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COMMENTARY / World
Jan 20, 2003

The folly of inflation targets

Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi said recently the next governor of the Bank of Japan must take aggressive action to fight deflation, giving rise to expectations of inflation targeting among government and ruling coalition officials. I doubt, however, that inflation targeting will cure deflation. In...
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 13, 2003

Britain's far right poses a rising threat

BRUSSELS -- The press in England has had a field day over the past 20 years chronicling the rise of the Continent's far right. The first chance came in the early 1980s with the emergence of France's National Front led by Jean-Marie Le Pen, a man who believes the Americans built the gas chambers in the...
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 13, 2003

Thais create Buddhist studies landmark

CHIANG MAI -- Against a background of terror, conflicts and violence worldwide, during times when consumerism and materialism have been elevated as never before on pedestals surrounded by a divine aura, a small group of modest but dedicated Thai scholars, monks and nuns have worked quietly and efficiently...
EDITORIALS
Jan 13, 2003

In the year 20, or maybe 33, A.I.

Maybe you missed it amid the noisy merriment of the New Year, but Jan. 1 marked a birthday worth observing. Twenty years ago on New Year's Day, the Internet as we know it was born, ushering in the era of the World Wide Web -- the closest humanity may ever get to a version of J.R.R. Tolkien's mythic global...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Jan 12, 2003

Art that arose from the ashes of World War II

JAPANESE PRINTS DURING THE ALLIED OCCUPATION: 1945-1952, by Lawrence Smith. London: The British Museum Press, 2002, 128 pp., 40 color and 75 black-and-white illustrations, £35 (cloth) At the end of the Pacific portion of World War II, Japan was occupied by the wartime Allies, and Gen. Douglas MacArthur,...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Jan 12, 2003

Facing economic facts, even if it hurts

STRADDLING ECONOMICS AND POLITICS: Cross-Cutting Issues in Asia, the United States, and the Global Economy, by Charles Wolf Jr. Santa Monica, CA.: Rand, 2002, 210 pp., $20 (paper) You have to give Charles Wolf credit. It takes courage to reprint articles when some of the predictions included are flat-out...
BUSINESS
Jan 10, 2003

FSA imposes operation ban on Unum Japan

The Financial Services Agency said Thursday it has ordered Unum Japan Accident Insurance Co. to halt operations for 30 days beginning Jan. 20. During the suspension, the nonlife insurance company will be banned from marketing and concluding insurance contracts.
EDITORIALS
Jan 8, 2003

Inducing banks to get on board

Japan's efforts to clean up the banking system will enter a new phase this spring when the government sets up a new body to help revive overly indebted but potentially viable borrowers. The "industrial revitalization corporation" will buy doubtful loans from creditor banks (excluding main creditor banks)...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Jan 8, 2003

Calling to the gods with a true, independent female voice

The career of composer, vocalist and dancer Makiko Sakurai has followed a unique path. She is the only woman who has been trained in shomyo -- the Buddhist liturgical chanting that dates back to the ninth century and is traditionally practiced only by males.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Jan 8, 2003

Music of the saints

Someone once said that the best way to start building a jazz collection would be to buy a couple albums from each decade that Miles Davis was recording and, after that, choose a sideman from each of these selections and buy one of his solo albums. The same could be said of John Zorn and his collaborators,...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music / FUZZY LOGIC
Jan 5, 2003

Rock 'n' roll that's as good as it gets

OK, the best album of 2002 goes to a bunch of teenage upstarts from Merseyside, England, but the place to be was underground in Japan. Veterans Shonen Knife and Guitar Wolf delivered their best albums to date, Salt Water Taffy and All Tomorrow's Party kick-started the indie-guitar revival with heart-melting...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Dec 29, 2002

Mt. Fuji observed, and revealed

FUJI: Images of Contemporary Japan, by Chris Steele-Perkins. New York: Umbrage Editions, 2001, 136 pp., 104 color plates, $45 (cloth) Ukiyo-e master Hokusai established a tradition when he traveled around Mount Fuji in the 19th century, illustrating his 36 views of the mountain. He made it the locus...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY
Dec 29, 2002

Koma Square -- a new years' tale by RK

1997-99 He woke to the sound of a prerecorded voice booming from the nationalists' minitruck rolling through their neighborhood, making the windows rattle. Shirtless on the tatami, his bare back pressed to the ribbed weave, he heard the voice as part of his dream and then part of the day, and then...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music / HIGH NOTES
Dec 25, 2002

