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Japan Times
JAPAN / Media / BIG IN JAPAN
Mar 28, 2020

Face masks can foster a false sense of security

What’s happening in Japan is written all over our faces — our blank, expressionless, masked faces. Never before, it seems safe to say, have so many people gone about masked.
CULTURE / Books
Mar 28, 2020

The seemingly perfect world of author Clarissa Goenawan

Set in Japan, Clarissa Goenawan's eagerly anticipated second novel, 'The Perfect World of Miwako Sumida,' has a winsome tone, harkening to the early works of Banana Yoshimoto.
CULTURE / Books / RECENTLY PUBLISHED BOOKS ABOUT JAPAN
Mar 28, 2020

'Grit, Grace, and Gold' review: The Olympics are postponed, but this book's a winner

On the surface, sports and haiku are an incongruous mix but, as Nagamura notes in the introduction, 'Writing good haiku involves the same attention to grace, balance, strength, bravery, restraint and observation that propels athletes to their peak.'
Japan Times
JAPAN / Regional Voices: Okinawa
Mar 28, 2020

Okinawa sees fall in foreign visitors amid pandemic

Senagajima Umikaji Terrace, a Mediterranean-esque shopping mall located near the west coast of Senaga Island in Okinawa Prefecture, usually sees crowds of tourists and lines of buses and rentals cars. Starting in around mid-February this year, however, the number of tour group from overseas has sharply...
Japan Times
JAPAN / Regional voices: Chubu
Mar 27, 2020

Fukui looks back at prefecture’s first nuclear reactor

Japan’s first commercial light-water nuclear reactor started operations in Tsuruga, Fukui Prefecture, on March 14, 1970.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Mar 27, 2020

Our phones can serve as a virus tool

Justified civil liberties concerns shouldn't prevent us from using technology to combat a pandemic that could kill millions.
Japan Times
BUSINESS / Tech
Mar 27, 2020

Huawei tests whether shoppers in China are ready for new phones, with range of 5G-only handsets

Huawei Technologies Co. is about to test demand for flagship smartphones in China, and the chief executive officer of its consumer business said he’s confident both markets and manufacturers are ready.
CULTURE / Stage
Mar 27, 2020

Must the show go on during the COVID-19 outbreak?

Responses to the spread of the COVID-19 virus have varied widely from country to country and are changing from day to day. So, while Broadway shows in New York have shut down for at least a month, West End productions in London have been canceled until further notice.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Mar 26, 2020

Ron Carter: A record-breaking jazz legend returns to Tokyo

"I think people still want to hear the old man playing on an antique,” says Ron Carter. “And as long as they want that idea, I’m kind of available.”
Japan Times
BUSINESS / Tech
Mar 20, 2020

Google critics see its Firebase tools as another squeeze play

Some app developers say Google LLC is increasingly pressing them to embed code in their own products that will deepen Google's access to data on consumers, giving the company a leg up on rivals.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Mar 20, 2020

Gezan's Mahito The People says music won't be beaten by a virus

These are trying times for gigging musicians. As COVID-19 continues its relentless spread, tours are being cancelled and artists and promoters are having to adjust to a brutal new reality, in which the activities that livelihoods depend on are suddenly rendered taboo. When I meet the members of alternative...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Mar 19, 2020

Nariaki Obukuro offers optimism with latest album, 'Piercing'

Nariaki Obukuro has been living in London for a little over a year now, and the Japanese singer-songwriter says the city routinely gets his imagination going.
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Mar 18, 2020

Canceling your trip due to coronavirus? Airbnb refuses scores of refunds

Josh Ostroff had a difficult choice to make: Cancel a trip to Japan in March that he'd been promising his 10-year-old son for three years, or ignore travel warnings and put his family's health at risk amid the coronavirus outbreak.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WHY DID YOU LEAVE JAPAN?
Mar 14, 2020

