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CULTURE / Art
Nov 26, 1999

Reflecting prosperity, deflecting evil

Every year in the middle of December, thousands of people flock to Tokyo's Asakusa Sensoji Temple for the annual hagoita market to buy oshie hagoita, a decorative battledore that serves as both a New Year's decoration and a good-luck charm.
JAPAN
Nov 15, 1999

Forester decries ranger shortage, U.S. whaling

Staff writer
JAPAN
Nov 15, 1999

Nissan auto mall aims to enhance buying experience

ZAMA, Kanagawa Pref. -- Nissan Motor Co. unveiled a new automotive mall here Monday, the largest of its kind in Japan, as one of its efforts to offer customers easy access to new and used cars and improve sales efficiency.
COMMUNITY
Nov 13, 1999

Goodwill ambassador delivers hope

Akasaka Prince Hotel's Crystal Palace Room was filled with billowing arcs and floating columns of peach, rose and violet balloons Nov. 9 to help celebrate the opening of the stage play "Friendship (Yujo)" and the release of "The Paradise of Angels (Tenshi no Paradaisu)," a five-volume set of children's...
JAPAN
Nov 11, 1999

Government unveils 18 trillion yen stimulus

The government unveiled an 18 trillion yen economic stimulus package Thursday that it hopes will put the economy on a full recovery track in the second half of fiscal 2000.
JAPAN
Nov 11, 1999

Economists give stimulus plan mixed reception

Staff writer
CULTURE / Music / MUSIC NOMAD
Nov 10, 1999

Soaring voice of modern Africa unifies the world music scene

Youssou N'Dour, one of Africa's (and the world's) greatest singers, makes a welcome return to Japan this month. The last time he was in Japan was for the 1994 WOMAD festival in Yokohama. World music was still on a roll back then, with some African artists such as Papa Wemba becoming genuinely "big in...
JAPAN
Nov 4, 1999

Naked minicar enters booming market

Daihatsu Motor Co. has launched a new minicar, the Naked, on the domestic market in an effort to take advantage of favorable sales of minicars, the automaker announced Thursday.
JAPAN
Nov 4, 1999

Nissan launches minivan, mulls minicar entry

In a move designed to tap into the current popularity of multipurpose vehicles in Japan's domestic market, Nissan Motor Co. on Thursday introduced the Bassara minivan.
EDITORIALS
Nov 2, 1999

An unconvincing debut

The extraordinary Diet session that convened last Friday is the first parliamentary sitting since the tripartite coalition administration of Prime Minister Keizo Obuchi was launched about a month ago. The public's main concern is with what Mr. Obuchi is trying to accomplish under the expanded coalition...
CULTURE / Art
Oct 30, 1999

New angles on contemporary art

One of the foremost exhibitions of contemporary art in Japan, the International Contemporary Art Festival, will be held at the Tokyo International Forum Nov. 3-7.
CULTURE / Books
Oct 26, 1999

This 'East Wind' blows ill

RIDING THE EAST WIND, by Otohiko Kaga. Kodansha International, 1999, pp. 518, 3,500 yen (cloth). The history of Japanese-American soldiers who fought for the United States in World War II is well-documented, but the story of an American-Japanese pilot who served in the Japanese Imperial Army remains...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Oct 26, 1999

Enjoy the neglected noh plays

DRAMATIC REPRESENTATIONS OF FILIAL PIETY: Five Noh in Translation, by Mae J. Smethurst. Cornell East Asia Series, Cornell University, Ithaca, New York, 1998, pp. 172, unpriced. Most Western writings on noh have been concerned with that category known as "mugenno," visional noh -- highly poetic, spiritually...
JAPAN
Oct 25, 1999

Nasdaq is ready to go head-to-head with Mothers

Staff writer
JAPAN
Oct 20, 1999

Tokyo Motor Show looks both to future, past

MAKUHARI, Chiba Pref. -- The 33rd Tokyo Motor Show is set to begin Saturday, bringing together automobile enthusiasts, automakers and auto parts manufacturers from around the world.
JAPAN
Oct 19, 1999

