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Events
Apr 25, 2004

KANSAI: Who & What

30 travelers a day can win Seto bridge pass: Every tourist who crosses the Seto Ohashi Bridge will have a chance to win, via a drawing, a prepaid expressway card between April 29 and May 5.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY
Apr 24, 2004

The Catch in publishing posters, cards, calendars

Meeting Frances Koston in May 2003 after a gap of years, she presented me with a clutch of postcards bearing beautifully printed images of early hand-tinted Japanese photographs. Just last month she came up with a collection of greeting cards of century-old textile prints, again originating in Japan....
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / BEST BAR NONE
Apr 23, 2004

Jazz retreat for night and day

Volontaire is a soothing retreat for jazz lovers that has stood its ground for the last three decades in Harajuku -- a neighborhood where bars change like the season's fashions. In Yuri Sakanoue's 27 years behind the counter, she has seen them all come and go. Unmoved, she has steadfastly maintained...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Apr 21, 2004

Artist and model, framed

The girl with a pearl earring, whoever she may be, is safely at home in the Netherlands. There, she's the centerpiece of the Mauritshuis collection in The Hague, although her identity is as much of a mystery as ever -- art history favored one of Vermeer's daughters, until Tracey Chevalier wrote her best-selling...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE ZEIT GIST
Apr 20, 2004

The green machine

Throughout the first half of the 20th century, "Nakano spy school" turned out thousands of spies, propaganda chiefs and commandos to serve in the furthest corners of Asia during the Pacific War.
Japan Times
Features
Apr 18, 2004

Hanging by a thread

Spurned by many top Japanese designers, patchy in quality and sprawling over a month at a mishmash of venues, the twice-yearly Tokyo Collections -- whose fall/winter 2004/05 shows end this week -- still lay claim to being the highpoints of Asia's fashion year. But are Tokyo's days numbered as the `Paris...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Apr 11, 2004

Stereolab

With their Francophone vocalist and doctrinaire allegiance to analog synthesizers, Stereolab tread a fine line between arty brilliance and frothy silliness. The Marxist proselytizers who emerged on their early albums have evolved into lounge aesthetes who still know a rock tune when they play it. Tim...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Apr 11, 2004

On a High with Teens

Friday, March 19: There's an explosion of noise and color in the heart of the Ten-jin district in Fukuoka City and the locals don't know what has hit them.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / VINELAND
Apr 9, 2004

A glass act that's proved hard to follow

A brief stint as an apprentice glassblower on Sado Island in the late '80s left me with a great appreciation of the aesthetics of a well-made wineglass. The weight, the balance, the cut of the lip, the curve and thinness of the bowl -- and the subtle ring after a toast -- are all factors that, when they...
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE ZEIT GIST
Apr 6, 2004

Otaku proud of it

I wouldn't be offended if someone called me an otaku," says Koichi Nakayasu, ". . . because I am."
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Apr 4, 2004

Oppressive flag of Pan Asian liberation

TENSIONS OF EMPIRE: Japan and Southeast Asia in the Colonial & Post-Colonial World, by Ken'ichi Goto. Ohio University Press, 2003, 349 pp., $24.95 (paper). The media has devoted considerable coverage to the Dr. Feelgoods of Japanese history who have vainly struggled to assert a vindicating and exonerating...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / CLOSE-UP
Apr 4, 2004

Robert Whiting: Outside the box

Back in 1972, a 30-year-old New Jersey native who had recently graduated from Tokyo's Sophia University was in New York City, trying to talk to anyone who would listen about politics and life in Japan. Nobody was interested.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Mar 31, 2004

It's a wonderful dog's life

Quill Rating: * * * 1/2 (out of 5) Director: Yoichi Sai Running time: 100 minutes Language: Japanese Currently showing [See Japan Times movie listings] Now Yoichi Sai directs a dog movie for kids? This is the guy who made "Tsuki wa Docchi ni Deteiru (All Under the Moon)," a picaresque...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Mar 28, 2004

