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Reader Mail
Nov 25, 2007

Why aim for permanent residency?

Regarding the Nov. 21 article "Foreign arrivals get biometric scan": I became a permanent resident of Japan in 2003 after going through so many administrative headaches and being fingerprinted and photographed quite a few times (the process took nearly 20 years!) We foreigners all know how protectionist...
CULTURE / Books
Nov 25, 2007

Tales of Meiji love, lust and drinking tea

Mistress Oriku: Stories from a Tokyo Teahouse by Matsutaro Kawaguchi. Tuttle Publishing, 280 pp., 2007, ¥1,785 (paper) During the middle to late years of the Meiji Era, factories, cement works and commercial shipyards began to spring up like noxious mushrooms along the embankments of Tokyo's Sumida...
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel / NATURE TRAVEL
Nov 25, 2007

The rigors of indolence!

After a week of decadent inactivity in the Aegean Dream resort on the coast of Turkey's Bodrum Peninsula I woke (late) to the disturbing realization that — as I confessed on this page last month — I had ceased to be a travel writer.
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Nov 25, 2007

Oh mother, I can feel the soil falling over your head

As shown by the media frenzy sparked by lapses in decorum on the part of women like Lindsay Lohan, Paris Hilton and Britney Spears, the value of a person's sins increases exponentially in direct proportion to her fame. Women celebrities are subject to closer scrutiny for their mistakes than are men,...
Japan Times
LIFE
Nov 25, 2007

Polishing a paradox high up in the sky

In the 1987 Japanese film "Gondola," a lonely window cleaner — mid-wipe, no less, and maneuvering high up on the side of an apartment building — catches sight of a young woman inside. She returns his glance and, with the sun's rays sparkling on the freshly cleaned pane of glass between them, a deep...
COMMENTARY / COUNTERPOINT
Nov 25, 2007

Salvation Skype's out for a state of despair

I must confess this Sunday. No, I am not about to blurt out my sins. I would rather keep those to myself, thank you. The confession today is out of total despair. Despair for this country we are living in: Japan.
SOCCER / World cup
Nov 21, 2007

Okada now frontrunner to replace stricken Osim

Takeshi Okada has emerged as the frontrunner to take over from the stricken Ivica Osim as Japan national team coach and is expected to be named the Bosnian's successor, The Japan Times learned late Tuesday evening.
ENVIRONMENT / WILD WATCH
Nov 21, 2007

Biodiversity to take your breath away

I promised that I would write more about my recent visit to South America, and as the first snows are now regularly dusting the mountains on view from my window here in Hokkaido — and even coating my balcony — it's hard not to reflect on times spent in warmer climes.
Japan Times
LIFE / Style & Design
Nov 20, 2007

A support service for sufferers

Phones ring off the hook in the office of VOL-NEXT, a Tokyo-based company that offers various goods and services for women battling breast cancer. Chiharu Soga, the demure 42-year-old who runs the three-year-old company, has just fielded a phone call made in desperation by the sister of a recently diagnosed...
LIFE / Language
Nov 20, 2007

Dial up a good impression with denwa echiketto

"Moshi-moshi. Kochira wa Japan Taimuzu no Shuraibaa to moshimasu. Itsumo wo sewa ni natte orimasu" ("Hello, this is Schreiber of the Japan Times. Thanks as always for your kind support.")
COMMUNITY
Nov 20, 2007

Starting today, 'gaijin' formally known as prints

Today sees the introduction of a law requiring the majority of foreigners entering Japan to be fingerprinted and photographed. This change has been met with howls of protest from foreign residents and the foreign media, who have pointed to the fact that the only terrorist attacks on Japanese soil have...
COMMENTARY
Nov 20, 2007

Robbed of childhood, bereft of a future

NEW YORK — Looking at photographs of Iraqi children maimed by the war makes the conflict unforgettable. Reflecting on the causes that led to that war makes it unforgivable. New information is steadily coming out on the effects of the war on children, and how it has affected not only their health but...
LIFE / Style & Design
Nov 20, 2007

Breast-cancer treatment is not always the same

Getting tested or treated for a life-threatening disease is nerve-racking for anyone, but it can be all the more so when outside of your home country.
MORE SPORTS
Nov 19, 2007

