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Japan Times
JAPAN / EXPLAINER
May 5, 2009

Go with the flow at classic 'sento'

Not simply as a means to get clean, "sento," or public baths, have traditionally been places where communication flowed. Bathing and chatting together with one's friends and neighbors in the buff exemplifies the off-guardedness of the most informal relationships.
COMMENTARY
May 5, 2009

Cannes set to sparkle in a depressing year

The Cannes Film Festival will unreel May 13, although the global recession has damped business at the picturesque French seaside resort renowned for its rich playboys and beautiful women.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE ZEIT GIST
May 5, 2009

Mean streets feared under Tokyo's new safety law

Last month a group of activists called Dystopia Tokyo called a protest against what they described as a "Draconian" new city ordinance by conservative Gov. Shintaro Ishihara.
COMMUNITY / Issues / JUST BE CAUSE
May 5, 2009

Fujimori gets his; Japan left shamed

News item: Alberto Fujimori, former president of Peru, was sentenced last month to 25 years in prison by a Peruvian court for connections to death squads.
EDITORIALS
May 3, 2009

Chrysler in bankruptcy court

Chrysler's filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection underlines the deep crisis the American car industry has been experiencing for a long time. The effort to reconstruct the No. 3 U.S. carmaker by using the bankruptcy procedure will be a test not only for the company but also for the administration...
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel
May 3, 2009

Encore Matsuyama!

Nibbling a sweet mikan from Ehime, prime terroir for Japan's citrus, I decided to explore somewhere I had a vague feeling might be an interesting off-the-beaten ramble.
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
May 3, 2009

SMAP star Kusanagi causes naked rage among media

Between the time the media first heard the news that SMAP member Tsuyoshi Kusanagi had been arrested for public indecency and his press conference the next day, there was a frisson of titillating anticipation over what the scandal might reveal and how Kusanagi would emerge from it. Even now, speculation...
COMMENTARY / World
May 3, 2009

World's biggest shock absorber

MUNICH — Since last autumn, Germany has been accused by a number of Anglo-American economists, above all by the 2008 Nobel laureate Paul Krugman, of not doing enough to combat the world economic crisis and of free-riding on other countries' stimulus programs.
COMMENTARY
May 2, 2009

Mideast and cheaper oil

LONDON — Back in the golden bubble days when stock markets were riding high and a barrel of crude oil sold for more than $140, there was no doubt which countries were getting richest quickest.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
May 2, 2009

A nation of outstanding debts

Japan is a nation of favors. Thus the custom that when you see someone, you thank them for the last nice thing they did for you. "Thanks for taking me to the bank yesterday," or "Thanks for dinner the other night."
JAPAN
May 2, 2009

Power struggle rages in North over Kim's heir

As succession speculation abounds amid reports of North Korean leader Kim Jong Il's deteriorating health, a recently obtained confidential report has shed new light on a power struggle taking place in the reclusive state.
JAPAN
May 1, 2009

American hiker believed missing on volcanic isle off Yakushima

A man in his 40s has been missing since Monday, when he was last seen at the head of a mountain trail on Kuchinoerabu, a volcanic island 12 km off Yakushima Island in Kagoshima Prefecture, Yakushima police said.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art / ART BRIEF
May 1, 2009

Ruud van Empel: 'Dawn, Moon, World'

Gallery Terra Tokyo, Kamiyacho
CULTURE / Film
May 1, 2009

'Goemon'

Big, original, visionary films are rare in today's Japanese film industry, which overwhelmingly prefers sure bets developed from hit manga, anime, TV dramas, novels and other media properties.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
May 1, 2009

Sean Penn 'Milk' star is cream of the crop — again

'Y ou know, just to get one of them is something most actors don't get to do, and for a long time I didn't think I'd ever get one, let alone two."
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
May 1, 2009

Mexico and Japan make beautiful music together

I n September 1609, when a Mexican sailboat ran ashore in a typhoon near the village of Onjuku in today's Chiba Prefecture, local fishermen and ama (female divers) rescued 317 souls from the angry ocean. That was Japan's first contact with Mexican people.
BASKETBALL / HOOP SCOOP
May 1, 2009

Playoff tiebreaker in bj-league becomes point of contention

Every sports league has a right to create its own set of rules. And it's only natural for a new league to face greater scrutiny for the way it operates than a league with a long established tradition, a way of doing things that won't change very easily.
Reader Mail
Apr 30, 2009

Some country has to go first

Ralph Cossa throws cold water on U.S. President Barack Obama's initiative to reduce nuclear weapons ("Nuclear disarmament: too much, too soon?", April 21). He insists that the initiative should not go forward unless China agrees to "equivalent percentage-based cuts" because of Japan's concern with China....
BASKETBALL
Apr 30, 2009

Benoit fears for job as Broncos pick over bones of failed season

Losing their final five regular-season games, the Saitama Broncos stumbled to a 19-33 overall record and finished fifth in the bj-league's six-team Eastern Conference.
COMMENTARY / World
Apr 30, 2009

Food crisis still plagues Asia

BANGKOK — For 583 million people across Asia and the Pacific the financial crisis has become a food crisis. While food prices have fallen from last year's spike, they remain high. Rising unemployment and falling incomes are putting additional pressure on poor and vulnerable groups. More worrying still...
Japan Times
JAPAN
Apr 30, 2009

Opening the door to foreigners

Massive layoffs from the current economic crisis are falling heavily on foreign workers, many of whom are opting to leave the country to seek work back home.
LIFE / Lifestyle
Apr 30, 2009

Architects Klein, Dytham find freedom and fun in Tokyo

Within three weeks of stepping off the plane at Narita, 26-year-old Astrid Klein and 24-year-old Mark Dytham found themselves holed up in an Ikebukuro love hotel, using hastily acquired T-squares to draw up plans for a hair salon in Ginza — one of the most expensive strips of real estate in the world....
JAPAN
Apr 28, 2009

Realism urged on disputed islands

The government should take a realistic approach instead of demanding the collective return of all four Russian-held islands off Hokkaido, panelists at a discussion said Monday in Tokyo.
COMMUNITY / Voices / HOTLINE TO NAGATACHO
Apr 28, 2009

When will High-Touch Town be cleaned up?

Dear Tokyo Gov. Shintaro Ishihara,
BASEBALL / BASEBALL BULLET-IN
Apr 26, 2009

Fans point way to watch NPB games online

There were several responses to the column of April 12 with information on how and where fans can find Japanese baseball games streamed via the Internet.
Japan Times
JAPAN / Media
Apr 26, 2009

Locating the Navitime Navigator on the map

Before actor Ian Moore gets on any train in Tokyo, he's careful to peek inside and check the carriage. Chances are his face is plastered on an advertisement in there somewhere, not quite sufficiently hidden behind the mustache and green-and- white helmet that for the last six years have transformed him...
JAPAN
Apr 25, 2009

Lower House panel takes up contentious immigration bill

A Lower House panel Friday began deliberating a controversial bill that would revise the immigration law by strengthening state control over foreigners and illegal entry by shifting responsibility for alien registration to the central government from municipalities and increasing penalties for violators....
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Apr 25, 2009

Expand your options to enjoy budding boost of flower power

Now that the cherry blossom season is over, many of us sit under the bare cherry trees and ponder: What next? For two weeks of O-hanami we had a place to go, a place to meet and a party to indulge in. Life seems dull now without cherry blossom-viewing parties.

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