Search - shop

 
 
Japan Times
JAPAN / CHUBU CONNECTION
Jul 9, 2011

Nagoya assistance for disaster-hit city a bit rocky at times

More than two months have passed since Nagoya started sending its officials to support the understaffed municipal government in Rikuzentakata, Iwate Prefecture, where 68 out of its 295 employees were killed in the March quake and tsunami or remain missing.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Jul 7, 2011

She Talks Silence aim for live experience on new mini-album

When a band kicks off an interview with a statement like "We don't do gigs, we do performances," you could be forgiven for thinking you're in the presence of a group of uncompromising, postindustrial noise punks. However, for indie-pop group She Talks Silence, this attitude is all about intimacy.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY
Jul 2, 2011

Aid-givers sending used bikes to disaster zone

Among the numerous nongovernmental and nonprofit organizations that delivered basic necessities like food and clothes to tsunami-devastated areas in the Tohoku region, the NPO Bikes for Japan did its part by delivering refurbished bicycles to survivors living in shelters.
COMMENTARY / World
Jun 28, 2011

The courage to rebuild

"The journey of life is not smooth and unimpeded, but may be fraught with difficulties exceeding our worst nightmares," observed Kan' ichi Asakawa (1873-1948), a historian and peace advocate originally from Fukushima Prefecture.
Japan Times
LIFE / Style & Design / ON: DESIGN
Jun 28, 2011

Some new old favorites

Ready for the summer buzz There's one summer discomfort that has yet to kick in: the dreaded mosquito attacks. To help us win the battle over insects, household goods brand Vitantonio has teamed up with Kincho, an insect-repellent manufacturer, to create the Mosquito Buster.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink
Jun 24, 2011

Keep a low-power kitchen this summer

Now that we are entering the hottest part of the Japanese summer, it's time to get really serious about saving electricity — in the kitchen as much as anywhere.
COMMENTARY
Jun 21, 2011

Poverty highlights gaps in India's economy

In many ways, India can be highly deceptive and contradictory. There are millions of mobile phones floating around. Dozens of swank hotels. Just about every major car manufacturer has set up shop in the country. Several designers are showcasing and selling clothes that are seen on the fashion streets...
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel
Jun 19, 2011

Summer's joys in snow country

If you'd only ever experienced Niseko under a four-meter blanket of snow, you'd barely recognize Hokkaido's most cosmopolitan winter-sports resort in summer — in the best way possible.
CARTOONS / DAHL'S JAPAN
Jun 12, 2011

Shop Light

Japan Times
LIFE / Travel
Jun 12, 2011

Enjoy art with alpine views

Back in the 1960s, a New York postal worker named Herbert Vogel and his librarian wife, Dorothy, began buying paintings. Using Herb's modest salary, and living off Dorothy's, they picked out affordable pieces that took their fancy — most of them by artists unknown at the time. By the early '90s, their...
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Jun 9, 2011

Video-sharing website sparks Net revolution

When you get down to it, the Nico Nico Douga website is just a combination of videos and text comments about them.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / CLOSE-UP
Jun 5, 2011

Amon Miyamoto: Globe-trotting dramatist seeks new horizons

Fifty-three years ago, Amon Miyamoto was born into a world in which he grew up listening to spirited exchanges between leading lights from the stage and showbiz in his father's coffee shop across from the modern-leaning Shinbashi Enbujo outpost of the venerable Kabuki-za theater in Tokyo's smart Ginza...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Jun 2, 2011

Fired-up tales of ceramics in wonderland

Craft was maligned in Japan's Meiji Era (1868-1912) as the transposition of Western aesthetic theory denigrated it in relation to grand ideas of "fine art." All the while, though, it was an important export industry and a core component of Japan's contributions to various world expositions. It became...
ENVIRONMENT
May 29, 2011

Serendipities at every turn on this island 'pearl'

The sound of Buddhist chanting grew louder as my travel companions and I entered the compound around the "temple," where flickering torches lit the smiling faces of sedately circling monks as the warm tones of their voices carried through the impenetrable darkness on a chilling, flag-fluttering breeze....
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel / BACKSTREET STORIES
May 29, 2011