Noguchi triumphs in return

Reigning Olympic champion Mizuki Noguchi made a triumphant comeback from a series of injuries to win the Tokyo International Women's Marathon on Sunday.
BASKETBALL / ONE-ON-ONE WITH ...
Nov 18, 2007

Takushi yearns to make impact

The Japan Times will be featuring periodic interviews with players in the bj-league — Japan's first professional basketball circuit — which has entered its third season. Naoto Takushi of the expansion Ryukyu Golden Kings is the subject of this week's profile.
Reader Mail
Nov 18, 2007

Careful card-carrying 'gaijin'

Regarding the Nov. 13 Zeit Gist article, " 'Gaijin card' checks spread as police deputize the nation": The story should have mentioned the trouble any foreigner can get into by neglecting to report to the Ward Office any change in passport visa status.
EDITORIALS
Nov 18, 2007

New wine in old bottles

Seasons change in Japan in two ways, according to nature and according to marketing. This last week started the season for Beaujolais Nouveau, the freshly harvested wine that has become an annual worldwide phenomenon. Marketing and traditional values, the two major forces on Japanese consumer behavior,...
COMMENTARY / World
Nov 18, 2007

What the Kaczynksi twins taught Poles

WASHINGTON — The defeat of the Kaczynski twins' Law and Justice Party (PiS) in Poland brought sighs of relief across Europe. But, as Donald Tusk's new government assumes office, it is important to learn the lessons that their defeat holds for all of us.
LIFE / Lifestyle / WEEK 3
Nov 18, 2007

Cup-and-ball master turns his 'toy' into an art form

Do you play kendama? Probably not, on an everyday basis at least, though you may well have tried it a few times if you live in Japan.
Reader Mail
Nov 18, 2007

Intervention has killed 'design'

Regarding Julian Worrall's Nov. 6 article, "Design turns over a greener leaf": I generally agree with the idea that we should enter a design recession. As someone who has been practicing for the past 20 years in Europe, the United States, and extensively in Japan, my feeling is that due to media frenzy...
MORE SPORTS
Nov 17, 2007

Noguchi eyes breakthrough performance in return

More than three years have passed since the most significant day in Mizuki Noguchi's life.
EDITORIALS
Nov 17, 2007

Staving off recidivism

The Justice Ministry's 2007 white paper on crimes focuses on repeat offenders, using analyses of statistics from 1948 to 2006. It points to the importance of education and support programs for criminal offenders as a means of preventing the recurrence of crimes, and shows that the duty to prevent crimes...
COMMUNITY
Nov 17, 2007

Lend the children an ear

LONDON — Samuel L. Jackson, Natalie Portman and other Hollywood celebrities have joined a global campaign to raise $1 billion over 10 years in support of disadvantaged children around the world.
JAPAN / MIXED MATCHES
Nov 16, 2007

Tokyo couple share humor, love of rock-climbing

To provide more coverage of topics closely related to non-Japanese residents, The Japan Times is launching the series "Mixed Matches" about international couples.
Japan Times
Events / Events Outside Tokyo
Nov 16, 2007

Let's talk about sax

After almost three decades in the music business, jazz saxophonist Kirk Whalum says his sound has remained the same.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music / FUZZY LOGIC
Nov 16, 2007

Kyoto's Ultra-man in bedroom revolution

"Shotgun Blues" is the latest track off Hidenori Fujiwara's turbo-charged musical conveyor-belt of rock 'n' roll madness, and it's a blast of bluesy punk that sounds like Kings of Leon being chain-whipped by Iggy Pop in a dark alley.
CULTURE / Music
Nov 16, 2007

Hirokazu Matsuda "Sanshin Zanmai"

Nowhere in Japan upholds its musical traditions as proudly as Okinawa. There, to make your name as a musician on a small island where there are hundreds of others, you have to be something special. "Sanshin Zanmai" by the 60-year-old Hirokazu Matsuda, his first album to be released nationwide, could...
JAPAN
Nov 16, 2007

Moriya implicates former defense chiefs

Former Vice Defense Minister Takemasa Moriya divulged Thursday that lawmakers Fumio Kyuma and Fukushiro Nukaga were among those wined and dined by a former executive of defense equipment trader Yamada Corp. now at the center of a widening corruption scandal.

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