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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
May 22, 2011

One of a kind: Bob Dylan at 70

Bob Dylan, the single most important artist in the history of popular music, will be 70 years old on Tuesday, May 24.
Japan Times
LIFE
May 22, 2011

Up close and personal: Why Dylan is so big in Japan

It was the fall of 1963, when — in what seemed like a flash of lightning — I became a fan of Bob Dylan the moment I heard "Blowin' in the Wind" on the radio. I was in my first year of high school.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
May 19, 2011

8otto lively up themselves again

Osaka's 8otto have a new album, a new label and a new mindset.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY
May 17, 2011

Dutch architect making a difference

Right after the earthquake hit northeast Japan on March 11, the small Pacific coastal town of Yamada, Iwate Prefecture, was almost wiped out by the massive tsunami. Hundreds of its residents were killed, while many of the survivors lost family members, their houses and jobs.
COMMENTARY / World
May 16, 2011

Bin Laden bled U.S. of a cool trillion

Osama bin Laden must be laughing from his watery grave. In announcing a new policy of "bleeding America to the point of bankruptcy," he mockingly declared in a 2004 video that "It is easy for us to provoke and bait. ... All that we have to do is to send two mujaheddin ... to raise a raise a piece of...
JAPAN / WEEK 3
May 15, 2011

Author's fiction turns horribly real

The Pacific Ocean a few kilometers off the coast of a city in the Tokai region of central Honshu turns white. Hundreds of curious holidaymakers caught in a traffic jam on the seaside road get out of their cars and jump up onto the sea wall for a better view of the strange sight — only to realize that...
COMMENTARY / World
May 12, 2011

Food fears return to haunt developing world

Lack of food is rarely the reason that people go hungry. The world today produces enough food to feed everyone. The problem is that more and more people simply cannot afford to buy the food they need. Even before the recent food-price increases, a billion people were suffering from chronic hunger, while...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
May 12, 2011

The Cherry Coke$

Fuji Rock 2005 was a very memorable weekend for Celtic-punk-inspired act The Cherry Coke$. The Tokyo septet were invited to the popular summer outing to showcase cuts from their 2004 "Beer My Friends" debut on the festival's Rookie A Go-Go stage. While there, they also had the opportunity to watch and...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
May 12, 2011

Go! Team hope to rock Japan in a good way

"People are scaredy-cats, aren't they?" laughs Ian Parton, founder of British cut-and-paste kitsch-pop outfit The Go! Team, when told that many Western bands have canceled their Japan tours in the wake of March's radiation-tinged triple disaster in the Tohoku region.
OLYMPICS
May 5, 2011

The least that East Asians can do to cooperate

As China continues its unremitting rise, people throughout East Asia are wondering whether their states will ever be able to achieve the peaceful, stable relations that now characterize Europe. Given the regularity of serious diplomatic spats — over everything from tiny atolls in the South China Sea...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE ZEIT GIST
May 3, 2011

It's innovate or die in today's mad mag world

In few countries are the most vital political, economic and cultural activities as geographically concentrated as in Japan. All the main institutions can be found in Tokyo — one can only shudder to think what will happen not only to this city, but to the whole country if and when a massive earthquake...
EDITORIALS
May 3, 2011

Mental care for children

Many schools in areas devastated by the March 11 earthquake and tsunami have started the new school year. Some schools, though, have no choice except to begin classes in early May because school buildings were damaged or were being used as temporary shelters for disaster survivors.
Japan Times
BASEBALL / HIT AND RUN
May 3, 2011

Ogasawara still swinging away as milestone draws near

There's little beauty in Michihiro Ogasawara's swing.
LIFE / Language / BILINGUAL
May 2, 2011

Reading between the lines of disaster vocabulary

If you chanced to visit Tokyo Electric Power Co.'s website in mid-April, you probably saw a note regarding the utility's tsunami e no taisaku (津波への対策, tsunami policy). Clearly it had been written in more innocent times. Relax, it said in effect. The policy was iron-clad. It rested on painstaking...
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
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
May 1, 2011

Tohoku charity a minefield for Japanese celebrities

One of the worst-kept secrets on television is the location of Dash Village, a remote farm that was built by the boy band Tokio in the late 1990s. It has since been maintained by the quintet as part of a running feature on their Sunday night Nihon TV variety show "Tetsuwan Dash," and in order to discourage...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY
Apr 30, 2011

Japan's oldest boxer keeps dreams of championship alive

"Champions aren't made in gyms. Champions are made from something they have deep inside them: A desire, a dream, a vision . . . . They have to have the skill and the will. But the will must be stronger than the skill."
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Apr 29, 2011

Wright, Cera get 1-up in 'Scott Pilgrim Vs. the World'

"Scott in the comics almost reminds me of Homer Simpson; you get to see what's going on in his head, and there's not much going on," says Hollywood indie poster-boy Michael Cera when asked about his role as the title character in the adrenaline-soaked action comedy "Scott Pilgrim Vs. the World."
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Apr 29, 2011

'Mr. Nobody'/'The Kids Are All Right'

Jaco Van Dormael, best known for his much-loved 1991 film "Toto the Hero," returns to the big screen in Japan after 14 years with his comeback film, "Mr. Nobody" — but all indications are he should have stayed in retirement. With "Mr. Nobody," director/screenwriter Van Dormael is indeed treading new...
JAPAN
Apr 26, 2011

First openly gay candidate wins in Tokyo ward

Openly gay candidate Taiga Ishikawa won a seat in the Toshima Ward Assembly in Tokyo in Sunday's election, marking a historic first.
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel
Apr 24, 2011

Mikura: Tokyo's island of natural wonders

Last week, while much of the metropolis continued to reel from aftershocks following the March 11 megaquake, and worries about radiation leaks from the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear reactors lurked in most people's minds, there was a part of Tokyo blissfully removed from all that madness.
EDITORIALS
Apr 24, 2011

Food first

The World Bank reported April 14 that world food prices have jumped 37 percent from a year ago. That has pushed an estimated 44 million more people into poverty. As countries around the world recover from weak economies, political instability or, like Japan, from natural disasters, a central concern...
Japan Times
BUSINESS / YEN FOR LIVING
Apr 23, 2011

Disasters kill appetite for travel during Japan's high season

The aftershocks of the March 11 quake will be strongly felt in the tourism industry come this Golden Week.

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