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Japan Times
Features / WEEK 3
Mar 19, 2006

Creative expression is the need of their souls

Reciting in a rap rhythm, a young man read his poem in a low, strong voice as 10 others around him listened intently.
CULTURE / Music
Mar 17, 2006

Reggae Japansplash

Until 2002, Reggae Japansplash was Japan's longest-running non-jazz summer music festival until it was moved up to the spring. The change made it easier to book a reasonably priced venue, but also eliminated one of the festival's most basic appeals: grooving to deep, sinuous riddims under a sweltering...
COMMENTARY / COUNTERPOINT
Mar 12, 2006

California dreamin' and the way the world's wheels could now be

Earlier this year it was widely reported that Toyota is soon likely to overtake General Motors as the world's largest car manufacturer.
CULTURE / Music
Mar 10, 2006

Dem Franchize Boys "On Top of Our Game"

In case you didn't know, "snap" is a relatively new hip-hop genus of the Dirty South species, utilizing slower tempos and concerning itself mainly with clubbing and a life of leisure. Dem Franchize Boyz is one of the groups who take credit for inventing the style, and Jermaine Dupree, who produced their...
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / VINELAND
Mar 10, 2006

Bisty boys invade Omotesando Hills

Nothing makes my heart skip a beat like the discovery of a great new wine. Yet the prospect of paying for a full bottle of something new, only to discover on first sip that it's definitely a not- for-me style, can prove daunting for even the most adventuresome. Fortunately for wine lovers in the Tokyo...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music / FUZZY LOGIC
Mar 10, 2006

Romancing, not stoned

I've got four High Teens in my apartment, one of them is unconscious on my futon, and "romance" will ultimately be on the agenda. But please hesitate from rushing to the nearest koban and filing a report because, I promise you, this story does not involve drugs and underage sex. (I'm saving that for...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Stage
Mar 9, 2006

Who are you, Tommy?

" 'Tommy' didn't really answer anything, which was the beauty of it.''
Japan Times
Events / Events Outside Tokyo
Mar 3, 2006

DJ gatecrashes VIP party

One of the biggest names in Japanese dance music, Mondo Grosso, returns to Club Yellow in Roppongi, Tokyo, on March 3 as a guest DJ for "Cyberjapan presents VIP Club."
COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM NEW YORK
Feb 27, 2006

Criticism of Japan skips the finer points

NEW YORK -- By way of criticizing Taro Aso as "Japan's Offensive Foreign Minister," a Feb. 13 New York Times editorial came up with a sweeping condemnation of the Japanese and their society by asserting that "public discourse in Japan and modern history lessons in its schools have never properly come...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Feb 26, 2006

Memoirs of a foreigner

JAPANESE JOURNEYS: Writings and Recollections, by Geoffrey Bownas. Kent: Global Oriental Ltd., 2005, 264 pp., with b/w photos, £30 (cloth). One late evening in 1970, the scholar Geoffrey Bownas was working with the writer Yukio Mishima on their anthology "New Writing in Japan." The noted author excused...
Japan Times
LIFE / Style & Design
Jan 24, 2006

DoCoMo's D902i phone, Signeo's MP3 player, Rooshopper tote bags, TEPCO's cooking heater, Stand Kamimakiki

It's the start of a new year and that often means making changes in your life. Want to be an eco-friendly shopper? Looking to make some much needed improvements in the household? Or maybe you just want to make the people around you exhibit signs of envy by sporting some new 2006 gear. Here are a few...
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel
Jan 20, 2006

Hitting the ski slopes in class

For city-dwelling snow lovers, winter can be an especially bleak time of year. Bare, gray streets feel all the colder without a dusting of white. Outdoor fun is limited -- no beach parties, no beer gardens, no leisurely walks in the park. The initial glow of the after-work pub grows dim and so does going...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Stage
Jan 19, 2006

"Stuff Happens" : So what do you think about it?

