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CULTURE / Art
Oct 8, 2000

Curator takes the J-way to Stockholm

"The J-Way" sounds like another example of Japanese-English, but if you thought so, like me, you would be mistaken. It is, in fact, the title of a high-octane exhibition of over 40 Japanese artists that was held Sept. 29-Oct. 1 at the Lydmar Hotel in Stockholm.
COMMENTARY
Oct 2, 2000

Japan's ills threaten the world

Japan's Naoko Takahashi won the gold medal in the women's marathon in the Sydney Olympics Sept. 24. In winning the tough race on a difficult, up-and-down course, she established an Olympic record and became the first Japanese woman to win an Olympic marathon gold medal. She also gave Japan its first...
JAPAN / History
Sep 30, 2000

MacArthur Honor Guard to fete his exit

In March 1951, at the age of 21, U.S. soldier David Valley was ordered to immediately leave the Korean Peninsula -- where the war was raging -- and go to Tokyo to serve on the Honor Guard of Gen. Douglas MacArthur, supreme commander of the allied powers.
COMMUNITY
Sep 28, 2000

Birth of a new generation

Turn on the television or flip through any popular magazine, and you're sure to come across gyarumama (gal mamas) -- teenage moms with tanned skin, trendy clothes and towering platform shoes.
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Sep 26, 2000

Welcome return of four classics

THE IZU DANCER, by Yasunari Kawabata, translated by Edward Seidensticker. THE COUNTERFEITER; OBASUTE; THE FULL MOON, by Yasushi Inoue, translated by Leon Picon. Singapore, Boston: Tuttle Publishing, 2000, 144 pp., $14.95. Here is a new, reset quality-paperback edition of one of the staples of modern...
CULTURE / Books
Sep 26, 2000

'New Order' was an old nightmare

INDONESIA: The Long Oppression, by Geoff Simons. London: MacMillan/ N.Y.: St. Martins, 2000, 289 pp. $35. Indonesia is just beginning the long process of coming to terms with and overcoming the consequences of three decades of dictatorship under President Suharto. His New Order regime was dominated...
CULTURE / Art
Sep 24, 2000

Impressions made in paper take form

When the semioticist Roland Barthes came to Japan, he decided to do what many foreigners do, which is to base his impressions of Japan on exactly that, his impressions. His book "The Empire of Signs" is ostensibly about Japan, but the author acknowledged (with no shame) that it actually was a collection...
LIFE / Digital / SURFERSPUD
Sep 20, 2000

Harry Potter, Castles and Voodoo

www.cesnur.org/recens/potter_00.htm One of the best Harry Potter sites comes from an organization that fights censorship of modern-day culture. There's chapter-by-chapter notes for "The Goblet of Fire," the latest in the series. But most of the site is dedicated to news articles (culled from all over...
EDITORIALS
Sep 18, 2000

Kinder, gentler animal farms

It's funny how McDonald's -- the much-reviled little hamburger stand that grew -- has become the world's handiest barometer of social change. It is the standard-bearer, or more often the whipping boy, for economic and cultural globalization, with progress or regress thereto measured in degrees of "McDonaldization."...
CULTURE / Books
Sep 15, 2000

An activist Emperor, pulling the strings

HIROHITO AND THE MAKING OF MODERN JAPAN, by Herbert P. Bix. New York: HarperCollins, 2000, 800 pp, $28 (cloth). This is a blistering and persuasive reassessment of Emperor Showa's reign, debunking the various myths that have accumulated about his allegedly powerless role in Japan's prolonged period...
LIFE / Travel
Sep 14, 2000

Bruised flowers: China's hidden army of child laborers

BEIJING -- Hu Changjun was desperate to escape the poverty trap in Wuxi County in southwest China's Sichuan Province. So she couldn't believe her luck when a fellow villager named Changyan offered her work at a joint-venture factory in distant Beijing. "A joint venture means a foreign company, where...
JAPAN
Sep 13, 2000

Volume 2 of 'Harry Potter' to hit Japan stores

To the relief of more than 500,000 Japanese fans who have been eagerly awaiting its release, the Japanese translation of the second volume of the best-selling "Harry Potter" book series will hit bookstores nationwide later this week.
CULTURE / Books
Sep 5, 2000

Asia takes capitalism on its own terms

ASIAN VALUES, WESTERN DREAMS: Understanding the New Asia, by Greg Sheridan. Allen & Unwin, 1999, 326 pp., 14.99 British pounds (paper). A lot of people thought -- hoped, really -- that the Asian economic crisis would end all that nonsense about "Asian values." The region's stumbles were supposed to...
JAPAN
Sep 4, 2000

