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Japan Times
JAPAN / WORKING IT OUT
Feb 7, 2002

Early retirement, outplacement, or just pink slip?

Makoto Kawamura, 51, felt he had few options left when the medium-size life insurer he worked for collapsed and a U.S. firm took over management.
JAPAN / Science & Health / NATURAL SELECTIONS
Feb 7, 2002

Hypersexual farming

Humans have practiced selective breeding for thousands of years to develop plants, animals and fungi better suited for human use than they are in their natural states. No genetic engineering is required, yet the genes of selected strains are different, "improved." Even people opposed to genetic modification...
EDITORIALS
Feb 5, 2002

Mr. Bush's battles

American President George W. Bush's first State of the Union address, delivered last week, will be remembered for one striking phrase: his reference to Iraq, Iran and North Korea as "an axis of evil." It is a powerful notion and one that perhaps reveals more than was intended. Yet for all its simplicity,...
COMMUNITY
Feb 3, 2002

Of nationhood and identity

Writer Ian Buruma was born in the Netherlands in 1951. He attended university in Japan and has spent a large part of his adult life in Asia. His nonfiction works include "The Wages of Guilt: Memories of War in Germany and Japan," "Behind the Mask," "A Japanese Mirror" and "Voltaire's Coconuts." Buruma...
MORE SPORTS
Feb 3, 2002

Hingis-Seles final in store at Toray Pan Pacific Open

Martina Hingis can't recall the first time she faced Silva Farina Elia of Italy. Not because Hingis lost 6-3, 6-1, but because it happened in 1996 and the current No. 4 player in the world was only 15-years-old.
CULTURE / TV & Streaming / CHANNEL SURF
Feb 3, 2002

It's not just who's cast but how they're cast out

A nother milestone in Japan-Korea cultural relations is achieved with the two-part drama special "Friends" (TBS, Monday and Tuesday, 9 p.m.). Japanese idol Kyoko Fukada and Korean heartthrob Wonbin portray a couple who meet in Hong Kong and then strike up a cross-Japan Sea e-mail exchange that turns...
CULTURE / Music / FUZZY LOGIC
Feb 3, 2002

Makes perfect pop sense to me . . .

Beat Crusaders must have overheard one of those critics a couple of years back saying "comedy is the new rock 'n' roll" and taken it literally, for what you get at their gigs is tons of cheap stand-up comic banter sandwiched between immensely hummable pop hymns. Remember the speedy guitar pop of The...
COMMENTARY
Feb 2, 2002

Afghanistan faces danger of donor fatigue

ISLAMABAD -- International pledges worth more than $3 billion from donors at the Tokyo conference called last month to discuss the reconstruction of Afghanistan are unprecedented. Never before has Afghanistan been the beneficiary of such a substantial largesse.
JAPAN
Feb 2, 2002

Despite being born in Japan, 7-year-old is deemed stateless

Ken was born in Japan to Thai parents. But Japan, where the nationality law is based on lineage rather than birthplace, considers him stateless.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY
Feb 2, 2002

How Lon Chaney led to lifetime of Japanese film

I'm rarely nervous these days. But the prospect of sitting down with author, academic, film scholar and art critic Donald Richie has me ever so slightly on edge. Movies like Akira Kurosawa's "Rashomon," seen as a student in England, were profound in effect. Forty years on and here I am with the man reputed...
JAPAN
Feb 1, 2002

Cultist's term upheld for 1994 murder attempt

The Tokyo High Court on Thursday upheld a 12-year prison term handed down to an Aum Shinrikyo defendant for attempting to kill attorney Taro Takimoto with sarin gas in May 1994.
Japan Times
LIFE / Lifestyle / LEARNING BY HEART
Feb 1, 2002

Kids learn from embracing the differences

The first thing you notice about the students at Musashino Higashi Secondary Vocational School is their uniforms. No matter the subject -- be it gymnastics or computer science -- the learning is done in a light-blue tracksuit.
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT / ANIMAL TRACKER
Feb 1, 2002

Japanese squirrel

* Japanese name: Nihon risu * Scientific name: Sciurus lis * Description: The Japanese squirrel is an arboreal species, which means it lives in trees. It has a long, bushy tail, large tufted ears and sharp claws. Its fur changes color according to the season. In summer, the fur is red-orange. In winter,...
JAPAN
Jan 31, 2002

