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Japan Times
WORLD / Society
Sep 29, 2013

Nontraditional college students juggle work, kids, bills with coursework

When President Barack Obama talks about the cost of higher education, his mentions of "college students" might often evoke images of teenagers who spent their senior years of high school searching for the four-year institution that best matched their personalities, then enrolled and moved into the dorms...
Japan Times
WORLD / Society
Sep 29, 2013

Tattoos make inroads with 50 and older crowd

Thirty years ago, a good girl didn't walk into an establishment plastered with images of dragons and flames, hike her shirt up over one shoulder and let her body be injected with ink. Especially not if she was, like Darlene Nash, a 57-year-old grandmother.
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Sep 29, 2013

Abe's overture to Wall Street lost in translation

Something was definitely lost in translation when Shinzo Abe spoke in New York on Thursday. First, Japan's self-described reformist prime minister raised the specter of Gordon Gekko, the greed-is-good villain of Oliver Stone's 1987 film "Wall Street." Speaking at the New York Stock Exchange no less,...
COMMENTARY / World
Sep 29, 2013

Best, brightest and least productive?

Financial traders and speculators help to allocate society's resources to the most promising businesses. But these people's activities also impose costs on the rest of us.
Japan Times
JAPAN / EMBASSY AVENUE
Sep 29, 2013

Estrada honors Rizal at Hibiya Park, Tokyo

Former Philippine President Joseph Estrada attended a wreath-laying ceremony for Dr. Jose Rizal (1861-1896), the father of Philippine independence, at Hibiya Park in Tokyo on Sept. 27, during his visit to Japan.
Japan Times
LIFE
Sep 28, 2013

Camera artist casts new light on Jomon millennia

The Jomon Period of Japanese history is so shrouded in the mists of time that any bid to fathom its secrets stretches even the usual bounds of prehistoric archeology. Yet as amateurs and experts alike have continued unearthing examples of Jomon pottery and stone tools for more than a century, the pieces of the puzzle are gradually coming together.
Japan Times
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Sep 28, 2013

Casinos bet on success in Tokyo

Most of the Olympics-related news reported since Tokyo won the right to host the 2020 Games is about projected economic benefits and drawbacks. A lot of construction will take place over the next seven years, but not all of it will be directly related to the sporting event.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Books
Sep 28, 2013

New survey of art fosters discussion

It goes without saying that giving a book the title "100 Works of Art That Will Define Our Age" is a hostage to fortune. We lack the necessary perspective when it comes to judging what it is about our time that is most important or representative culture-wise, for which reason the work of drawing up...
Reader Mail
Sep 28, 2013

Keep tabs on Lake Biwa water

It was with great distress that I read the Sept. 19 Kyodo article "Cesium-tainted wood chips found near (Lake) Biwa."
COMMENTARY / COUNTERPOINT
Sep 28, 2013

Japan and Korea: Reconciliation and redress for wrongs remain elusive

On the eve of the International Olympic Committee's decision to award the 2020 Summer Games to Tokyo, Seoul's abrupt import ban on all fisheries products from Fukushima and seven other Japanese prefectures was clearly a response to public concerns about radiation spewing into the ocean.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Books
Sep 28, 2013

Biography of Masaoka Shiki excels in the expanded details

Haiku, the short Japanese poem now proliferating overseas, scarcely needs an introduction anymore. Its three great pillars, widely read even in translation, are the poets Matsuo Basho (1641-1694), its first creator, then Yosa Buson (1716-1784) and Kobayashi Issa (1763-1828), who renewed it.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives
Sep 27, 2013

Dutch banker turned writer finds a home and inspiration in Japan

The first taxi driver really didn't have a clue, going as far as to suggest that the address given him was a fabrication. The second driver, with the aid of a car navigation device, had more luck in finding the Fukuoka apartment of Dutch writer Hans Brinckmann.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Sep 27, 2013

FYI: Agricultural World Heritage status

After our 3,776-meter-tall friend Fuji-san won the coveted UNESCO World Heritage status this year, many people are wondering what site will win the status next? Only one Japanese site per year can be nominated for the award, and recent reports have said the government is considering a steel works, a...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Sep 26, 2013

