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Japan Times
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Feb 1, 2014

Paternity testing opens up a world of hurt for families — and family courts

The paternity test procedure can now cost as little as ¥30,000, which means it's affordable to anyone. Recently, an increasing number of Japanese men have been carrying out DNA testing on their children, usually because they suspect their wives of cheating.
Japan Times
JAPAN / Media / DARK SIDE OF THE RISING SUN
Feb 1, 2014

War against stalkers broadens its aims

If you would, dear reader, please take a moment of your time today and let Prime Minister Shinzo Abe know that you'd like him to treat Japan's stalking problem seriously. Let him know that you'd like the Diet to make real laws that would protect the women who are subject to harassment, humiliation, injury...
Reader Mail
Feb 1, 2014

Love for classical music came late

Regarding David Cozy's Jan. 19 article, "Chanelling Bronte to write a true classic," I agree with Cozy's review of Minae Mizumura's "A True Novel," except on one point. Cozy writes that Mizumura bungles her depiction of the upper class in Japan and that her citing their "snobbishness ... in their love...
Reader Mail
Feb 1, 2014

Anti-nuclear 'fad' belies the passion

Regarding the Jan. 26 AP article "Tokyo race focuses on nuke issue": I understand the strong public feeling against nuclear power that is a reaction to the 2011 Fukushima crisis.
COMMENTARY / Japan
Jan 31, 2014

Japan and China's great African game

It's no longer Western powers vying for African land and the continent's wealth as they had until the outbreak of World War I. The power struggle now is among Asian nations, most notably China and Japan.
Japan Times
JAPAN / CHUBU CONNECTION
Jan 31, 2014

Hida lacquer artisans seek successors to preserve technique

Hida Shunkei lacquer work, a traditional craft based in Hida, Gifu Prefecture, is at risk of fading away because its masters are having serious difficulty finding successors to keep it alive amid weak sales.
EDITORIALS
Jan 30, 2014

Calling Abe to account

The ruling Liberal Democratic Party and New Komeito should refrain from ramrodding their proposals through the Diet as they did with the state state secrets bill during the recent extradordinary Diet session.
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 30, 2014

Troubled Thailand is only the tip of Asia's iceberg

Thailand may offer the clearest example of how the U.S. Federal Reserve's ultralow interest rates have helped cover up deep-seated structural problems in emerging markets.Officials throughout Asia will regret ignoring the near suicidal course they're on.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Stage
Jan 29, 2014

Olé! A 'Carmen' supreme

The heroine of French composer Georges Bizet's "Carmen" is one of the most famous roles in opera, but it's also one of the most difficult of all to carry off well.
Reader Mail
Jan 29, 2014

Japan drives a dangerous road

I was disturbed but not surprised to read in the Jan. 27 front-page article "NHK chief gets with the program" that the new chairman of NHK (Japan's national broadcaster), Katsuto Momii [appointed to the position by the NHK Board of Governors after Prime Minister Shinzo Abe had packed the board], states...
COMMENTARY / Japan / SENTAKU MAGAZINE
Jan 28, 2014

Abe's deceptive rice reform

On Dec. 9 Prime Minister Shinzo Abe declared that his government has abolished the subsidy system for reductions in rice acreage, yet subsidies for growing rice as animal feed will greatly increase.
LIFE / Language / COMMUNICATION CUES
Jan 26, 2014

Asada, Takahashi book Sochi Olympic tickets

Japan's former world figure-skating champions and Olympic medallists Mao Asada and Daisuke Takahashi booked tickets to the Sochi Olympics on Dec. 23, despite their disappointing performances at the national championships over the weekend.
Japan Times
BUSINESS / YEN FOR LIVING
Jan 26, 2014

Special K: Mini-cars come of age in a maxi-world

Japanese mini-cars are becoming the norm rather than the exception.
Japan Times
JAPAN / WEDGE
Jan 26, 2014

NISA a hit with old investors, not new

NISA, short for Nippon Individual Savings Account, in which individual investors will be eligible for tax exemptions of up to five years on their financial gains, has begun this month. Banks and securities houses are rushing to promote sales campaigns to encourage individual investors to open NISA investment...
Japan Times
WORLD
Jan 26, 2014

French women defy stereotypes

Shock news: French women do get fat, they have brattish, fussy-eater children, chipped nails, they sometimes sleep on their own wearing big cotton knickers and they do mind if their husband is enjoying "cinq-a-sept" trysts with his mistress.
Japan Times
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Jan 25, 2014