The night I got back home from the premiere of "Stuff Happens," the BBC World television news led off with a report on a further mess in Iraq -- the chief judge in the trial of deposed president Saddam Hussein had resigned following criticism of his "soft attitude" toward the defendant. I felt strongly...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Jan 15, 2006

Spreading the word on popular literature

THE BAMBOO SWORD AND OTHER SAMURAI TALES by Shuhei Fujisawa, translated by Gavin Frew. Tokyo: Kodansha International, 2005, 254 pp., 2,400 yen (cloth). Japanese critics have long made a distinction between taishu bungaku, "popular literature," which is simple entertainment, and jun bungaku, "pure literature,"...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Jan 14, 2006

Houses with faux fur lining

It's that time of year for me to give "gaijin" instructions on how to survive the subzero temperatures in Japan. Those inside your house, that is.
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel
Jan 13, 2006

Aichi Prefecture shows the glory of culture, industry -- past and present

Aichi Prefecture, internationally better known as the venue of the 2005 Aichi World Expo, which was successfully held for six months last year, is located near the center of Japan and has prospered as a corridor between the east, west, north and south with a long history.
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE ZEIT GIST
Jan 10, 2006

Mind the gap

While the exoticism of cultural otherness certainly adds something to the experience of meeting a lover from another country, differences can also be the source of annoyance and complications.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / PERSONALITY PROFILE
Dec 31, 2005

Gen Okamoto

Gen Okamoto sees himself as an illustrator rather than a fine artist. For that reason, in his printmaking he uses different techniques to produce "tones and softer shadows, a kind of texture," which he is looking for as the most desirable for his kind of creative expression. Sometimes people ask him...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Dec 30, 2005

Pull of the people

My album of the year was M.I.A.'s "Arular," for a number of reasons. First, it's a party album whose energy and imagination never flag. Second, it's utterly distinctive: Maya Arulpragasam's nursery-rhyme rapping style doesn't sound like anybody else's. Third, it's a work of art whose local specificity,...
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / BEST BAR NONE
Dec 23, 2005

Plenty of ways to howl in the new year

Once again, it is time to make that all-important decision about where to spend the magic midnight moment when the calendar starts anew. According to the Chinese zodiac, the cock will pass his hat on to the dog. And, as usual, there are several options for parties where, this year, you can let out a...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Dec 16, 2005

Stripping it down, thriving on basics

Born in 1970 into an acting family -- his father is butoh master Akaji Maro and his brother is rising star Nao Omori -- Tatsushi Omori served as an assistant director for Junji Sakamoto and Kazuyuki Izutsu before working for producer/director Genjiro Arato on "Akame Shijuha-taki Shinju Misui" in 2003...
Features
Dec 11, 2005

Discordant history mars neighbors' friendship overtures

Japanese actress Yoshino Kimura was the lone main guest at the Chuo Kokaido Hall in Osaka in October. She appeared without her Korean counterpart in the opening ceremony to celebrate this year's 40th anniversary of the 1965 Japan-South Korean Treaty that normalized Tokyo-Seoul relations.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Dec 8, 2005

Inside the belly of the beast

Jennifer Abbott's entire career as a filmmaker and editor has been involved with challenging people's perceptions. Her first documentary, "A Cow at My Table," was on the horrors of factory farming, and Abbott met her co-director Mark Achbar while working as an editor on his documentary on lesbian marriages...
COMMENTARY / World
Dec 5, 2005

Soft power matters in Asia

CAMBRIDGE, Massachusetts -- U.S. President George W. Bush recently returned from Asia after attending the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum summit, but he should continue to pay attention to another Asian summit to which he was not invited. In December, Malaysia will host an East Asian Summit that...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Dec 4, 2005

Complexity drawn from emptiness

THE ANCIENT CAPITAL OF IMAGES by John Mateer. Fremantle, Australia: Fremantle Arts Centre Press, 2005, 61 pp., A$22.95 (paper). The poet John Mateer has published previously in South Africa, where he comes from, Australia, where he now lives, and Indonesia, which he has traveled in. A group of his poems...
CULTURE / Music
Dec 2, 2005

Quruli: "Nikki"

Quruli? An indie band? It's just not true. While at their creative peak they made mind-blowing J-pop (2002's "The World Is Mine"), at their worst, they are MOR J-popsters with bad hair.
SPORTS / SPORTS SCOPE
Nov 30, 2005

Guts and glory the key elements to the Takahashi story

Is there anything more compelling in sports than a once great champion, who has been written off by just about everybody, recapturing their former glory in dramatic fashion?
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / PERSONALITY PROFILE
Nov 26, 2005

Richard Quest

Almost 20 years ago, viewers of the BBC World Service used to watch a British television reporter whose agile, distinctive style excited comment. "Unconventional," some said. "Quirky," said others, "original and mold-breaking."

Longform

A man offers prayers at Hebikubo Shrine in Tokyo's Shinagawa Ward. The shrine is one of several across the country dedicated to the snake.
Shed your skin and reinvent yourself in the Year of the Snake