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COMMENTARY / World
Jul 17, 2000

G8 must act to save forests

There are few losses more profound than a forest laid waste and vanished.
COMMENTARY / World
Jul 14, 2000

Growing Islamic tide in region heightens Singapore's vulnerability

SINGAPORE -- A red dot in a sea of green. That was how former Indonesian President B.J. Habibie, talking to a Singapore minister who was paying a courtesy call, once described Singapore's position among its bigger neighbors in Southeast Asia.
COMMUNITY
Jul 2, 2000

Noh master calling U.K. college alumni

There was some initial confusion when Naohiko Umewaka requested help in finding graduates of Royal Holloway. What was he talking about? The only Holloway known to this Londoner is the district north of the River Thames best known for the prison of the same name. Now here was a story! Japan's best known...
MORE SPORTS
Jul 1, 2000

Japan needs foreign touch: Troussier

THE HAGUE -- Japan soccer coach Philippe Troussier may not know if he's coming or going when dealing with the Japan Football Association, but when it comes to his players and the team he has no doubts whatsoever.
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Jun 27, 2000

Art, enlightenment and empire

THE IDEALS OF THE EAST, by Okakura Kakuzo. Tokyo: ICG Muse Inc., 2000, 250 pp., 1,300 yen.
JAPAN
Jun 18, 2000

Australian Rules militia invades Japan

Speak to an Englishman and football can only mean soccer. An American immediately dreams of the pigskin and the glory of the Super Bowl. For a Kiwi, of course, it's the scream of the Haka and the mighty All Blacks of Rugby Union fame. But to an Australian sports fan, the word can mean only one thing...
CULTURE / Books
Jun 14, 2000

Asian economic ills were homegrown

ASIAN ECLIPSE: Exploring the Dark Side of Business in Asia, by Michael Backman. Singapore: John Wiley and Sons, Ltd., 1999, 379 pp., $29.95 (cloth). An insightful adage states that a best friend dispenses "tough love," meaning that if one is turning into an alcoholic, the friend will withhold strong...
JAPAN
Jun 9, 2000

Ainu law fails to address grievances

ASAHIKAWA, Hokkaido — For thousands of years, Kenichi Kawamura's ancestors owned nothing but had access to everything.
JAPAN
Jun 6, 2000

Sansei documentarian brings internees' stories to Japan

Kasumi Yamashita is a nisei studying at Hitotsubashi University in suburban Tokyo on a yearlong research grant.
COMMENTARY
Jun 5, 2000

The conservative's dilemma

Traditionally American voters have been given a choice between conservatism and liberalism. The Republican Party is labeled "conservative" and the Democratic Party "liberal." In Japan before 1993, when the Liberal Democratic Party lost its monopoly on power, the choice was between conservatism and socialism....
LIFE / Travel
Jun 4, 2000

Unlikely hero fights for Mindanao

MANILA -- The potential locked up in the island of Mindanao -- in its resources, its environment and, perhaps most importantly, its people -- is just waiting to be tapped.
JAPAN
Jun 2, 2000

Official or not, English a must for Japan leaders: symposium

The proposal to make English Japan's official second language has been hotly debated over the past few months, but panelists at a recent symposium say it is Japan's leaders — not necessarily the general public — who need to master the language.
COMMENTARY / World
May 26, 2000

From Asian style to global style

"If mankind eradicates the habitat of the giant panda, then the panda ceases to exist in the wild. The IMF package is a mandate to eradicate the existing habitat of Asia's corporates." -- Russel Napier, a strategist at Credit Lyonnais Securities Asia
CULTURE / Art
May 25, 2000

Draw the bow, ride and speak the truth

You could argue that in this age, we look to movies to preserve our traditions. But it begs the chicken and egg question: Where does the filmmaker go to authenticate the details?
COMMENTARY / World
May 18, 2000

Ambivalence, hope greet Korean summit

YANJI, China -- When Eun-byol crossed the Tumen River from North Korea into China three years ago, she was nearly bald from malnutrition after subsisting on a diet of grass and bark mixed with an occasional spoonful of rice.
JAPAN
May 17, 2000

