 Diet members have their own Web site.
COMMUNITY
Feb 15, 2001

A playground for the imagination

From the outside, Minamisawa Steiner Hoshi-no-ko Kodomo-en kindergarten looks much like any other home-run preschool. The two-story house is approached from a quiet side street, and you enter through a garden gate.
LIFE / Travel
Feb 14, 2001

The Chinese are coming!

BEIJING -- For centuries, Chinese living away from home loyally trekked back to their ancestral villages every Spring Festival. Last month, a record 45 million people hit road, rail and airlines during the seven-day public holiday. The most auspicious date in the lunar calendar is a time for family reunions....
COMMENTARY
Feb 12, 2001

Destroying a fragile trust

In the semirural area near Tokyo where I and some others spend weekends, we have just suffered our first break-ins. Nothing serious. Someone, probably delinquent kids, going through unlocked parked cars looking for loose items. Far more interesting is why we have been able to leave our houses and cars...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Feb 12, 2001

Let the spring light the fires

THE PILLOW BOOK OF SPRING AND LAUGHTER: Eroticism in Meiji, Taisho and Showa Japan, by John Stevens. Tokyo: The East Publications, Inc. 156 pp., profusely illustrated, color plates/b/w photos. 4,200 yen. We associate spring pictures ("shunga") with the Edo period, lovers usually fully dressed with...
COMMUNITY
Feb 11, 2001

Still thrilled every spring by start of Wimbledon

There was America's No. 2 seed, Lindsey Davenport, on court in the final stages of the Toray Pan Pacific Open, thrashing Croatia's Iva Majoli, and looking a lot softer and prettier in the flesh than TV ever suggests.
COMMENTARY
Feb 11, 2001

In the land of the militantly mellow

NEW YORK -- San Franciscans, if we're to believe reporters who've spent the last week running up their New York employers' expense accounts, are searching the bottom of their recyclable souls in the aftermath of the death of Diane Whipple. Whipple, 33, was killed by one (or two, according to some sources)...
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / PERSONALITY PROFILE
Feb 11, 2001

Christopher Hughes

Bath in southwestern England, his birthplace and home for his first 18 years, played its part in the makeup of Christopher Hughes. Several generations of his family have lived in that beautiful town of squares, crescents and terraces. Set in a bend of the River Avon and famed since Roman times, Bath...
CULTURE / Art
Feb 11, 2001

A passage to modern sculpture

There is a wraith of a bird stalking the basement of the Canadian Embassy, and if you are interested in contemporary sculpture it is worth tracking down. "Passages" shows 20 works by four Canadian artists, ranging from whimsical wildlife to meditations on a cube.
COMMUNITY
Feb 11, 2001

Shinto priestess finds freedom while minding duties of past

On summer weekends, Kugenuma Beach turns into a parody of the nearby metropolis' encroachment on the holidaymaker, with girls in bikinis and 20-cm platform sandals struggling across the sand while loudspeakers on towers belch J-pop at 50-meter intervals, making it difficult to find a moment for quiet...
CULTURE / Music
Feb 9, 2001

Richard Thompson defies death and lives to tell

By his own estimate, Richard Thompson played about 100 concerts last year, "which means you're on the road for about 150 days."
LIFE / Food & Drink / TOKYO FOOD FILE
Feb 8, 2001

Brash, bright, cheerful and fun

As a matter of principle, the Food File doesn't write up places within the first few weeks of their opening. Instead we prefer to wait until the kitchen has settled in properly and recovered from the inevitable strain of dealing with the local media and the surge of customers that inevitably follow....
LIFE / Food & Drink / TOKYO FOOD FILE
Feb 8, 2001

Roti: Brash, bright, cheerful and fun

As a matter of principle, the Food File doesn't write up places within the first few weeks of their opening. Instead we prefer to wait until the kitchen has settled in properly and recovered from the inevitable strain of dealing with the local media and the surge of customers that inevitably follow....
COMMUNITY
Feb 8, 2001

Kids who learn by doing what comes naturally

The melting snow has transformed the playground of Hiratsuka Yochien into a muddy winter wonderland, but the kids follow their own pace. Some plunge ecstatically into the puddles, some carefully make their way to the chicken coop, while still others keep warm in the library.
LIFE / Digital
Feb 7, 2001

Post-Dreamcast, Sega set to become world's top game publisher

SEATTLE -- With its recent decision to abandon the 128-bit Dreamcast video game console and to publish games for PlayStation2 and other gaming platforms, Sega appears to be leaving the game hardware business permanently. Sega Enterprises cofounder David Rosen says it's about time.
LIFE / Travel / NATURE TRAVEL
Feb 7, 2001

Why not join the marine corps?

Welcome to the second week of the second month of the United Nations-designated "International Year of Volunteers." To mark this joyous occasion, we are pleased to announce the release of a book named "Kokusai Volunteer Guido," aka "Inside International Volunteer Work," published by The Japan Times and...
COMMENTARY
Feb 7, 2001

In defense of Davos' ideals

DAVOS, Switzerland -- President Vicente Fox of Mexico was received very warmly at this year's World Economic Forum summit in Davos. His message was clear: that globalization creates dangers, such as a deepening divide between rich and poor, and that these must be addressed if the globalization "backlash"...
JAPAN
Feb 6, 2001

Inefficient public works projects creaking under debt burden

KOBE -- The Akashi Kaikyo Bridge, the world's longest suspension bridge, looks superb as it spans the Akashi Strait, linking Kobe and Awaji Island in Hyogo Prefecture.

Longform

Totopa in Tokyo’s Shinjuku Ward was picked by consultants TTNE as the best sauna of the year.
Japan’s sauna movement: Relax, refresh, repeat