Finding new beginnings in the United States

Sachi Asato, a young man on the autistic spectrum, started life with the odds stacked against him. Mother Sheila and father Satoru talk about their family's move to the U.S. to aid his remarkable progress.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Books / ESSENTIAL READING FOR JAPANOPHILES
Mar 14, 2020

'Underground': The thematic keystone to Haruki Murakami's oeuvre

In the 20 years that have passed since the publication of Haruki Murakami's nonfiction 'Underground,' it remains both an outlier and a springboard for the career that would follow.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / Japan
Mar 13, 2020

Starting the Olympic torch relay in Fukushima should remind us of the dangers of nuclear power

Regardless of who we cheer for at the Olympics Games, nuclear power does not deserve our applause.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Mar 13, 2020

The right way for leaders to address 'fear itself'

The Great Depression was worse than coronavirus. Yet FDR found a way to warn and reassure all Americans, all at once.
Japan Times
Special Supplements / Sea of Japan discovery trail
Mar 13, 2020

Beautiful island paradise home to water activities, mountain trails

This is the third article in a Sea of Japan series, showcasing natural beauty spots, tourist attractions, conservation initiatives and the region's historical significance.
Japan Times
Special Supplements / Japan Cultural Expo
Mar 13, 2020

Explore 10,000 years of Cultural practices

Attracted to Japanese paintings like those of artist Katsushika Hokusai? Curious about ancient techniques for wooden architecture or the works of famous modern architects such as Kenzo Tange and Kengo Kuma?
Japan Times
Special Supplements / Japan Cultural Expo
Mar 13, 2020

The Architecture of Japan: Natural Materials Meet Traditional Techniques

November 2020 to February 2021 (tentative)
Japan Times
CULTURE / Japan Cultural Expo
Mar 13, 2020

Rich history seen in Nationwide Programs

Held across the country in the years before and after the 2020 Tokyo Olympic and Paralympic Games, Junko Kawamura, president of Japan Arts Council, is confident that the Japan Cultural Expo will offer a great opportunity for people from Japan and abroad to appreciate and learn about the blessing of nature...
Japan Times
BASKETBALL / B. League / B. LEAGUE NOTEBOOK
Mar 12, 2020

Teams regroup after long layoff for season's stretch run

The revamped playoff format, which was revealed on Tuesday, created a different reality for teams in the hunt for the 2019-20 title: a smaller margin of error.
COMMENTARY / Japan
Mar 11, 2020

Fighting COVID-19: It's the story, stupid

The Japanese government is failing to effectively combat infections and unable to win the confidence of publics at home and abroad.
JAPAN
Mar 11, 2020

Nine years on, monuments in Tohoku pass on lessons and memories from 3/11

The public, industry and academic sectors in four northeastern prefectures hit by the March 2011 earthquake and tsunami are collaborating on a project to highlight disaster-related monuments and remains across the region.
Japan Times
Denmark report 2020
Mar 11, 2020

PureteQ powers through sustainable shipping technologies

The shipping industry is perhaps the world’s most efficient and earliest form of transportation. Being one of the oldest modes of transport means that older technologies are often used.
Japan Times
LIFE / Lifestyle
Mar 7, 2020

Altered perspectives: The 'interactive' Okinawan garden

If Japanese landscape gardeners looked toward mountains and river valleys for inspiration in creating the rock arrangements that form the power grids of their gardens, infusing natural elements with Taoist and Buddhist principles, it is likely that Okinawans cast their eyes over the seas that surround...
Japan Times
JAPAN / Media / BIG IN JAPAN
Mar 7, 2020

Paradise lost: Japan longs for simpler times in trying days

The Japanese weren't always workaholics. Once upon a time, work had its place and knew its place. It didn't swallow life whole. Other pursuits were given their due. People worked without being consumed by work.

Longform

Visitors walk past Sou Fujimoto's Grand Ring, which has been recognized as the largest wooden structure in the world.
Can a World Expo still matter? Japan is about to find out.