Zen and the art of Beatnik haiku

JACK KEROUAC: Book of Haikus, edited and with an Introduction by Regina Weinreich. Penguin USA, 2003, 240 pp., $13.00 (paper). Jack Kerouac (1922-69), the King of the Beats, started writing haiku with the belief that this short poetic form was an avatar of Zen, and he pursued both haiku and Zen to his...
JAPAN
Mar 26, 2004

Ex-LTCB execs to pay damages

The Tokyo District Court on Thursday ordered two former executives of the failed Long-Term Credit Bank of Japan to pay damages of 1.1 billion yen in connection with irrecoverable loans extended by the bank during the bubble economy period.
BUSINESS
Mar 16, 2004

Koizumi aims to maintain 1 trillion yen subsidy cut in 2005

Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi will retain 1 trillion yen in cuts in national subsidies for fiscal 2005, government sources said.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Mar 14, 2004

The evening still young for Rickie Lee

In the CD booklet of her new album, Ani DiFranco says that "art is activism" and therefore it's pointless to try and distinguish them in terms of their effect on each other. But political engagement can often have a stultifying effect on an artist's work. It's easy to fall back on platitudes when trying...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art / CERAMIC SCENE
Mar 10, 2004

Hold your breath and turn the wheel

Kyoto. The name conjures up images of courtly nobles and stoic Zen temples -- and yet so much more of Japan's cultural identity was born in that ancient city. In the world of ceramics, one of its glorious contributions has been Kyo-yaki, or Kyoto pottery.
JAPAN
Mar 10, 2004

Cabinet OKs highway privatization plan

The Cabinet endorsed contentious legislation Tuesday aimed at privatizing the nation's four expressway corporations.
Japan Times
Features
Mar 7, 2004

Cheers! Ganging up in pursuit of fine pints

On a Friday night in Tokyo, there's no place livelier than Shibuya. But on Friday, Feb. 20, four pubs there were far busier than usual thanks to a crowd of revelers on a pub crawl called "Beer Gang" -- the inaugural event of the Good Beer Club, a newly formed group already with more than 150 members...
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Mar 5, 2004

Easy-to-play Donkey Kong, Pac-Man find new favor as gamers seek fast fix

Major video-game manufacturers are releasing new versions of old hits as users are increasingly becoming turned off by the growing complexity of the latest productions.
Japan Times
JAPAN
Mar 4, 2004

Amusement parks on white-knuckle ride

Roller coasters and merry-go-rounds at amusement parks offer people an opportunity to spice up their lives with a few thrills and spills.
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Mar 2, 2004

Railways venture down new income track

In a bid to expand their revenue sources, major railways are rushing to open a diverse range of shops and restaurants inside urban stations.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art / NEW ART SEEN
Feb 25, 2004

Discovering the bright side of the 'dark continent'

When I was young, Africa and its people were represented to me through two distinct sets of images. The first, delivered by National Geographic and other anthropological sources, were the cliched photographs of tribesmen gripping spears in their hands and bare-breasted woman balancing baskets on their...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Feb 20, 2004

Music at the heart of Kichijoji's spirit

Most of Tokyo's main business districts are inside or around the JR Yamanote Line, but Kichijoji is a notable exception, being a part of Tokyo that's beyond the city's 23 wards.
Japan Times
JAPAN
Feb 19, 2004

Housing corporations in deflation funk

An increasing number of local public housing corporations are on the brink of insolvency due to declining land prices, threatening to deal a serious blow to already fragile regional economies.
BUSINESS
Feb 17, 2004

TSE listing reflects Shinsei's return to viability

Demonstrating its successful revival, Shinsei Bank, the successor to the failed Long-Term Credit Bank of Japan, will list its shares Thursday on the Tokyo Stock Exchange.
BUSINESS
Feb 14, 2004

Car recycling law brings automakers together

A new law to promote car recycling that will take effect in January has already fueled competition and led to greater cooperation among Japanese automakers.

Longform

Visitors walk past Sou Fujimoto's Grand Ring, which has been recognized as the largest wooden structure in the world.
Can a World Expo still matter? Japan is about to find out.