Search - features

 
 
COMMENTARY
Mar 11, 2002

Reform takes back seat to economic values

HONOLULU -- Despite the hype, Japan's antideflation package has failed once again to impress the critics. This failure is remarkable given the international attention that has focused on the proposal, the vote of no-confidence that had been delivered by the markets and the pressure applied by the U.S....
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / TOKYO FOOD FILE
Mar 10, 2002

Il Pentito: Anyway you slice, it's real Roma

The first thing you see when you walk through the door of Il Pentito is the oven. It's a monolithic, red-brick structure, like a relic from some Industrial Revolution foundry. A massive, dominating presence, it seems to take up half the premises, an impression reinforced by the way the tables are crammed...
Japan Times
JAPAN
Feb 9, 2002

Indian director blasts the bomb

While many Indian people greeted the nuclear tests conducted by New Delhi in 1998 with enthusiasm, one Indian film director claims that nationalist fervor has blinded the Indian public toward the hideous potential of nuclear weapons.
Japan Times
Events / Events Outside Tokyo
Feb 5, 2002

Faith in a tropical Gethsemane

When the Spanish arrived in the Philippines in the 16th century, they found a lush tropical garden ripe for replanting. King Philip II had commanded his soldiers, administrators and religious zealots that there were to be no repetitions of the atrocities committed in the name of the cross throughout...
JAPAN / Science & Health / NATURAL SELECTIONS
Jan 24, 2002

What was eating away at Judea's King Herod?

Herod the Great, King of Judea, died more than 2,000 years ago, in 4 B.C. He is remembered, among other things, for ordering the Massacre of the Innocents, the systematic execution of baby boys in Bethlehem. It was an attempt, if we are to believe biblical records, to kill the newborn Jesus.
COMMUNITY
Jan 20, 2002

Japan's homogeneous diversity

More than one in 100 people residing in Japan is a foreign national -- but not all of them are immigrants or expatriates from overseas. Koreans are the largest foreign ethnic group in Japan, numbering some 635,269 persons (or 37.7 percent) of a foreign population put at around 1.7 million. Many are the...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Jan 20, 2002

Redefining the role of education in Japan

THE JAPANESE MODEL OF SCHOOLING: Comparisons with the United States, by Ryoko Tsuneyoshi. New York and London: Routledge Falmer, 2001, 219 pp., $80 (cloth) What role should schools play? Should they reflect the existing social order, or should they be active agents that set a course for social transformation?...
JAPAN
Dec 31, 2001

Japan Times Readership Survey results

More than 90 percent of respondents to The Japan Times Readership Survey conducted in July rated our paper's news coverage favorably, both domestic and foreign.
JAPAN / Media / CHANNEL SURF
Dec 30, 2001

A holiday basking in the blue glow

Depending on how you feel about the New Year's holidays and Japanese TV programming in general, the first week of the year is either the best week for TV or the worst. Most New Year's specials mimic what the average Japanese family is doing at home. Celebrities sit around in their finest holiday duds...
JAPAN / Media / CHANNEL SURF
Nov 18, 2001

Saddle up for the mystery tour

Monday night at 8 and 9:15, NHK-G will broadcast the first two parts of a six-part drama series by best-selling mystery novelist Keigo Tono, who is famous for his elaborate plot twists. Tono himself was quite surprised that NHK had picked up his novel, "Akui (Malice)," for serialization, since, according...
CULTURE / Film
Nov 14, 2001

FILMeX kicks off Sunday

Tokyo's alternative film festival, Tokyo FILMeX, returns for its sophomore year with a lineup of Asian cinema as solid as that shown at its debut. With six special screenings, 10 films in competition and two hefty retrospectives, FILMeX has a lot to offer Asian film buffs, and -- as many readers will...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Nov 4, 2001

Isabella Bird's letters from Japan

UNBEATEN TRACKS IN JAPAN: An Account of Travels in the Interior Including Visits to the Aborigines of Yezo and the Shrines of Nikko, by Isabella L. Bird. New York: ICG Muse, 2000, 1,700 yen, 342 pp. (paper) "Unbeaten Tracks in Japan" documents the journeys of Isabella Bird, an extraordinary woman for...
ENVIRONMENT / ANIMAL TRACKER
Oct 26, 2001