Suede plays it anew with 'Bloodsports' album

Ten years ago, Suede was in the process of fizzling out to a backdrop of apathy. For a band whose initial brilliance inadvertently help kick-start Britpop in the 1990s, it all seemed unedifying.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / JAPANESE KITCHEN
Sep 26, 2013

Japan's secret love of a breakfast loaf

Japan is generally regarded as being a rice-based food culture. However, bread — or pan in Japanese, derived from the Portuguese word pu00e3o — is eaten almost as widely.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Sep 25, 2013

'Tokyo Art Meeting: Bunny Smash — Design to Touch the World'

As part of the Tokyo Culture Creation Project, this exhibition focuses on how expressions in contemporary art and design can inspire each other and society. It spotlights 21 groups of artists, designers and architects from around the globe, all of whom create works inspired by the information-saturated...
Japan Times
JAPAN
Sep 25, 2013

Students offer practical ideas to boost tourism

Creating a credit-card friendly market, providing round-the-clock public transportation and supporting travelers in multiple languages would go a long way toward increasing overseas visitors to Japan, international students advised the tourism ministry Wednesday.
COMMUNITY / Voices / HOTLINE TO NAGATACHO
Sep 23, 2013

Why are so many Nepalese in Japan taking their own lives?

Dear Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, Minister of Education Hakubun Shimomura and Minister of Health, Labor and Welfare Norihisa Tamura,
Japan Times
ASIA PACIFIC / Crime & Legal
Sep 22, 2013

Bo sentenced to life in prison over corruption

Ousted Chinese Communist Party heavyweight Bo Xilai gets life in prison for corruption, embezzlement and abuse of power as the fallen star's heavily publicized trial concludes.
COMMENTARY / World
Sep 22, 2013

Will financial rumors spark crisis for developing states?

Already, the so-called emerging markets have been badly hit by the rumors of the U.S. Fed tapering $85 billion a month in asset purchases.
Japan Times
WORLD / Crime & Legal / FOCUS
Sep 22, 2013

Alexis was atypical Buddhist

Aaron Alexis had a gold Buddha in his room, a regular meditation practice and a gun with him "at all times," according to a friend.
COMMENTARY / COUNTERPOINT
Sep 21, 2013

Rokkasho: nuclear white elephant or yen sucking black hole?

As one approaches Rokkasho, a small town of 11,000 on the remote, windswept coast of Aomori Prefecture at the very north of Japan's main island, Honshu, one sees dozens of power-generating windmills spinning away. Aside from this ambitious renewable energy project, Rokkasho also is the site for a national...
Reader Mail
Sep 21, 2013

Are Japanese minds closing?

Japan's science and technology universities, including all engineering departments, should heed what the president of Shiga University, Takamitsu Sawa, had to say about the critical link between innovations in manufacturing and the humanities. Creativity takes inspiration from the heart as well as the...
Japan Times
WORLD
Sep 21, 2013

Savvy pope wooing the Catholic middle

On Thursday, Pope Francis said in a historic interview that the Catholic Church talks too much about abortion. The following day, he gave his most forceful anti-abortion comments to date. What's the strategy here?
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Sep 19, 2013

Finding forgiveness: Japan reworks a Western classic

Clint Eastwood's 1992 Academy Award winner “Unforgiven” has undergone a Japanese remake. “Yurusarezaru Mono” is loyal to Eastwood's classic Western but adds a pulsating core of Japanese-ness.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Sep 18, 2013

'Arakawa Africa 4'

Although the Arakawa district of Tokyo and Africa are thousands of kilometers apart, the two locations do, perhaps surprisingly, share some commonalities in their culture and landscape.
Japan Times
BUSINESS / Economy
Sep 18, 2013

Vacant homes highlight hole in 'Abenomics'

Pieces of broken wood dangle and sway like autumn leaves from the window frames of vacant homes in the Inariyato district in Yokosuka, Kanagawa Prefecture, where taped-over mailbox slots tell a story of abandonment.
Japan Times
WORLD / Crime & Legal / FOCUS
Sep 18, 2013

For world, U.S. gun violence is new norm

Jimmy Davis, a 41-year-old London disc jockey, was saddened when he heard about the latest mass shooting in the United States. But like much of the world after the attack Monday at Washington's Navy Yard, he was no longer shocked.

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