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Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Voices / HOTLINE TO NAGATACHO
Apr 16, 2013

Education: What are we paying all the money for?

Dear Minister of Education Hakubun Shimomura,
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Apr 5, 2013

'Hitchcock'

A more suitable title to this would be: "Hitch and Alma: The love story." But as Alma — the wife of cinema giant Alfred Hitchcock — complains in this fictional and wildly entertaining account of Hitchcock's private life, no one pays her any attention because "all they can see is the great and glorious...
Japan Times
WORLD
Mar 30, 2013

What sculpture reveals about sex and the Romans

Nothing is more likely to inspire us to see for ourselves than a warning about the effects of looking. Take the media interest this month when it was revealed that the British Museum's exhibition, "Life and Death in Pompeii and Herculaneum," is to include a "parental guidance" notice. The reason? An...
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel
Mar 24, 2013

Abashiri astounds with its ice and convict connections

In April 1890, the Japanese government shipped more than 1,200 political prisoners from all over the country, including samurai insurgents from the 1877 Satsuma Rebellion against the government of Emperor Meiji. Nine years before, more than 250 years of rule by the Tokugawa shoguns had finally ended....
Japan Times
LIFE / WEEK 3
Mar 17, 2013

Ghosts of Cowra breakout haunt Japan to this day

Prisoner A: " 'Never live to experience the shame of being taken prisoner by the enemy' ... that's what the Imperial Japanese Military Regulations say, hence there must be no prisoners. So what's happening here now are the dreams of ghosts" — from "Cowra no Hancho Kaigi" ("Honchos' Meeting in Cowra")....
Japan Times
WORLD
Mar 16, 2013

The Facebook executive on a self-help mission

Sheryl Sandberg does not do things by half-measures. So when the chief operating officer of Facebook and the most high-profile businesswoman in the world publishes a book she does not sit back, give a few interviews and let the glowing reviews flow in. No, Sandberg tries to start a fully fledged social...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WHEN EAST MARRIES WEST
Mar 16, 2013

Cheering for cherries

If the Grinch — that well-known wet blanket of holiday mirth — were both a betting man and Japanese, it wouldn't be Christmas he was after. Nor New Year's, nor the Emperor's birthday, nor Golden Week, nor National Toilet Day (Nov. 10. Mark it down).
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE FOREIGN ELEMENT
Mar 12, 2013

Right or wrong, corporal punishment can produce winners

It was shaping up to be just another day at practice. The high school's head basketball coach, who was young and still trying to establish himself, was picking on the captain of the once-famous girls' team, jumping on her every mistake and yelling at the top of his voice to make his point.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Mar 10, 2013

Filmmaker captures the 3/11 stress of Tohoku's deaf

Nobuko Kikuchi, a 72-year-old resident of Iwanuma, Miyagi Prefecture, couldn't hear the emergency sirens that followed the 9.0-magnitude earthquake that struck on March 11, 2011.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Books
Mar 10, 2013

An economist's guide to romance

THE ROMANTIC ECONOMIST, by William Nicolson. Short Books, 2013, 304 pp., £12 (hardcover)
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Mar 6, 2013

As Abe leans toward TPP, car, insurance sacrifices possible

With Prime Minister Shinzo Abe determined to join negotiations for the Trans-Pacific Partnership free-trade pact, the focus has now shifted to how much deregulation Tokyo would have to sacrifice to Washington in the automobile and insurance sectors in exchange for the protection of Japan's politically...
COMMENTARY / World
Mar 4, 2013

Exiting a wounded church

Roman Catholics pray that the Holy Spirit will cut through all the politicking by cardinals and light upon a pope who can rescue a wounded church.
JAPAN / Media / CHANNEL SURF
Mar 3, 2013

Re-creating Reiko Ohara; Tragic tsunami elementary school; CM of the week: Elleair

Reiko Ohara died in 2009 after a long illness and an even longer time out of the public eye. In the 1970s and '80s, she was one of the busiest and most respected actresses in Japan. On Wednesday, TV Tokyo is presenting a two-hour drama about her life, "Joyu Reiko: Hono no yo ni" ("Actress Reiko: Like...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / CLOSE-UP
Mar 3, 2013

Japanese women strive to empower themselves

When it comes to gender equality, Japan has never failed to disappoint.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / CLOSE-UP
Mar 3, 2013

Maco Yoshioka: Battling the postpartum blues

Maco Yoshioka is the founder of Madre Bonita, a nonprofit group that offers postpartum fitness programs for women using elastic exercise balls. Yoshioka, 40, who studied sports physiology at the University of Tokyo, says she became aware of physical and mental difficulties for new mothers when, in the...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Books
Mar 3, 2013

A native son's grim account of hard-luck lives

DETROIT: An American Autopsy, by Charlie LeDuff. Penguin Press, 2013, 286 pp., $27.95 (hardcover)
Japan Times
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Feb 28, 2013

The long arm of the antipiracy law

Captured half a world away, off the coast of Oman in the Indian Ocean, four Somalis are sent to Tokyo to stand trial for piracy after a failed attempt to hijack an oil tanker. Three have already been convicted by the Tokyo District Court.
COMMENTARY / Japan / SENTAKU MAGAZINE
Feb 26, 2013

Who'll repair Japan's roads?

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's grandiose plan to reinforce the nation's infrastructure could end up being a pie in the sky unless more attention is paid to details.
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT / OUR PLANET EARTH
Feb 24, 2013

One former student's inspiring path to success

Seeing fewer years ahead and more behind me as a teacher, I often think back over the students who have passed through my classrooms and wonder how many will truly make a difference in the world.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WHEN EAST MARRIES WEST
Feb 23, 2013

Driving me crazy

Next to my house lies a carpet of land not flat enough to resist puddles and not sandy enough to attract cats.
Japan Times
LIFE / LABOR PAINS
Feb 19, 2013

Teachers are workers, not martyrs: the severance scandal that isn't

'Teachers quitting before graduation?!' the headlines screamed as we headed into the new year.
Japan Times
WORLD / Society
Feb 18, 2013

'Interruptions' gives form to invisible immigrants

As senators opened the immigration reform debate with a hearing Wednesday morning, spectral sentinels last seen in the Hollywood Hills and on Rodeo Drive began appearing on Capitol Hill.
Japan Times
JAPAN / INTERPRETATION & TRANSLATION
Feb 18, 2013

Making a living using foreign language skills

What would it be like to make a living using foreign language skills as a freelance professional? Missa Takahashi, an interpreter and translator of English, French and Italian, shares how she established her career, expanded her work and deepened her understanding of language and culture.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Books
Feb 17, 2013

Vibrant novel offers rich pleasures

UNEXPECTED LESSONS IN LOVE, by Bernardine Bishop. John Murray, 2013, 378 pp., £16.99 (hardcover)
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel
Feb 17, 2013

Warm memories of an Aizu winterlude

It starts to snow soon after the train leaves Koriyama, and further inland at Aizu Wakamatsu the snow is knee deep. My hosts, Nobuyuki and Mikiko, are waiting at the station. I'm relieved to see they've brought boots for me.
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT
Feb 16, 2013

War on the seabed: the Hebridean shellfishing battle

The problem with bottom-trawling is that it lacks discrimination. The gear plows through the seabed, taking or breaking nearly everything in its path.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives
Feb 8, 2013

Founder of TIS makes creativity cornerstone of school's curriculum

Patrick Newell, 47, founder of Tokyo International School, calls himself a “learning activist,” a zealot on the frontlines of learning.

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