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Japan Times
LIFE / Travel
Jul 27, 2007

Escape from Tokyo Part II

I've been to Nikko countless times, but really could kick myself for putting off a trip to Edo Wonderland for so long. I finally visited on June 23, and fortunately the delayed onset of the rainy season got me there on a day with perfect weather.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink
Jul 27, 2007

Ikuta: slow-burning class that's a cut above

Alongside geisha and poisonous blowfish, gourmet Kobe beef fits nicely into the stereotype of refined Japan. And like astronomically priced department-store melons, this pricey breed of cattle does much to reinforce the image of a land of big-spenders.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Jul 27, 2007

Akon

"Trouble" is about right.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Jul 26, 2007

And the beat goes on

Weatherbeaten and remote, the fishing port of Ogi hardly seems like a cultural magnet. Yet the unassuming little community on the southern peninsula of Niigata Prefecture's Sado Island has achieved worldwide renown as the site of Earth Celebration, a music festival with a twist.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Jul 26, 2007

Demented in NY

It's almost counterintuitive — in the midst of the glorious chaos that is China as it modernizes itself, Chinese painters are technically spotless. In their hands, paint has been tamed, a tool with which they slickly create canvases with flawless surfaces that almost hide their workmanship.
JAPAN / UPPER HOUSE SHOWDOWN
Jul 25, 2007

Shimane voters: Has Tokyo helped us?

National polls may show that voter outrage over the pension records fiasco is the primary issue in Sunday's Upper House election.
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT / ANIMAL TRACKER
Jul 25, 2007

Carpenter bee

* Japanese name: Kumabachi * Scientific name: Xylocopa appendiculata * Description: A large, stout, noisy insect, the carpenter bee spooks most people when they see one. It should not spook any reader of this column, though: the bees are mostly harmless. In fact, males are completely harmless, and females...
LIFE / Digital / IGADGET
Jul 25, 2007

Glowing mini-fridge/heater, the world's smallest robot

Miniature fans are just so standard fare as office accessories for the long hot days of summer. International Trading Kansai Co. has crafted something rather more compelling, a minifridge that looks like a giant egg. Available in 6-liter and 10-liter sizes, the gadget gives you the option of keeping...
SPORTS / SPORTS SCOPE
Jul 24, 2007

MLB, NPB should retire legendary Bambino's uniform number

Should Major League Baseball retire Babe Ruth's No. 3?
COMMENTARY
Jul 24, 2007

When democracy goes bad

LONDON — "We do not want to go back to an elective democracy where corruption becomes all pervasive," Lt. Gen. Moeen U Ahmed, chief of the Bangladesh army, told a conference in Dhaka in April.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE ZEIT GIST
Jul 24, 2007

Koreans speak out on schooling

Since the publication of my article about the Okayama Korean Primary and Middle School (Community, May 22), I have had several people ask me questions about the attitudes, opinions and beliefs of the people involved with the school.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WORDS TO LIVE BY
Jul 24, 2007

Hiroko Tsunoda-Shimizu

Hiroko Tsunoda-Shimizu, age 46, is director of the Department of Radiology at St. Luke's International Hospital in Tokyo, where she works with a team of 15 other doctors and 50 radiology technologists diagnosing and trying to eradicate various types of diseases. Tsunoda-Shimizu has been researching breast...
Japan Times
BUSINESS / TAKING A CHANCE
Jul 24, 2007

'Silver workers' a gold mine for temp agency entrepreneur

When Shigeo Hirano set up Mystar60 Corp., a staffing agency specializing in finding jobs for people age 60 and over, he was a man on a mission.
BUSINESS / JAPANESE PERSPECTIVES
Jul 23, 2007

10 years on, currency earthquake is waiting to rattle Asia once more

It is 10 years since the Asian currency crisis. Currency crises are like earthquakes. I hesitate to use this analogy when lives have been lost and people continue to suffer as a result of the quake last week in the Chuetsu area of Niigata Prefecture. Yet the parallel is a valid one.
EDITORIALS
Jul 22, 2007

Passing of the JCP architect

Mr. Kenji Miyamoto, who died Wednesday at the age of 98, embodied the history of the Japanese Communist Party both before and after World War II. The charismatic leader put the party on a realistic policy path, helping the party gain some influence in Japan's politics.
Reader Mail
Jul 22, 2007

Resolution demonstrates cynicism

Regarding the July 14 article "Conservatives want U.S. reps to kill apology motion": Prostitutes have been used by soldiers in every military since the beginning of time, and still are today. They can be found near every military base in every country. With regard to the past, whether women became prostitutes...
CULTURE / TV & Streaming / CHANNEL SURF
Jul 22, 2007

Ex-patriot returns home, samurai classic revived, inventor-farmer special

On Monday at 9 p.m., TBS will present a new drama by noted scriptwriter Taiichi Yamada called "Toi Kuni kara Kita Otoko (The Man from a Faraway Country)."
CULTURE / Books
Jul 22, 2007

Beijing sleuth's treasure hunt a hit and miss

The Eye of Jade: A Mei Wang Mystery. London: Picador, 2007, 227 pp., £10.99 (paper) Any study of Chinese females portrayed in English and American literature over the past century will find no lack of sources, from the works of Pearl Buck and Louise Jordan Miln to those by Han Suyin, Amy Tan and Jung...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / PERSONALITY PROFILE
Jul 21, 2007

Mitsuya Goto

Mitsuya Goto can tell any aspiring student how to learn English. "You really have to want to," he might say, and "you must use any tool available to you."
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Jul 21, 2007

What's your Hokey Pokey biography?

So, where are you from? How old are you? What are your hobbies? What do you like sports? How long stay Japan? Tired of answering questions? Really?
COMMENTARY / World
Jul 20, 2007

Confused by a Turkish veil

ISTANBUL — On Monday millions of Turks will wake up to a new, post-elections Turkey. What will happen is hard to foresee. Turkish politics is full of surprises that only foreigners find surprising.
SPORTS / MULLY'S MISSIVES
Jul 20, 2007

Nakamura's talent has Aussies on alert

HANOI — It's no surprise whom Australia 'keeper Mark Schwarzer singled out as Japan's danger man ahead of their Asian Cup quarterfinal match: Shunsuke Nakamura.
CULTURE / Film
Jul 20, 2007

Tokyo hosts world's top refugee film fest

The United Nations High Commission on Refugees (UNHCR) counts about 33 million refugees in the world today. There is an even larger multitude saddled with the chillingly bureaucratic title "internally displaced persons."
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film / SHORT TAKES
Jul 20, 2007

Freedom Writers

Director: Richard LaGravenese Language: English
COMMENTARY
Jul 19, 2007

'Quad Initiative': an inharmonious concert of democracies

NEW DELHI — The newly launched Australia-India-Japan-U.S. "Quadrilateral Initiative" has raised China's hackles, but its direction is still undecided owing to differing perceptions within the group over what its aims and objectives ought to be.
COMMENTARY / World
Jul 19, 2007

Palestinians still paying for past failures

PRAGUE — Every week, it seems, brings another backward step for Palestine. President Mahmoud Abbas' failure to convene the Palestinian Legislative Assembly, due to a Hamas boycott, may lead inexorably to the final breakdown of the political structures created under the Oslo Accords.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Jul 19, 2007

Sounds of smallness

Settling down into Yukio Fujimoto's "Ears with Chair" (1990) and adjusting the two long tubes on either side to your ears, the drone of the electronic organs on the surrounding walls both intensifies and hollows out. The hushed voices of mingling spectators magnify, as do passing footsteps. You cannot...

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