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COMMENTARY / World
Oct 5, 2011

Reformer for the delusional

The only vote that matters in Russia's 2012 presidential election is now in, and Prime Minister Vladimir Putin has cast it for himself. He will be returning as Russia's president next year.
Japan Times
MULTIMEDIA
Sep 29, 2011

Chim↑Pom and the art of social engagement

Most commercial art galleries in Tokyo — or anywhere in the world, for that matter — would be happy to get 100 visitors through the door in a day. Artist collective Chim↑Pom's most recent exhibition, "Real Times," which was held over six days in May at Mujin-to Production in Tokyo's Koto Ward,...
COMMENTARY
Sep 28, 2011

Let Greece default and live

Few things are as galling as being right too soon. Back in 1970, dissident Soviet historian Andrei Amalrik wrote a book boldly called "Will the Soviet Union Survive Until 1984?"
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / MIXED MATCHES
Sep 27, 2011

Jamaica coffee, music recipe for success

Yukiko Ariga, 39, a Tokyo native, visited Jamaica, where her friend was living, twice on holiday because she loved reggae music. Eventually, she decided that she wanted to do something different in her life, so she went to live and work in the Caribbean nation in 1998.
ENVIRONMENT / OUR PLANET EARTH
Sep 25, 2011

Now is the time for a 'brand Japan' that creates and inspires

On Sept. 19, just as this column hit deadline, news outlets reported that a massive demonstration was taking place in Tokyo, rallying tens of thousands of people against nuclear power.
Japan Times
BASKETBALL / HOOP SCOOP
Sep 25, 2011

Problems plague every level of game

Without drastic changes in the way it operates — and stuck with a mentality that is out of date with current reality — the Japan Basketball Association (JBA) will continue to be a deterrent to success and progress in men's and boys basketball at all levels.
Japan Times
LIFE
Sep 25, 2011

Students' skills help to forge a new Tohoku

In late July, when the students of Osaka Institute of Technology's Department of Architecture first arrived at the tiny port of Oharahama, an air of negativity hung over the conversation of the locals.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY
Sep 24, 2011

Fukuoka publisher offers discerning readers range of translated genre fiction

The Japanese publishing industry is facing a historic crisis, with total sales now only two-thirds of that in 1997 and hundreds of bookstores nationwide shutting down every year.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Sep 23, 2011

Actress Kaho Minami on speaking without words

Kaho Minami has had a busy and varied career as an actress since her 1985 debut in Kohei Oguri's "Kayako no Tameni" ("For Kayoko"). In addition to appearing in everything from commercial hits (Takashi Miike's "Yokai Daisenso [The Great Yokai War]," 2005) to films with leading indie directors (Jun Ichikawa,...
Japan Times
BUSINESS / YEN FOR LIVING
Sep 22, 2011

In Japan, you get the education you (the consumer) pay for

Why is private spending for education in Japan so much more than public spending?
Japan Times
JAPAN
Sep 22, 2011

Tohoku students share tales of disasters on global stage

Global leaders who gathered last week in Dalian, China, for the Annual Meeting of the New Champions, Asia's premier global business forum, had a rare chance to hear Japanese high school and university students' firsthand experiences of the March disasters.
Japan Times
MULTIMEDIA
Sep 22, 2011

Flattening the art world with gentle avant-gardism

The avant-garde probably never looked as moderate and conservative as it did in 1888, when a group of young, bearded French painters founded a group known as "Les Nabis." The facial hair was not incidental either, helping to give the group its moniker: "Nabi" is Hebrew for prophet; the joke being that...
Japan Times
JAPAN
Sep 20, 2011

Masses turn out to protest nuclear power

Tens of thousands of people including musicians, a Nobel laureate and Fukushima residents converged on Meiji Park in Tokyo Monday to vent their anger about the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant crisis and demand the abolition of atomic power.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY
Sep 17, 2011

American out to save boat-building art

Douglas Brooks is a man on a mission. A boat builder and craftsman originally from Connecticut, Brooks is committed to helping keep afloat the dying craft of traditional boat building in Japan.
EDITORIALS
Sep 15, 2011

