Search - special

 
 
Japan Times
Events / Events Outside Tokyo
Sep 12, 2013

Short films to get screen time in Sapporo

The eighth annual Sapporo Short Fest received 3,746 submissions from 94 countries. Organizers have whittled that number down to 99 films that will screen during the competition.
Japan Times
BASEBALL / Japanese Baseball
Sep 11, 2013

Balentien ties single-season home run record

Before facing the Hiroshima Carp, Wladimir Balentien and teammate Ryoji Aikawa decided they were going to go with a high-sock look, or as Balentien put it, "old-school, Sadaharu Oh-style."
EDITORIALS
Sep 10, 2013

Home nursing care for the elderly

The central and local governments should begin concrete efforts to build an effective network so the transition from caring for the elderly in special nursing care facilities to caring for them in their own homes will go smoothly.
Japan Times
WORLD
Sep 10, 2013

Volleyball as you've never seen it: Chinese '9-man'

My 15-year-old daughter had a warning for me. "You know, Mom," she said, "you'll probably be the only white person there."
EDITORIALS
Sep 4, 2013

Slash wasteful government spending

The Liberal Democratic Party has not learned from its past policy reliance on pork-barrel projects, which caused the national debt to soar.
EDITORIALS
Sep 2, 2013

Net addiction a growing problem

Steps must be taken to combat the problem of Internet addiction, which is affecting a growing number of children and adults.
CULTURE / TV & Streaming / CHANNEL SURF
Sep 1, 2013

Power spots of famous shrines; dinosaur drama in Fukui; CM of the week: Fuji-Q Highland

TV personalities with psychic powers used to be all the rage and then they suddenly disappeared because of a few scandals. Who could have foreseen that they'd now be making a comeback? One of the new psychic stars is a young woman named Chie, who suddenly lost her memory when she was 14 and during a...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Aug 28, 2013

SEPTEMBER LIVE

Students are heading back to school, the fireworks displays are pretty much done and the gyaru (gals) are a lot more tanned. It's too early to declare an end to summer yet, though. There are still plenty of music festivals and concerts in September to satisfy those who don't want to head back indoors...
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Aug 27, 2013

Can the ailing Emerald Isle roar back as the Celtic Tiger?

Much of Ireland has been riveted this summer by recordings of phone conversations from 2008 that revealed not only shocking levels of greed and bad breeding among some of the country's top bankers, but a deliberate effort to snooker the government into bailing out the country's banks by concealing the...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Books
Aug 24, 2013

Shocking exposé of Britain's police spies

Overexcitable publishers like to bandy around words such as "explosive" and "shocking" when trying to flog their books, even though generally you could substitute them for ones such as "mildly interesting."
Japan Times
WORLD
Aug 23, 2013

China's voyage of discovery to cross the less frozen north

For a ship on a mission of worldwide importance, the Yong Sheng is a distinctly unimpressive sight. The gray and green hull of the 19,000-ton cargo vessel, operated by China's state-owned Cosco Group, is streaked with rust, while its cargo of steel and heavy equipment would best be described as prosaic....
EDITORIALS
Aug 20, 2013

Care for A-bomb disease sufferers

The government should widen the scope of medical assistance to atomic bomb survivors and hasten efforts to ease the criteria for recognizing such survivors.
Japan Times
BUSINESS / YEN FOR LIVING
Aug 20, 2013

Hot biz: stocks that climb with the temperature

The heat may be bad for your peace of mind, but it's great for the economy.
Japan Times
CULTURE / CULTURE SMASH
Aug 13, 2013

Otakon celebrates 20 years of anime fandom in the U.S.

The American anime convention, Otakon ("Otaku Convention"), begins with a costume parade before it officially opens. Last week I had a bird's-eye view of the spectacle from my 14th-floor hotel room in Baltimore, Maryland. An endless army of imaginary characters trudged across the elevated concourse and...
COMMENTARY / World
Aug 13, 2013

The data mining of social media: Get used to it

Many people love the convenience of cellphones and ever more social media applications. What many don't focus on is how easily outsiders can invade their lives.
CULTURE / TV & Streaming / CHANNEL SURF
Aug 11, 2013

An "Unknown Escape" and an explanation of the LDP's Constitution plans; CM of the week: Potenon

In June, 11 Japanese people whose family members died shortly after the end of World War II in the area now called North Korea traveled to the communist country to carry out memorial services for their kin. It was the first time they'd ever done so on North Korean soil.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Aug 8, 2013

'In the Land of Blood and Honey'

When you think about Angelina Jolie in 2013, the term "preventive double mastectomy" may leap to mind. Which is probably why now is a good time to release her 2011 directorial debut, "In the Land of Blood and Honey." Jolie, who visited Bosnia and Herzegovina as a U.N. goodwill ambassador, has made a...
JAPAN / EXPLAINER
Aug 5, 2013

U.S.-style class action? Unlikely for Tepco suits

About 1,700 people from various prefectures filed four separate lawsuits against Tokyo Electric Power Co. and the government last March 11, exactly two years after the start of the Fukushima nuclear disaster.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives
Aug 2, 2013

Housewife takes time to make a difference volunteering in Tohoku

Sometimes making a difference just means making the time. Kerry Shioya, 49, travels two or three times a month to the Tohoku areas hit by the March 11, 2011, disasters. Sometimes setting out alone, sometimes bringing one of her five children, interested English students or other volunteers, Shioya continues...
Japan Times
WORLD / Science & Health
Aug 2, 2013

Curiosity rover's descent to Mars — the story so far

Nestled below the foothills of the San Gabriel mountains, the Jet Propulsion Laboratory outside Pasadena has a surprisingly low-tech feel. For more than 40 years, space missions to the planets have been controlled from its operations rooms, yet the place is still striking for its bucolic charm. Mule...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music / FUJI ROCK 2013
Jul 31, 2013

Steruss

You're performing on the Red Marquee this year as a result of winning the Rookie A Go-Go competition at last year's festival, how does that feel?
MORE SPORTS
Jul 31, 2013

Gymnastics coach Tomita fondly remembers legendary Aihara

The late Nobuyuki Aihara, a gymnastics legend, left a great impression on many individuals he met or influenced during his many decades in the sport, including Yoichi Tomita.
Japan Times
WORLD / Society
Jul 28, 2013

Woman with Down syndrome pushes for her independence

It wasn't her turn to talk, but early on in a hearing that will determine the limits of her independence, Margaret Jean Hatch stood up in a Newport News, Virginia, courtroom and cut the judge off in midsentence.
Japan Times
LIFE
Jul 27, 2013

Exclusive: Red Hat's lethal Okinawa smokescreen

In July 1969, a leak of chemical weapons on Okinawa sickened more than 20 U.S. soldiers and laid bare one of the Pentagon's biggest Cold War secrets: the storage of toxic munitions outside of continental United States.
Japan Times
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Jul 27, 2013

NHK drama dives into the 'idea' of idols in rural Japan

When it was announced last year that entertainment Renaissance man Kankuro Kudo would write the script for NHK's spring-summer 2013 "TV novel," a few people probably wondered how the iconoclastic writer-director-actor would respond to the broadcaster's narrative strictures. In a recent interview with...

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