Obuchi, Rouhani discuss investment expansion

Prime Minister Keizo Obuchi and Hasan Rouhani, Iran's first deputy speaker of the Islamic Consultative Assembly, agreed Tuesday that Japanese investment in Iran should be expanded to strengthen bilateral ties.
JAPAN
Oct 13, 1999

Regional Special: KYUSHU

Reclamation project splits locals, power elite> Staff writer
LIFE / Digital / CYBERIA
Oct 13, 1999

Not just for kids anymore

I was never much of a video-game player, although I did have a brief infatuation with Missile Command. (It ended when a pal proceeded to stomp me every time we went head to head.) I must be one of the few: Video games are reckoned to be a $20 billion-a-year industry and revenues now outpace movie-ticket...
JAPAN
Oct 7, 1999

Diplomat corps offers fresh views of Japan

An exhibition of 71 photographs by foreign diplomats in Japan opened Thursday at the Printemps Department Store in Ginza, Tokyo, for a 10-day run through Oct. 16.
EDITORIALS
Oct 6, 1999

Familiar features of a new Cabinet

The reshuffled Cabinet of Prime Minister Keizo Obuchi will literally have to lead Japan into a new millennium fraught with uncertainties. Its immediate task is to solidify the nascent recovery of the long-foundering Japanese economy and put it on the path of sustained growth. To meet this demand, Mr....
CULTURE / Art
Oct 2, 1999

Winged labors of love

Bird carvings have typically been thought of as a Western art form, but Haruo Uchiyama is challenging this assumption. Even the birds that have come into contact with his carvings have been made believers.
CULTURE / Music / HOGAKU TODAY
Oct 2, 1999

New audiences for Japanese music

It takes a lot of planning and creative effort to successfully present a public concert, and hogaku is no exception.
COMMENTARY / World
Sep 28, 1999

Amnesty International fetes the Year of Child

Amnesty will stage its annual Tokyo charity concert Oct. 3 with one of Tokyo's longest-running bands, the Howling Loochie Brothers, providing music to get people up and dancing.
COMMUNITY
Sep 23, 1999

A woman on the narrow road

One might not imagine that Lesley Downer -- author of books on Basho's travels, Japan's richest family and now geisha -- started out in the culinary arena.
ENVIRONMENT / GARDENING FOR ALL
Sep 22, 1999

Borrowing scenery for a lord's lagoon

A short distance from the center of Wakayama City, on an inlet very close to the sea, is a flat piece of land called Suiken, where a well-preserved daimyo garden known as Yosui-en stands.
JAPAN
Sep 13, 1999

Taiwanese youths becoming Japan fans

Staff writer
JAPAN
Sep 9, 1999

Exhibition displays horrors of Minamata disaster

Staff writer
CULTURE / Music
Aug 31, 1999

Songs you can hum on the Pavement

The opening act at Akasaka Blitz on Aug. 24 was an earnest Danish group called Thau, who offered a thumping and searing sound reminiscent of the Meat Puppets. The audience awarded their 20-minute set with a warm and noisy ovation, prompting effusive gratitude from the band's drummer, who mentioned what...
CULTURE / Art
Aug 28, 1999

Nihonga exhibit blossoming

To be able to admire paintings by the nation's top 120 nihonga artists in the confines of a single room sounds quite remarkable. Yet when the new assembly building of Zojoji Temple in Tokyo opens its doors in the spring of 2001, the coffered ceiling of its hall will be adorned with that number of Japanese-style...
CULTURE / Art / CERAMIC SCENE
Aug 28, 1999

Fall's ceramic finds fire up auction

The summer drought of pottery exhibitions is slowly ending and the wonderful autumn season, so full of good exhibitions, is about to start. Come September, exhibitions too numerous to list will fill gallery spaces throughout Japan and pottery enthusiasts will have their hands full -- with a few good...

Longform

Professional cleaner Hirofumi Sakurai takes a moment to appreciate some photographs in a Gotanda apartment whose occupant died alone.
The last cleanup: Life and death in a lonely Japan