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JAPAN
May 31, 2008

SDF quake-relief airlift to China is ruled out

Acknowledging apprehension in China, Japan has dropped plans to send Self-Defense Forces aircraft to China to transport emergency supplies to earthquake survivors, Chief Cabinet Secretary Nobutaka Machimura said Friday.
LIFE / Food & Drink
May 30, 2008

Aged sake from distillery in Chiba packs 20 years of flavor

After the period when the aging of sake was rarist, some breweries and retailers rediscovered the genre by accident. Stock that for some reason was left over would sit forgotten or neglected in a dusty corner, only to be later rediscovered after having turned from a remaindered caterpillar to a glorious...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
May 30, 2008

TV dumbos drum up big following

As Forrest Gump said, stupid is as stupid does. And in Japan, these days, it does pretty well.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink
May 30, 2008

Good drinks for those who wait

In most sake breweries, the brewing season is over by May, a month marked by the announcement of the National New Sake Awards, the biggest public prize to which a brewer can aspire. (Those interested can taste some of the prizewinners at the National Sake Fair in Tokyo's Ikebukuro on June 11th.)
BUSINESS
May 30, 2008

Honda unveils new compact minivan

Honda Motor Co. on Thursday unveiled its new compact minivan, the Freed, aiming to gain a bigger share of a segment that remains popular amid slow domestic car sales.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
May 30, 2008

'Bakemono Moyo'/'Mukidashi Nippon'

Still only 24, Yuya Ishii has not only made four feature films in a blazingly short time, but had them screened in his own section (hard to call it a retrospective) at the 2008 Rotterdam Film Festival. Also, at this year's Hong Kong International Film Festival, he received the first Edward Yang New Talent...
JAPAN / TICAD IV
May 29, 2008

Japan vows ambitious Africa aid

YOKOHAMA — Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda kicked off a major Africa development conference Wednesday by pledging to double Japan's annual net official development assistance to the continent to $1.8 billion by 2012 and extend up to $4 billion in new yen loans over the next five years, in particular for...
Reader Mail
May 29, 2008

Zeroing in on relative Truth

In his May 25 letter, "The reconciliation of opposites," William Johnston explains that Peter Singer's May 19 article, influenced by the rationalism that has "invaded the Western world since the time of the Greeks," made him laugh because, in a word, "everything is one and not one."
JAPAN / TICAD IV
May 29, 2008

Africa making strides but still in need of help

African leaders said Wednesday that while their nations have a responsibility to fight poverty and improve the living conditions of millions on the continent, its partners, including Japan and other affluent nations, must also lend a hand.
BUSINESS
May 29, 2008

Clear Sony speaker goes tubular

Sony, the company that brought the world the egg-shaped music player and the doglike robot, has now created the transparent tube speaker.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
May 29, 2008

Cannes: sobriety and great excess

JAPAN / TICAD IV
May 29, 2008

NGOs urge greater access, and more than just cash aid at TICAD

Addressing the fourth Tokyo International Conference on African Development on Wednesday, representatives of nongovernmental organizations stressed the need for more than economic assistance.
Reader Mail
May 29, 2008

Natural greeting makes the day

On Armed Forces Network radio, iconic American newscaster/commentator Paul Harvey often says "Wash your ears out with this" before delivering a pleasant piece of news. I wonder if it is possible to "wash your eyes out" in the same manner. I'm quite tired of the diatribes in The Japan Times recently about...
Japan Times
JAPAN / ALSO OUT THERE
May 29, 2008

'Anime'-decorated cars latest 'otaku' fad

They're painful. So painful that pedestrians can't help staring at them and real girls stay away from their owners.
COMMENTARY / World
May 28, 2008

Eagerly awaiting a warmer Arctic

What connects oil at $135 a barrel with last month's discovery of huge cracks in the Ward Hunt ice shelf off Ellesmere Island at the top of Canada's Arctic archipelago? And what might connect those two things with a new, even Colder War?
COMMENTARY / Japan / THE VIEW FROM NEW YORK
May 28, 2008

Behind the failure of the Japanese economy

Takafusa Shioya has sent me his book published last year, "Keizai Saisei no Joken" (Conditions for Economic Recovery). Nearly three decades ago, during a period of a few years when Jimmy Carter's presidency morphed into Ronald Reagan's, he was stationed in the New York outpost of a Japanese trade office...
Japan Times
JAPAN / AFRICA LIFELINE
May 28, 2008

Africa donors failing with financing: Sachs

The main quandary in aiding Africa is not the absence of initiatives or technology, but the "lack of adequate financing" by donor countries that fail to follow through on their commitments, U.N. adviser and economist Jeffrey Sachs said Tuesday.
Japan Times
JAPAN / AFRICA LIFELINE
May 27, 2008

Investors looking beyond raw materials to consumers

Japan and its trading houses have scrambled in recent years to court resource-rich African countries as competition has intensified with Europe and China to secure natural resources and raw materials prices have surged with the demand of rapidly growing emerging economies.
COMMENTARY
May 26, 2008

Second wind for cigarette sales

At the initiative of the Finance Ministry, the government has introduced a system to verify the age of anyone using a cigarette vending machine. But the system reportedly is not widely used.

Longform

Eme-Ima Kitchen is one of over 10,000 kodomo shokudō in Japan. A term first used in 2012 to describe makeshift eateries offering free or cheap meals to disadvantaged kids, it now refers to a diverse range of individuals, groups and organizations working to provide not only food but a sense of belonging to both children and adults.
Japan’s ‘children’s cafeterias’ are booming — but is that a good thing?