Nuke issue could restore power to the regions

The LDP fears that if Morihiro Hosokawa successfully taps anti-nuclear sentiment among Tokyoites and wins the gubernatorial election, the movement could spread to areas across the country that host nuclear plants.
EDITORIALS
Jan 24, 2014

Limits of secrecy oversight panel

An expert council for Prime Minister Shinzo Abe may be able to serve as a minor check against the arbitrary application of the new state secrets law, but the the defects of the law will remain.
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 24, 2014

Francois Hollande: What became of dull Mr. Normal?

However indignant French President Francois Hollande might have been about a glossy celebrity magazine revealing the details of his affair with a French actress, the idea of sitting down and drafting his resignation was almost certainly not among them.
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 24, 2014

Pining for Lyndon Johnson, Americans got Christie

New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie's recent scandals won't impress anyone who has read of the political arm-twisting shenanigans conducted a half-century ago by U.S. President Lyndon Baines Johnson.
Japan Times
JAPAN / CHUBU CONNECTION
Jan 24, 2014

Kabuki reviews shed light on Edo theater culture

Seven compilations of acting reviews for kabuki shows performed in Nagoya during the Edo Period have been found in the storeroom of Misono-za, an old theater in the city that is under renovation.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Jan 23, 2014

Searching for hidden meaning in a Kubrick classic

I'm old enough — barely — to have seen Stanley Kubrick's horror masterpiece "The Shining" when it opened in the theaters back in 1980. My strongest memory of this tale of writer's block meets cabin-fever insanity is that my girlfriend's drink wound up in my lap the first time the twins appeared....
Japan Times
CULTURE / Stage
Jan 22, 2014

The Onodera enigma

The name of the late great Pina Bausch's acclaimed Tanztheater in the German city of Wuppertal may translate as "Dancetheater," but its works often owe more to abstract emotional action and snatched dialogue than to dance. Over in London, meanwhile, Simon McBurney's Complicite company has long been at...
Reader Mail
Jan 22, 2014

Avoiding the nuclear debate

Regarding the Jan. 17 Kyodo article "Fukushima No. 1 engineer's warning to Taiwan: Nuclear power unstable": So now we know that the government — the Liberal Democratic Party, that is — was not only clearly informed of the likelihood of a nuclear disaster but has been deliberately covering up this...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Stage
Jan 22, 2014

Komanosuke Takemoto: a rare voice of tradition

The traditional performing art of bunraku (ningyō jōruri) involves three puppeteers together operating a cast of single puppets, with a gidayū bushi to the side comprising a story-teller (tayū) and a shamisen player (shamisen- hiki) seated on a round platform (yuka).
COMMENTARY / SENTAKU MAGAZINE
Jan 21, 2014

Is the Obama administration prioritizing ties with China?

The different tones of the U.S. and Japanese reactions to China's recent establishment of an air defense identificatin zone raises the question of whether the Obama administration is prioritizing ties with Beijing.
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 20, 2014

Ambiguous fisheries law sets up in-your-face conundrum for China

The ambiguity of China's 'new' fisheries law courts conflict by setting up an in-your-face conundrum for its neighbors
Japan Times
BUSINESS / YEN FOR LIVING
Jan 20, 2014

Use it or lose it: Workers want companies to pay for paid vacations

Getting workers in Japan to take paid holidays is difficult, but that doesn't mean they don't want them.
LIFE / Language / COMMUNICATION CUES
Jan 19, 2014

Kirobo chats with astronaut in space

The first humanoid robot with speech capability to be in space made small talk with astronaut Koichi Wakata and said it had no problem with zero-gravity on the International Space Station.
JAPAN / FUKUSHIMA FILE
Jan 19, 2014

Fukushima kids' teeth to be checked for strontium-90

The Fukushima Prefecture Dental Association will spearhead efforts to determine whether children's teeth contain the radioactive isotope strontium-90 amid worries they were exposed to fallout from the triple core meltdown at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant in March 2011.
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 18, 2014

The need for a peace narrative in the Middle East

A physician-writer wonders why a common narrative of shared commercial and cultural interests cannot be developed in the Mideast like the one that Jewish and Arab business owners had in his hometown in northern Argentina a half-century ago.

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