Lesser mole

Events
Oct 16, 2001

New museum celebrates Osaka history

OSAKA -- Universal Studios Japan, which opened in Osaka in March, draws around 1 million visitors every month, many of them from outside the prefecture.
CULTURE / Music / MUSIC NOMAD
Jul 8, 2001

Where Nas is coming from

One of the most unlikely roots music success stories of recent years has been Olu Dara's 1998 album, "In the World: From Natchez to New York." Even more surprising than the spontaneous ease with which he combined blues, folk, Afro and Caribbean styles, or his vivid, autobiographical, half-spoken words,...
CULTURE / Art
Jul 4, 2001

Korean imports offer glimpse of a subtle aesthetic

It is not often that such a rare and wonderfully varied collection is put on public view as that currently at the Seikado Bunko Art Museum. This special exhibition, from the permanent collection of the museum, is on display for the first time since 1994.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY
Jun 3, 2001

Where to find those bygone gems

If you're after antique furniture you don't have to go to Camden Lock or Jubilee market in London to find that "one-and-only" piece. There are antique shops right here full of treasures from home and abroad -- and at reasonable prices.
JAPAN / Science & Health / NATURAL SELECTIONS
May 24, 2001

Bone collectors dig into our past

Two papers published today shed light on our early evolution, though "early" is a relative term. The first describes what could've been the first species of mammal, a tiny beast that quivered in the shadows of the dinosaurs 195 million years ago. The second reports on a shift in eating habits of early...
CULTURE / TV & Streaming / CHANNEL SURF
May 13, 2001

Death and the maidens

TBS's "Sekai Fushigi Hakken," currently the longest-running quiz show on commercial TV, was also one of the first series to combine education and entertainment in a way that didn't compromise either. Whereas the previous record-holder, "Naruhodo the World," which went off the air several years ago, presented...
COMMENTARY / World
May 12, 2001

The hallucinogenic security of nuclear mushroom clouds

When former U.S. President Bill Clinton was recently in India, the story goes, he was walking along the beach one evening in a contemplative mood. Spying an object sticking out of the ground, he pulled it out, gave it a rub to see what it was and found it was a brass lamp. True to form, a genie appeared...
CULTURE / Art
May 9, 2001

An exhibition of temple treasures to rival any in the country

NARA -- Kofukuji holds a special place in Japanese history, rivaled by few other temples. Throughout its nearly 1,300 years, it has enjoyed the largess of imperial and noble patrons, been home to armies of warrior monks and been rebuilt time and again from the ashes of devastating fires.
CULTURE / Music
Apr 11, 2001

K-pop, ya don't stop

BoA Last month, 500 members of the media gathered for the debut of singer BoA at the Roppongi club Velfarre.
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Mar 27, 2001

Farewell to the rabbit hutch

THE JAPANESE DREAM HOUSE: How Technology and Tradition are Shaping New Home Design, by Azby Brown and Joseph Cali. Tokyo/New York: Kodansha International, 2001, pp. 132, profusely illustrated with Japanese-language translation insert, 6,000 yen. This big, beautiful, well-designed book tells and shows...
ENVIRONMENT / WILD WATCH
Jan 3, 2001

Asian continent in league of its own

First of three parts As the third millennium dawned, the light of the rising sun swept westward across the Pacific Ocean and the Bering Sea. It brought a gray half-light that crept slowly across the dark ice-locked wastes of northeast Asia. Farther south, the sun's fiery-orange disc rose majestically...
LIFE / Travel
Nov 29, 2000

Pilgrimage to Chiba's stone daibutsu

KYONAN, Chiba Pref. -- Finding the perfect, companionable Buddha can become an obsession. Foreigners living in Asia are often struck by this calm, enlightened face; its features contrast sharply with the figures of Western religious art and their often contrived depictions of the ecstasy of Christian...
CULTURE / Art
Nov 12, 2000

Investing in life beyond the grave

The Museum of the University of Tokyo has changed and modernized in recent years, emphasizing particularly the use of up-to-date information technology. It is no longer an ivory tower but is reaching out beyond the university community to the general public. Its exhibitions have received favorable attention...

Longform

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