Gov. Ishihara tells troops to take heart

Tokyo Gov. Shintaro Ishihara, who led the charge for expanding the participation of Self-Defense Force troops in Sunday's disaster drill by the metropolitan government, urged SDF personnel to take pride and retain confidence as a military force.
JAPAN
Sep 2, 2000

Emperor Showa took 'active' role in war, author says

The late Emperor Showa was anything but the military-manipulated pacifist he has been portrayed as in the United States since the end of World War II.
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Aug 31, 2000

Frugality boom highlights fun and fulfillment of the simple life

As explained in this column several months ago, Japanese TV often adapts successful programming ideas from abroad. Still, I wouldn't hold my breath waiting for a local version of "Survivor." Reality-based programming is already available in Japan. Years ago, "Denpa Shonen" moved beyond such simplistic...
LIFE / Travel
Aug 30, 2000

In the realm of the accidental tourist

While there are women who work exclusively as travel writers, many women writers, journalists and novelists among them, have chosen at one time or another to temporarily commandeer the travel vehicle to get their ideas or dreams across.
CULTURE / Books
Aug 29, 2000

Captivating fragments of Southeast Asia

THE TRUTH ABOUT ANNA . . . and Other Stories, by William Warren. Archipelago Press, Singapore, 2000, 224 pp., unpriced. Most of these essays by William Warren, who has lived in Bangkok for 40 years, concern aspects of life in Thailand, about which the author has written copiously. There are also glimpses...
COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM NEW YORK
Aug 28, 2000

A revisionist's view of Japanese history

"Kokumin no Rekishi," published last year, has been touted as the first major attempt to rewrite Japanese history. I've acquired and read it because I've been asked to comment on Japanese nationalism next month, in Chicago. The author of the book, Kanji Nishio, has been prominent in the movement known...
LIFE / Digital / SURFERSPUD
Aug 23, 2000

Eye scream

lcweb.loc.gov/exhibits/treasures/uc004810.jpg Not only did the U.S. government give us the Internet, but it has posted a recipe for vanilla ice cream as well. It's actually a photo of a recipe handwritten by Thomas Jefferson, one of the architects of that government, sometime in the 1780s. Click on "Holograph...
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Aug 17, 2000

Support the economy -- take a vacation

If all you knew about Japan was what you saw on Japanese TV, you might think the Japanese are the most well-traveled citizens in the world. No other broadcast culture offers as many travel programs in which happy-go-lucky celebrity guides see the sights, interact freely with the natives and, most importantly,...
JAPAN
Aug 13, 2000

Sleaze market festers with rip-off artists

The promise is too good to be true -- all you can drink and "excellent service" provided by "companions" for 6,000 yen in Tokyo's adult entertainment central.
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Aug 8, 2000

Japan: everything and more

THE MIKADO'S EMPIRE: A History of Japan from the Mythological Age to the Meiji Era, by William Elliot Griffis. A facsimile printing of the 1895 edition. New York, Tokyo, Osaka & London: ICG Muse, Inc. 2000, 462 pp., 1,300 yen. William Elliot Griffis, educator and clergyman, first came to Japan in 1870....
CULTURE / Books
Aug 8, 2000

White guys to the rescue

OUTPOSTS OF CIVILIZATION: Race, Religion and the Formative Years of American-Japanese Relations, by Joseph M. Henning. New York and London: New York University Press, 2000, 243 pp., $35 (cloth). U.S. foreign policy has a mission. Many American politicians or diplomats would be proud rather than hesitant...
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / PERSONALITY PROFILE
Aug 6, 2000

William Currie

At the end of last year, to say goodbye to 1999 and welcome in 2000, The Foreign Correspondents' Club of Japan held "a sing-along session of songs from the good old days." Playing the piano and leading the songs was William Currie. The Press Club billed him as "the renowned singing father from Sophia...
JAPAN
Aug 5, 2000

Average Cabinet minister has 258 million yen in assets

The personal and family assets of Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori and his Cabinet at the time of the Cabinet's formation July 4 averaged 258 million yen, according to government data released on Friday.
LIFE / ALTERNATIVE LUXURIES
Aug 3, 2000

Lessons of the past inspire a future

Calligraphy by Nako Oizumi The evolution of a single human neither starts with their birth, nor stops with the end of their childhood. Each of us has been given pieces of the past by previous generations from which we make new meaning and, in turn, hand it on to the young.
EDITORIALS
Jul 30, 2000

Pulp-free fiction, at a price

"There's a fellow sitting up in Maine having fun," said one American literary agent last week, "but (what he's doing) is not a way to run a business."

Longform

Visitors to Kyoto walk along a street near Kiyomizu Temple in April. A popular tourist spot, Kyoto has seen what locals feel to be an overwhelming amount of tourists in 2024.
Is Japan ready for 60 million tourists?