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Takayuki Midorikawa stands in front of Ueda Junior High School in Iwaki, Fukushima Prefecture.
JAPAN / Society / Regional Voices: Fukushima
Jun 17, 2024

Fukushima schools open up to revising old rules

The prefecture has recently made some moves to accommodate a little more diversity in the classroom.
Chef Yusuke Murayama’s creative cuisine at Pas Mal spotlights the premium produce of Yamagata Prefecture.
LIFE / Food & Drink / Destination Restaurants
Jun 8, 2024

Pas Mal: French cuisine spotlighting Yamagata’s premium produce

Chef Yusuke Murayama’s signature dessert is a framboise mousse the color of glossy lipstick rouge in the shape of a mouth.
Korean skincare routines tend to be more complex than Japan’s counterpart beauty industry of “less is more,” making K-beauty something of a sweet spot between Japan and the West.
LIFE / Style & Design
Jun 9, 2024

K-beauty or J-beauty? The two 'are not so different these days.'

In early 2024, imports of Korean beauty products to Japan topped French cosmetics for the first time.
Bill May (rear, second from left) poses with the rest of the U.S. team after earning silver at the World Aquatics Championships in Fukuoka on July 17, 2023.
OLYMPICS
Jun 10, 2024

No men chosen to compete in artistic swimming at Olympics in Paris

World Aquatics said it was very disappointed that there would be no men in the Olympic competition.
Lee Kyoung-hyun, a popular YouTuber shaman, at her shaman parlor in Seoul on May 13
WORLD / Society
Jun 10, 2024

South Korea's young shamans revive ancient tradition with social media

Google Trends shows that searches on YouTube for "shaman" and "fortune-telling" in Korean have nearly doubled over the past five years.
Australian-born Connor O'Leary will represent Japan in the surfing competition at the 2024 Paris Olympics.
OLYMPICS / Surfing
Jun 11, 2024

At Paris Games, Connor O’Leary aims to win and inspire

The waves in Teahupo'o, Tahiti, may bode well for the goofy-footed surfer.
A health worker prepares a dose of the Covishield vaccine, co-developed by the University of Oxford and AstraZeneca, and manufactured by Serum Institute of India.
BUSINESS / Companies
Jun 11, 2024

World’s largest vaccine maker sees demand doubling in five years

Serum Institute of India plans to double its vaccine production to 3 billion doses annually over five years, expecting a surge in demand as global health budgets rise.
Employees of a seafood restaurant work in their kitchen space at Tsukiji Outer Market in Tokyo. Side gigs are becoming increasingly common in Japan as companies look for flexible sources of labor while workers look to top up income in their spare time.
BUSINESS / Companies
Jun 11, 2024

Japan spot work startup Timee targets July listing, sources say

The startup, founded in 2017, is aiming for a valuation of roughly $1 billion and the joint global coordinators are Daiwa Securities and Morgan Stanley, the people said.
Australia Treasurer Jim Chalmers in Sydney on Wednesday
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics
Jun 12, 2024

Australia ‘not naive’ on China as Li visit looms, Chalmers says

Premier Li Qiang will visit Australia for four days starting Saturday, touring Adelaide, Canberra, and Perth in the highest-profile Chinese visit since 2017.
A survey has shown that 722 municipalities in Japan had made school lunch services free of charge as of September 2023. Of those, 547 provided such services at all elementary and junior high schools.
JAPAN
Jun 12, 2024

Free school lunches offered in 40% of Japanese municipalities

Many places said that they wanted to reduce financial burdens on households through the initiative.
Basketball legend Jerry West at the Los Angeles Clippers training facility on April 9, 2018.
BASKETBALL / NBA
Jun 13, 2024

Basketball legend Jerry West dies at 86

West played for the Lakers from 1960 through 1974, winning his only NBA title in 1972, and later had a wildly successful career as an executive.
Pitcher Shohei Ohtani celebrates after he closed out the finals of the World Baseball Classic against the U.S. on March 21, 2023, in Miami.
BASEBALL
Jun 13, 2024

Baseball may have arrived in Japan in 1871, earlier than thought

An NPB historian has found that U.S. sailors may have had a baseball game with Japanese players in the early part of the Meiji Era (1868-1912) in Osaka.
Former lawmaker Tomohiro Konno has been arrested for allegedly lending his name as a lawyer to other people to do legal work in violation of the attorney law.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Jun 13, 2024

Ex-Japan Lower House member Konno arrested over name-lending

Konno allegedly lent his name to have other people do legal work to recover special fraud damage for five victims, with virtually no cases of damage recovery.
Postage rates in Japan are set to increase to ¥110 from ¥84 for standard-size letters weighing 25 grams or less and to ¥85 from ¥63 for postcards.
JAPAN
Jun 14, 2024

Japan Post announces October postage hike

Rates will increase to ¥110 from ¥84 for standard-size letters weighing 25 grams or less, and to ¥85 from ¥63 for postcards.
Displaced Sudanese families wait to receive food from a charity kitchen in the city of Omdurman, Sudan, in April.
WORLD / Society
Jun 14, 2024

Famine watchdog says many Sudanese face starvation in coming months

About 3.6 million children in Sudan are acutely malnourished, according to a joint statement by U.N. chiefs.
Rose (pronounced like the wine) is nothing to fear.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / ADOPT ME!
Jun 17, 2024

A Rose by any other name

As lovely as a flower and as smooth as wine, Rose would make a wonderful, loving companion for someone who can recognize the precious gem she is.
A firefighting plane disperses fire retardant over a wildfire in Puertollano, near Tarifa, Spain, on June 4.
ENVIRONMENT / Climate change / ANALYSIS
Jun 14, 2024

Airplanes won't solve Europe's wildfire problem, but prevention might.