Population seen peaking at 127.74 million in '06

Japan's population is expected to fall to about 100.59 million in 2050 after peaking at roughly 127.74 million in 2006 -- a year earlier than in the last report -- according to an estimate released Wednesday by an institute affiliated with the health ministry.
COMMENTARY
Jan 31, 2002

Toughest task yet: rebuilding Afghanistan's civil society

HONOLULU -- Two decades of war have exacted a horrific toll on Afghanistan. As the dust settles after the latest conflagration, the meaning of "nation building" is becoming clear -- and it's a mind-boggling assignment.
ENVIRONMENT
Jan 31, 2002

Learning their ways makes sharks much safer

During the blistering heat of last summer, which was accompanied by unusually warm waters to the east of the Philippines and the Nansei Islands, a juvenile hammerhead shark wandered into the Sea of Japan. After being sighted off Shimane Prefecture it was hunted ruthlessly -- but apparently never caught....
BUSINESS
Jan 30, 2002

Nissho Iwai to eliminate 5,000 jobs in restructuring

Major trading house Nissho Iwai Corp. on Tuesday announced a three-year restructuring plan featuring a cut of 5,000 jobs from its current consolidated workforce of 19,000.
JAPAN
Jan 29, 2002

Teens face prosecution over slaying of homeless man

Three 14-year-old males arrested over the weekend on suspicion of beating a homeless man to death in northern Tokyo were turned over to prosecutors Monday, police said.
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel / NATURE TRAVEL
Jan 29, 2002

Learning Spanish under the volcanoes

Fancy learning Spanish? We're pleased to suggest four options.
JAPAN
Jan 27, 2002

Playwright offers art to lift Japan out of crisis

In these gloomy times, it seems everyone in Japan is chanting the mantra of structural reform, yet progress is excruciatingly slow. The greatest obstacle is not the political old guard nor the foot-dragging banks. Instead, the main problem is lack of art, according to playwright Oriza Hirata.
JAPAN
Jan 27, 2002

Grandson of Jews saved from Nazis by Sugihara meets diplomat's relatives

The grandson of one of the 6,000 Jewish people saved by a Japanese embassy official during World War II met with the diplomat's relatives in Tokyo's Shinjuku Ward on Saturday.
COMMUNITY
Jan 27, 2002

We've lost that food-loving feeling

Feeling hungry? Luckily, those of us living in the here-and-now can eat almost anything we want, anytime we want -- and as much as we like.
COMMUNITY
Jan 27, 2002

Crash diet with a soft landing

"That's impossible!" said my colleague. "Ten kilos in three months? That's . . ." "Don't say it!" I put my hands over my ears, but he continued anyway. "That's 100 grams a day."
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Jan 27, 2002

In search of a new life and identity Down Under

FAREWELL TO NIPPON: Japanese Lifestyle Migrants in Australia, by Machiko Sato. Japanese Society Series, Trans Pacific Press, 2001, 161 pp., $29 (paper) At the turn of the millennium, the number of Japanese permanent residents in Australia surpassed 30,000, the highest figure since emigration Down Under...
JAPAN
Jan 26, 2002

Man wants name cleared in '63 Sayama case

A man sentenced to life in prison for the 1963 murder of a high school girl spoke out Friday against the Tokyo High Court's recent dismissal of his complaint over not being granted a retrial in 1999.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / PERSONALITY PROFILE
Jan 26, 2002

Sorious Samura

Last summer for its "Perspectives" series, CNN presented the documentary film "Exodus," made by Sorious Samura. Sorious, from Sierra Leone, said of that film: "To try and tell a story like this means witnessing tragedy and sometime playing with death. . . . I was never sure we'd return in one piece."...
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 25, 2002

Heightened fear of radicals gives Mahathir a big win

KANGAR, Malaysia -- Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad has cleverly manipulated the Sept. 11 Islamic terrorist attacks in the United States and their aftermath to crush his political rivals in a crucial by-election in the north Malaysian state of Perlis over the weekend.
JAPAN
Jan 25, 2002

Shops pull Snow products

Supermarkets and department stores accelerated moves to withdraw Snow Brand Food Co. products from the shelves of their stores Thursday, a day after the meat packer admitted a mad cow disease subsidy swindle.

Longform

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