The Pascals: "The Pascals Go"

The Pascals are a quirky collection of outstanding Japanese musicians whose tunes are penned in the spirit of the French composer Pascal Comelade.
Japan Times
LIFE / Digital / NAME OF THE GAME
Dec 19, 2002

Ride a dream wave

Kelly Slater is a real surfer -- the high-profile world champion credited with helping reform the sport's image. But "Kelly Slater's Pro Surfer," a new game for PlayStation2, Xbox, and GameCube from Activision, is not about real surfing.
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Dec 15, 2002

On the trail of a killer in ancient Kyoto

RASHOMON GATE, by I.J. Parker. St. Martin's Minotaur: New York, 2002, 336 pp., $24.95 (cloth) Scholars who pen historical mystery fiction must tread a fine line between being faithful to the materials they research and creating stories and characters that will appeal to contemporary readers. It's by...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art / CERAMIC SCENE
Dec 11, 2002

In search of the real artist-potter Ogata Kenzan

"Sensational art finds are both desired and feared: desired because they become a form of pleasure and capital; feared because they displace something or somebody. Japan has had its share of such moments."
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel / NATURE TRAVEL
Dec 8, 2002

Swiftlets threatened by bowls of soup

Entering a Borneo emporium in 1922, American missionary Elizabeth Mershon noted that "many strange and evil-smelling articles greet the eye and the nose."
EDITORIALS
Dec 5, 2002

DPJ must assess its crisis

The resignation of Mr. Yukio Hatoyama as president of the Democratic Party of Japan, just two months after his re-election, is probably the most poignant reminder yet that the nation's largest opposition party is deeply divided. On Tuesday, taking the blame for his abortive plan to forge an opposition...
CULTURE / Music / HIGH NOTES
Dec 4, 2002

Aphex Twin: "Out From Out Where"

Techno music is never short on energy, but with artists now letting their laptop algorithms call the shots, electronica often comes up dreadfully short on actual human emotion. Richard D. James (aka Aphex Twin) best displays this embrace of the cold, clinical side of the sampler. Most of his ambient...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / CLOSE-UP
Dec 1, 2002

Writer on the borderline

Haruki Murakami is Japan's most important and internationally acclaimed living writer. "Norwegian Wood," his fourth novel, has sold more than 2 million copies since it was published in 1987. His latest, "Kafka on the Shore," has sold more than 200,000 copies since its publication in September, and has...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY
Dec 1, 2002

'Mongrel' seeker after new self-understandings

"One day, people will realize they are a mongrel people with a mongrel history."
COMMUNITY
Dec 1, 2002

Essential dangling modifiers

Yuko, 38, an office worker, has keitai straps appropriate for each season -- furry ones for winter and beaded ones for summer. When the temperature changes, she adds another to her collection.
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Dec 1, 2002

A trip down Japan's garden path

THEMES IN THE HISTORY OF JAPANESE GARDEN ART, by Wybe Kuitert. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 2002, 284 pp., including 25 pp. of color plates and 72 pp. black-and-white photos, drawings and plans, $50 (cloth) LANDSCAPE GARDENING IN JAPAN, by Josiah Conder, with a foreword by Azby Brown and an...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY
Nov 24, 2002

Faking it

Fakes and copies -- the words conjure up images of brand-name goods that aren't; trademarks purloined; forged money and passports; pirated CDs, software and videos . . . and even archaeological finds that weren't as historic as they were purported to be.
LIFE / Food & Drink / BEST BAR NONE
Nov 24, 2002

Sweet remedy for the ills of a metropolis

Mishiku, to Shibuya's west, offers a variety of interesting little bars along the meandering network of back streets between Ikejiri and Sangenjaya. If one knows where to look, it is possible to find everything from chic little wine bars secreted behind unmarked doors to full-on, in-yer-face rock dives...
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Nov 23, 2002

U.S. has learned from Japan's inaction: Quayle

As the United States keeps an eye out for signs of deflation there, it has learned one lesson from Japan's battles.

Longform

Construction takes place on the Takanawa Gateway Convention Center in Tokyo, slated to open in 2025.
A boom for business tourism in Japan?