Tasks set for Mr. Noda

Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda in his first policy speech before the Diet on Sept. 13 refrained from talking about eye-catching slogans. Instead he concentrated on listing issues his Cabinet will tackle in earnest — reconstruction from the March 11 earthquake and tsunami, putting the Fukushima nuclear...
Japan Times
JAPAN
Sep 15, 2011

Iwate survivors wonder, worry about future

The coastal town of Yamada, Iwate Prefecture, used to have a railway station, cafes, restaurants and medical clinics, but all that remains now are the foundations and twisted iron support bars of buildings.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WHO'S WHO
Sep 13, 2011

Swede on mission to help Japan seniors

Gustav Strandell believes that if there is something good about his home country, Sweden, that he can bring to Japan, it's the concept and some of the technical skills of its social welfare system developed over its 100-year-plus history as an aging society.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Voices / HAVE YOUR SAY
Sep 13, 2011

The loneliness — or otherwise — of the long-distance foreigner

The Japan Times received a large number of readers' emails in response to Debito Arudou's Just Be Cause column published Aug. 2, headlined "The loneliness of the long-distance foreigner." Here, belatedly, are a selection.
Japan Times
BASEBALL / Japanese Baseball
Sep 11, 2011

Giants' Ramirez produces only run in win over Carp

Alex Ramirez did the one thing no one else could at Tokyo Dome on Saturday night.
Japan Times
CULTURE
Sep 8, 2011

True glimpses of the underworld

Cloaked in mystery and perhaps a certain degree of myth, the yakuza constitute one of the hardest subculture groups in Japan to infiltrate. But when Belgian photographer Anton Kusters and his brother, Malik, saw a gangster walk by as they were drinking at a bar in Tokyo's entertainment district of Kabukicho,...
Japan Times
LIFE / Lifestyle / Japan Pulse
Sep 8, 2011

Weekend volunteering just got easier

Been up north to lend a hand? There's still plenty left to do in Tohoku.
COMMENTARY / World
Sep 7, 2011

Taking aim at foreigners' blinkered views on doing business in China

Fraser Howie is scathing about foreigners' blinkered views, particularly those of his financial colleagues who believe they are God's gift to a reforming China. "Some of the management of these top firms genuinely believe that China is reforming and say 'we will be in there and China needs us.'
COMMENTARY / World
Sep 6, 2011

Will the IMF stand up to eurozone officials?

As the eurozone crisis continues to deepen, the International Monetary Fund may finally be acknowledging the need to reassess its approach. New Managing Director Christine Lagarde's recent call for forced recapitalization of Europe's bankrupt banking system is a good start. European officials' incensed...
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Sep 3, 2011

When people ask, 'Do you remember me?'

Believe it or not, many Japanese people go to the beach just once a year, go skiing for one day a year and have a BBQ . . . once a year! It's no wonder Western holidays such as Valentine's Day and Christmas have become so popular in Japan — they happen just one time a year! And it's no wonder that...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / LIGHT GIST
Aug 30, 2011

Mascots on a mission to explain the mundane

It is often said that the Japanese have a unique attitude towards law. Many explanations have been offered for why this is so, and in what circumstances:
BUSINESS / JAPANESE PERSPECTIVES
Aug 29, 2011

Global fiscal reactor meltdown contains a warning for Japan

Public finances are melting down in Europe, in America and of course Japan. The situation is going nuclear, left, right and center. It's not so much China Syndrome as it is Global Syndrome.
LIFE / Language
Aug 29, 2011

Japanese humor: more universally funny than you think

Japanese comedy gets a bad rap. Foreigners either knock it for being too silly and too focused on slapstick or too pun-based and difficult to understand.
Japan Times
LIFE
Aug 28, 2011

The best of his years . . .

This summer, my translator and I stood in Izumi Matsumoto's home-cum-office in Tokyo, where he had just been searching in vain for any original drawings from "Spring Wonder," which was, 27 years ago, the first manga serial he pitched to leading comics magazine Weekly Shonen Jump.

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