Casting around in Tsukudajima

From Tsukishima Station on Tokyo's Oedo subway line, I launch myself northward toward Tsukudajima. A mere sandbar in the early days of the Edo Period (1603-1868), Tsukudajima long ago began to be expanded with boulders and landfill on the way to creating the area we now know.
BUSINESS
May 26, 2011

Rakuten to start U.K., Germany sites in Europe push

Rakuten Inc., Japan's biggest online retailer, is aiming to start full-service sites in the U.K. and Germany by the end of this year, part of its effort to challenge Amazon Inc. and eBay Inc. in Europe.
Features
May 22, 2011

Collector's 'labor of love' is a wonder to behold

From the outside it's just another concrete building rising up nine or 10 stories on a downtown Tokyo street. Inside, it's no more impressive — until Shinichiro Tatsumi opens the well-secured door to his own, private Bob Dylan heaven.
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel
May 22, 2011

Iejima: an island of resistance

During the 30-minute ferry ride from Motobu on mainland Okinawa, Iejima reveals itself in stages. First, Mount Tacchu emerges above the waves like a chunk of the peanut brittle for which the island is renowned. Next, the wind-blown scent of countless thousands of hibiscuses sweetens the stink of the...
BUSINESS
May 20, 2011

Auto industry agrees to adopt weekend work shifts

Automakers and auto parts makers formally agreed Thursday to operate their plants on Saturdays and Sundays and close shop on Thursdays and Fridays to help ward off the threat of blackouts during the summer, when demand for electricity is expected to peak from July to September.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / TOKYO FOOD FILE
May 20, 2011

Roppongi Nouen: Farmers' touch brings peas and quiet to Tokyo

Where does the food on our plates come from? Who grows it and how does it reach our tables? It's almost impossible to know, even when we're at home cooking for ourselves. Eating out in restaurants is a far greater leap of faith.
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel / HOTELS & RESTAURANTS
May 20, 2011

Enjoy an evening among the fireflies

The historical garden Chinzan-so is famed for its Japanese fireflies, or hotaru, and in honor of the firefly-viewing season, the Four Seasons Hotel Tokyo at Chinzan-so will offer a special Hotaru Stay Plan from May 21 through July 10.
JAPAN
May 13, 2011

Fukushima village on way to becoming ghost town

Sleepy, idyllic and dangerously irradiated, the village of Iitate is preparing to evacuate.
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel
May 8, 2011

Pedal-power pleasures on Kansai's byways

Spring is the perfect season to explore Kansai by bicycle. Going with the flow along largely flat cycle routes beside the Yodo, Katsura and Kizu rivers, it's possible to chart a comfortable six-day trip — or, in my case, a rather challenging four-day one — between the cities of Osaka, Kyoto and Nara....
Japan Times
BUSINESS
May 3, 2011

Blackout fears lift battery demand

What happens when the power goes out during a sizzling summer without warning?
LIFE / Digital / Japan Pulse
May 2, 2011

Hacking for a safer world

The mother of invention is alive and well at Tokyo Hackerspace.
JAPAN / Media / BIG IN JAPAN
May 1, 2011

Tabloids warn of major quake beneath Tokyo

Now that northeast Japan is gradually shifting into recovery mode and the Fukushima nuclear plant crisis is becoming more manageable, new themes have been emerging in the vernacular media. One is the life expectancy of the cabinet of PM Naoto Kan.
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel
May 1, 2011

Explore Seoul's hidden heart

Just two weeks after the March 11 triple-catastrophe in Tohoku, and a mere 90 minutes after leaving Haneda Airport in Tokyo, it was almost unreal to be standing in Kimpo International Airport just outside Seoul and listening to excited Japanese tourists chatting about what and when they will eat and...
Japan Times
JAPAN
Apr 29, 2011

Evacuee mayor's community torn

Katsutaka Idogawa, the 64-year-old mayor of Futaba, Fukushima Prefecture, is standing at a crossroads.

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