Search - features

 
 
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art / NEW ART SEEN
Jun 29, 2005

World Press prizewinning photos get to the heart of the story

Every year the Dutch-based non-profit organization World Press Photo sifts through thousands of news photographs from around the world in search of images that "represent an event, situation or issue of great journalistic importance and demonstrate an outstanding level of visual perception and creativity."...
Features
Jun 26, 2005

Learning to fly

He had been looking for someone to commit suicide with for a long time. Now that he had found the right person, Ken had traveled half the way around the world in order to carry out his plan. He was nevertheless surprised to find himself standing on a familiar-looking train platform with his hands tucked...
Japan Times
Features
Jun 26, 2005

What price is heritage?

Landmark one day, parking lot the next -- that is the fate that seems about to befall an early 20th-century stone building in the heart of historic Shimoda, Shizuoka Prefecture.
Japan Times
Features
Jun 26, 2005

A great way to start

Ever since the first edition of the monthly photojournalism magazine Days Japan was published just over a year ago, the same motto has appeared in the corner of every glossy cover: "A single photograph has the power to change the course of a nation."
Japan Times
JAPAN
Jun 25, 2005

New bullet train could be world's fastest

East Japan Railway Co. on Friday unveiled a new shinkansen in the town of Rifu, Miyagi Prefecture, that will run at a speed of 360 kph, which may make it the world's fastest train.
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel
Jun 24, 2005

A prize catch for travel merchants

First impressions of a Japanese provincial town can be so thoroughly dispiriting as to make you inclined to believe that the developer of the station area set about his task grimly determined to bring a whole new meaning to the concept of drabness. And so it is upon alighting at Omi Hachiman Station...
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT / ANIMAL TRACKER
Jun 23, 2005

Yellow-browed bunting

* Japanese name: Kimayuhojiro * Scientific name: Emberiza chrysophrys * Description: Buntings are related to finches and sparrows, but the Yellow-browed bunting -- whose Japanese name means "yellow eyebrow white cheek" -- is distinguished from them by its rather large head, brown-streaked upperparts...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Jun 22, 2005

Sacred sounds of Ainu tonkori resurrected

Keeping traditions alive is not easy; it's even harder when there is no one to teach them. When Ainu musician Oki recently re-created traditional tunes on the tonkori, the stringed instrument of the Ainu people, his only guides were pre-1970s recordings of tonkori music collected by ethnomusicologists...
BUSINESS / JAPANESE PERSPECTIVES
Jun 20, 2005

European integration a great idea, but need, motivation absent in Asia

The Netherlands followed France in rejecting the EU Constitution in a referendum earlier this month. While France has long been the driving political force behind European integration, the Netherlands has also been a key player in the integration process.
Japan Times
Features
Jun 19, 2005

Filming rough

If you are a documentary filmmaker, one surefire way to impress viewers is to expose some aspect of your chosen subject that conventional reporting chooses to ignore.
Japan Times
Features
Jun 19, 2005

Tomb raver

Teenage years are often a time of confusion. But for one 37-year-old who goes by the pen name Kajipon Maruko Zangetsu, it was a time of torment due to family problems and a majorly broken heart.
BUSINESS
Jun 17, 2005

NPA goes online to curb Net crime

The National Police Agency launched a Web site Thursday that will offer automatic answers to questions about Internet-related crimes, including online auction fraud, fraudulent online billing and so-called phishing.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / TOKYO FOOD FILE
Jun 17, 2005

Tribes: An African heart beats in Kagurazaka

Not so long ago, Kagurazaka was one of this city's most traditional neighborhoods, its alleys still echoing from the days when it was an important geisha district. Though some of its old character survives, these days it has much more of an international nature -- especially when it comes to dining out....
Japan Times
JAPAN
Jun 14, 2005

'Yafoo' site nets first 'phishing' arrest

A computer-system engineer was arrested Monday on suspicion of creating a bogus version of Yahoo Japan Corp.'s Web site to steal personal information from users of the nation's largest portal site, police said.
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Jun 12, 2005