Mori's 'divine nation' remark spurs outrage

Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori on Tuesday moved to contain potential political damage after saying Monday that Japan is a "divine nation centering on the Emperor," a sentiment some compared to the nationalist fervor stoked before and during World War II.
CULTURE / Music
May 14, 2000

Japan's greatest battle in song and story

Oct. 21 this year marks the 400th anniversary of the most decisive battle in Japan's history, fought at Sekigahara near the border between Shiga and Gifu prefectures, where Tokugawa Ieyasu overcame all opposition to set the course of events for the next three centuries.
COMMENTARY
May 8, 2000

Japan drifts without goals

This last decade of the 20th century has been labeled a "lost decade" for Japan. The Heisei recession that began in May 1991 bottomed out in October 1993. In subsequent years, however, Japan's economy continued to stagnate, contrary to general expectations. A decade of economic drift has created a sense...
CULTURE / Art
May 7, 2000

Jewels of the printmaker's art

"I call these my jewels," said Joanna H. Schoff, as we bent to catch a gleam of silver in the softly lit museum. Treasures indeed, but instead of the brilliance of diamonds we were looking at far gentler beauties: rare gems of Japanese printmaking from the 1800s.
CULTURE / Books
May 2, 2000

'The gooks from Gardena' go to war

FROM PEARL HARBOR TO SAIGON: Japanese-American Soldiers and the Vietnam War, by Toshio Whelchel. London & New York: Verso, 1999, 203 pp., three maps, 12 photos, 16.20 British pounds (cloth). At last, a simple but moving book about the violent soul of America that almost any educated Japanese can...
SOCCER / World cup
Apr 23, 2000

FIFA 'insults' Japan over use of language

Staff writer
CULTURE / Art
Apr 23, 2000

Collection shows Warhol's scope

Andy Warhol's death, 13 years ago, was an ignominious one: A man who had access to the best medical care, Warhol died after a routine but botched gall bladder operation.
COMMUNITY
Apr 18, 2000

Japanese maps Mayan shamanism

As a university student in the early 1970s, little did Katsuyoshi Sanematsu know that picking up a Carlos Castaneda book would propel him on a nearly three-decade odyssey culminating in the publication this month of the first exhaustive account of Mayan shamanism by a Japanese scholar.
COMMENTARY / World
Apr 9, 2000

EU knocking down the Tower of Babel

BRUSSELS — The European Union brings together 15 states with a total population of 380 million people. Thirteen other countries have applied to join. Europeans speak some 45 different languages, of which 11 are recognized as official languages for the purposes of EU business. But millions of European...
LIFE / ALTERNATIVE LUXURIES
Apr 6, 2000

The alchemical way of self and bamboo

"The etymology of the word 'God' in English is totally different from the Japanese word kami, and has a completely different sense," says master charcoal burner Hironori Takebayashi, in his deep, laconic voice.
COMMENTARY / World
Apr 4, 2000

Rationales for new whaling weak

Whaling nations are again girding for the battle to resume industrial whaling ahead of the meeting this spring of the two bodies that could lift the international moratorium on industrial whaling -- the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species and the International Whaling Commission....
COMMUNITY
Apr 2, 2000

Europe cheese fan driving wedge into parochial taste buds

OSAKA -- It was love at first bite when Hisaji Taketomo discovered the joy of European cheese more than 20 years ago.
LIFE
Mar 30, 2000

A gathering of cultures and characters

Surrounded by trees, birdsong and a riot of cherry blossoms as you head up the hill into the nature preserve surrounding Tokurinji Temple, you can easily forget that a moment ago you were in the middle of Nagoya, one of Japan's largest cities. When you enter the temple grounds during the annual Hana...
JAPAN / Media
Mar 30, 2000

Medium is the message, no matter the language

The government's recent proposal to make English Japan's official second language has generally been met with approval. The proposal takes on quixotic overtones, however, when you consider the fact that almost no one in the government itself can actually speak English.

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