Climate change is costing Europe tens of billions of euros per year, and that will rise if nothing is done to reduce emissions and invest in prevention.
Father's Day is said to have come to Japan around 1950, shortly after the establishment of Mother's Day.
JAPAN / Society / Longform
Jun 15, 2024

The evolving nature of fatherhood in Japan

Meiji Era fathers were stern, those from Showa had to be productive for the nation. Heisei dads were told to get involved at home. What will the "Reiwa Dad" look like?
Natsuko Imamura’s new short story collection "Asa: The Girl Who Turned into a Pair of Chopsticks" explores the worlds of three alienated girls whose problems are anything but typical.
CULTURE / Books
Jun 16, 2024

‘Asa: The Girl Who Turned into a Pair of Chopsticks’: Uncanny tales of troubled young women

Natsuko Imamura's narrators are young women with dogged resolve, few scruples and a naivete that borders on delusion.
South African president Cyril Ramaphosa reacts after being reelected as president of South Africa on Friday.
WORLD / Politics
Jun 15, 2024

South Africa's Ramaphosa survives ANC hammering to win second term

A skillful negotiator, Ramaphosa clinched the agreement with the white-led Democratic Alliance and at least two other smaller parties.
A person uses a tong with a camera and GPS system attached to pick up litter, part of an initiative to boost participation in collecting trash.
ENVIRONMENT / Sustainability / OUR PLANET
Jun 16, 2024

Japan’s gamified environment apps target a greener mindset

Government funding has helped drive a boom in environmental and social app development.
Chinese Premier Li Qiang visits the Adelaide Zoo during his trip to Australia on Sunday.
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics
Jun 16, 2024

China’s Li begins Australia trip as symbolism masks tensions

Beijing’s No. 2 official will meet with Prime Minister Anthony Albanese in Canberra before heading to a critical minerals project in Perth with links to Chinese business.
Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings' Kashiwazaki-Kariwa nuclear power station in Kashiwazaki, Niigata Prefecture, in November 2022. The plant was shuttered in the wake of the 2011 Fukushima disaster, and has sat idle since.
JAPAN
Jun 23, 2024

World’s largest nuclear plant sits idle while energy needs soar

The Kashiwazaki-Kariwa plant has the potential capacity to power more than 13 million households.
Chinese Premier Li Qiang shakes hands with Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese at the Australian Parliament House in Canberra on Monday.
ASIA PACIFIC / Politics
Jun 17, 2024

China says relations with Australia back 'on the right track'

Australia said the two countries had agreed to improve "military-to-military" communications.
Durians at a roadside stand in Chantaburi, Thailand, which is by far the fruit’s biggest exporting country, on April 24. China’s demand for the large and spiky fruit is creating fortunes and reshaping parts of Southeast Asia.
ASIA PACIFIC
Jun 17, 2024

China’s lust for durian is creating fortunes in Southeast Asia

Last year, the value of durian exports from Southeast Asia to China was $6.7 billion, a twelvefold increase from $550 million in 2017.
Mavericks guard Kyrie Irving has a complicated history with the Celtics.
BASKETBALL / NBA
Jun 17, 2024

Mavericks star Kyrie Irving focused on Game 5 as NBA Finals head back to Boston

Irving is cognizant of his complicated personal history with the Celtics.
Rohingya refugee children walk along a road at a refugee camp in Cox's Bazar, Bangladesh, on May 2.
WORLD
Jun 17, 2024

Thousands of Rohingya feared trapped in fighting in western Myanmar

Nearly a million Muslim minority group live in refugee camps in Bangladesh's border district after fleeing a military-led crackdown.
Giant panda Lei Lei at Ueno Zoo in Tokyo's Taito Ward on May 20
JAPAN
Jun 17, 2024

Clock ticking for transfer of Tokyo giant panda cub twins to China

The likelihood of the transfer is expected to rise when the twins — who turn 3 on June 23 — reach an age at which they can breed.
Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich, who is in custody on espionage charges, waves behind a glass wall of an enclosure for defendants as he attends a court hearing in Moscow on April 23.
WORLD / Politics
Jun 18, 2024

Russia sets closed espionage trial for U.S. reporter Gershkovich

The White House has called the charges "ridiculous," and President Joe Biden has said the reporter's detention is "totally illegal."
An Israeli tank maneuvers inside the Gaza Strip on Thursday. Gaza's environment was already suffering from recurring conflicts, rapid urban growth, and high population density, before the most recent conflict began on Oct. 7.
WORLD / Society
Jun 18, 2024

Gaza conflict has caused major environmental damage, U.N. says

Water, sanitation, and hygiene systems are now almost entirely defunct, the report found, with Gaza's five wastewater treatment plants shut down.

Longform

Construction takes place on the Takanawa Gateway Convention Center in Tokyo, slated to open in 2025.
A boom for business tourism in Japan?