In Japan's tabloid world, truth trumps pulp fiction

TABLOID TOKYO: 101 Tales of Sex, Crime and the Bizarre from Japan's Wild Weeklies, by Geoff Botting, Ryann Connell, Michael Hoffman and Mark Schreiber. Tokyo: Kodansha International, 2005, 255 pp., 1,400 yen (paper). Aside from the sight of middle-age Japanese businessmen happily reading comic books,...
Japan Times
Features
Jun 12, 2005

Shotengai

When sumo elder Futagoyama, the father of former grand champions Takanohana and Wakanohana, died of cancer two weeks ago, many sumo fans were deeply saddened at the loss of the charismatic, 55-year-old former ozeki. Many people prominent in varied walks of life expressed their sadness, as did members...
Japan Times
Features
Jun 12, 2005

Traders take lead in local initiatives

On a recent showery Tuesday afternoon, about 15 people assembled in a shopping district near Waseda University in Shinjuku Ward, Tokyo. When the rain eased up, they armed themselves with working gloves, waste pickers and plastic bags. Then, together, they set off on their mission to clean up the neighborhood's...
Japan Times
Features
Jun 12, 2005

Shop till you drop on the longest arcade of all

"We get a lot of oddballs here," says Yuji Nomura. "Artistic types, computer nerds, bookworms, the homeless, and those who, for whatever reason, don't feel comfortable in the crowds among the big shops in Umeda."
Japan Times
Features
Jun 12, 2005

Feast your eyes and more

When it comes to food in the Kansai region, Kyoto is not the first place that springs to mind. Kyoto folk, the saying goes, spend their money on good clothes, whereas people from Osaka spend their money on good food.
Japan Times
Features
Jun 12, 2005

Retro points to a rosy retail future

When the four floors of the Nakano Broadway shotengai opened for business in October 1966, resident retailers went for a high-class image in the hopes of attracting a wealthy clientele.
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT / ANIMAL TRACKER
Jun 9, 2005

Four-lined rat snake

* Japanese name: Shimahebi * Scientific name: Elaphe quadrivirgata * Description: Unfortunately, despite the name, this snake does not always have four lines running down its length. Often it has black lines running down a light-brown body (as in the photo), or sometimes lighter, dashed lines that...
JAPAN
Jun 4, 2005

Diet OKs use of high-tech passports

The Diet on Friday approved revisions to the Passport Law that will facilitate the introduction of a new type of passport featuring integrated circuit chips.
COMMUNITY / How-tos / LIFELINES
May 31, 2005

Residency, repairs, finance and printing

Permanent Residency You've probably addressed this question before, but if you could enlighten me once again, I'd be grateful, indeed.
COMMUNITY / COUNTERPOINT
May 29, 2005

Causes and effects can encompass far more than 'specifics'

In January 1977, an express train traveling from the Blue Mountains of New South Wales to Sydney derailed on a curve near Granville Station, 21 km west of the city. The train -- which was three minutes late when it left the last stop on its 2 1/2-hour journey -- smashed into the pillar of a bridge, killing...
Japan Times
Features
May 29, 2005

Tragedy and miracles on the same wave

COLOMBO -- In Sri Lanka, it seems everyone has a tsunami story to tell. Wherever you go, from Jaffna in the north, Tricomalee in the east, Kalutara in the west and Hambantota in the south, people recount near-miraculous escapes and tragic, life-changing episodes.
Japan Times
Features
May 29, 2005

Aftershocks in Sri Lanka

HAMBANTOTA, Sri Lanka As the sun sets on another sultry Sri Lankan day, a small crowd gathers outside tent No. 68, home of Thuwan Rashid Kaseer and his three children. The 45-year-old carpenter is well known in the southern town of Hambantota for his fine, emotion-filled voice, and this evening his song...
Japan Times
Features
May 29, 2005

Japanese NGO in unique role

KILINOCHCHI, Sri Lanka -- Eight-year-old Koushigan Sivapalasundaram's day begins at 4:30 a.m.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / BEST BAR NONE
May 27, 2005

A rock 'n' roll heart

Rock 'n' roll will never die. The sound may have mutated with each passing generation to create a variety of strains: alternative, progressive, metal, punk, noise, grunge. But it's the same 4:4 beat that drives them all and syncs our pulse to the rhythm.

Longform

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