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BUSINESS
Aug 18, 2006

Insurers scour the streets to fill female sales ranks

A couple approach a young woman on a Tokyo street and ask her if she is interested in pursuing a new career.
BUSINESS
Aug 18, 2006

JAL to increase fuel surcharges on overseas routes

Japan Airlines Corp., struggling to deal with soaring jet fuel prices, said Thursday it will raise fuel surcharges on international flights by 700 yen to 5,600 yen, depending on the route, starting Oct. 1.
BUSINESS
Aug 17, 2006

Sony braces for impact of massive battery recall

Sony Corp. is cooperating fully with personal computer maker Dell Inc.'s recall of 4.1 million notebook computer batteries supplied by Sony, but it does not know how much the recall will cost, a spokesman said Wednesday.
COMMENTARY / World
Aug 17, 2006

The rules of Lebanon's reconstruction

PRAGUE -- Lebanon's reconstruction, so painstakingly carried out in the 1990s, is now at risk of being undone. But Lebanon is not alone in that respect: According to the United Nations and several independent studies, countries in transition from war to peace face roughly a 50 percent chance of sliding...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Aug 17, 2006

Exploring her selves

Modern culture is deeply interested in constructed and changing identities. The mutability of the individual is an obsession that stretches from stories about Leonardo Da Vinci's "Mona Lisa" being a portrait of the artist in drag to Oprah Winfrey's very public weight-loss programs; from Japanese artist...
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Aug 17, 2006

Fuel spike hits taxi, airline passengers

Crude oil price rises are turning the screws on taxi companies and airlines, pushing them to pass higher fuel costs on to passengers in the form of higher fares.
Japan Times
JAPAN / Politics
Aug 16, 2006

'Stubborn maverick' makes good on promise

Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi on Tuesday took his last opportunity while in office to visit Yasukuni Shrine on the anniversary of Japan's wartime surrender, finally following through on a campaign pledge he made before his April 2001 inauguration to break the diplomatic taboo by making the contentious...
Japan Times
JAPAN
Aug 16, 2006

Tax hike gets people to stub out for good

Miho Shimada has seen the difference 1 yen can make.
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Aug 16, 2006

Firms find niche market turning office towers into dwellings

From the outside, the apartment building Kenny Sumitani recently moved into looks exactly like an office high-rise.
SUMO
Aug 15, 2006

Trips north, south, east and west -- oh, and unwanted amateurs!

While the dust was flying during the should they/shouldn't they (make Hakuho yokozuna and Miyabiyama ozeki) promotion debate that blew up following the Nagoya Basho, the sumo powers that be did what they so often do best and ignored the fuss.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE ZEIT GIST
Aug 15, 2006

The trafficking scourge

Urairat Soimee's journey began with an invitation from a wealthy neighbor -- her mother's childhood friend -- in her small Thai village to come and work at a restaurant she claimed she owned in Japan. It ended with her in a Japanese prison, serving a sentence for murder.
JAPAN
Aug 15, 2006

Paraguay envoy looks back on emigration plan that worked

, now the Japan International Cooperation Agency, played a key role in assisting the emigrants to Paraguay and improving their lives, providing them with agricultural knowhow. Hospitals and schools were built with aid from Japan, while JICA experts collaborated to improve soybean strains and advised...
JAPAN
Aug 13, 2006

Firms see expansion lasting through spring

More than 90 of 100 major firms expect the economy to keep expanding until next spring, but more than 80 are concerned about oil price hikes and an economic slowdown in the United States, a Kyodo News survey shows.
BUSINESS
Aug 12, 2006

GDP grows at lower than expected 0.2% in quarter

Japan's economy is on the road to a sane recovery at a slower than expected 0.8 percent annualized rate seen in the April-June period, the Cabinet Office said Friday.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music / THE SECOND ROOM
Aug 11, 2006

Psychedelic radar 08.11

Mother: Aug. 13-15
EDITORIALS
Aug 10, 2006

Nagano bids maverick goodbye

Nagano voters on Sunday chose a steady and stable style of politics over maverick leadership often characterized by theatrics, confrontation and confusion. Gov. Yasuo Tanaka, a reform-minded ex-novelist, sought a third term but was defeated by Mr. Jin Murai, a former state minister for national disaster...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Aug 10, 2006

There's an art to saving country life

Just a few hours north of Tokyo's seemingly endless sprawl is the mountainous region of Echigo-Tsumari in Niigata Prefecture. Like so many other rural parts of northern Japan, it is a rugged, isolated, aging and economically stagnant place where elderly men and women can be found doubled over in terraced...
COMMENTARY / World
Aug 10, 2006

Will polluters pay for climate change?

PRINCETON, New Jersey -- I am writing this in New York in early August, when the mayor declared a "heat emergency" to prevent widespread electricity outages from the expected high use of air conditioners. City employees could face criminal charges if they set their thermostats below 25.5 C. Nevertheless,...
BUSINESS
Aug 9, 2006

Japan to share expo-tise with China

The government will set up a panel of experts Wednesday to share its experience hosting the World Exposition last year in Aichi Prefecture with 2010 expo host China, the trade minister said Tuesday.
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Aug 9, 2006

Honda sets up U.S. unit for jet sales

Honda Motor Co. has set up a subsidiary in the United States to oversee the sales promotion, production and further development of its small jet, the automaker said Tuesday.
BUSINESS
Aug 9, 2006

Softbank rings up profit thanks to Vodafone deal

Softbank Corp. said Tuesday that group sales surged 91.1 percent year on year to 494.2 billion yen in the first quarter of 2006, with nearly half its revenue coming from new mobile phone subsidiary Vodafone K.K.
JAPAN
Aug 9, 2006

Low-paying jobs holding down birthrate: report

The steady increase in low-wage, part-time workers and those in temporary jobs is contributing to the low birthrate as people become reluctant to marry because of financial insecurity, according to a government report on the labor market released Tuesday.
BUSINESS
Aug 9, 2006

Konaka snubs tender offer by Aoki for its Futata stake

Konaka Co., Japan's fourth-largest menswear chain, said Tuesday it will not sell its stake in Futata Co. to Aoki Holdings Inc., No. 2 in the industry, which is trying to take over the smaller firm.
BUSINESS
Aug 8, 2006

Hokuetsu issues new shares to Mitsubishi

Hokuetsu Paper Mills Ltd., the target of a hostile takeover bid by industry leader Oji Paper Co., said Monday it has completed its planned new share issuance worth about 30 billion yen to major trading house Mitsubishi Corp.

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