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Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / TOKYO FOOD FILE
Oct 19, 2012

Ginza Okuda: Kaiseki master invites you to his second home

Autumn is the golden season. Fruit and hearty root vegetables; mushrooms, nuts and new-season rice; plentiful fish and seafood, too: This abundance is the palette from which Japan's top kaiseki chefs draw in creating their intricate, elegant multicourse meals. Few are as accomplished at the art as Toru...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Oct 19, 2012

'Argo'

OK, put down your coffee and steady yourself, because you are about to read "Ben Affleck" and "best movie of the year" in the same sentence. Yes, it's true, it wasn't so long ago — somewhere between "Pearl Harbor" and "Gigli" — that Affleck wore out his welcome as a Hollywood A-lister, and nothing...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Oct 19, 2012

Tokyo International Film Festival hits 25

This year, Tokyo International Film Festival (TIFF) celebrates its 25th edition and will hold commemorative programs, including a three-day screening of six Japanese films from the Showa Era (1926-89) in the very Showa-esque district of Nihonbashi.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music / IN THE RECORD
Oct 18, 2012

XLII

A mainstay of the Tokyo underground electronic scene and cofounder of the Raid System label/collective,
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Oct 18, 2012

"The record of personal experiences of silk, by Mariano Fortuny: 2012 editions"

Silk, admired for its texture and functionality, has been revered as a luxury fabric since ancient times. It has captivated artists and fashion designers worldwide, one of the most famous being Mariano Fortuny (1871-1949).
EDITORIALS
Oct 17, 2012

Asian universities catching up

Asian universities are gaining on their western counterparts, according to the recently released Times Higher Education rankings. The annual evaluations of world universities found Asian universities doing better than ever before in the annual global rankings. Japan had 16 universities in the top 400...
BUSINESS
Oct 17, 2012

Japan Inc. nears record year of overseas M&As

Softbank Corp.'s bid for control of Sprint Nextel Corp. is adding to evidence that Japan Inc.'s overseas buying spree isn't about to abate.
Japan Times
BUSINESS / NOTEBOOK
Oct 17, 2012

Kozo Keikaku Engineering talks; UN Day forum on sustainability; kabuki documentary

events
CULTURE / Books
Oct 14, 2012

Developing a natural aesthetic

JAPAN AND THE CULTURE OF THE FOUR SEASONS: Nature, Literature and the Arts, by Haruo Shirane. Columbia University Press, 2012. 311 pp., $29.50 (hardcover) The starting point for this illuminating study lay in the author's curiosity about the formation of the saijiki, or seasonal almanacs, that have been...
CULTURE / Books
Oct 14, 2012

Heterodox views enter mainstream

RETHINKING JAPANESE HISTORY, by Yoshihiko Amino, translated by Alan S. Christy. Center for Japanese Studies, University of Michigan, 2012. 317 pp., $20 (paper) It is a testimony to Yoshihiko Amino's influential legacy that his once iconoclastic views regarding Japanese history have now become mainstream....
Japan Times
JAPAN / Media / Japan Pulse
Oct 13, 2012

Some Japanese women crave a rougher cut of man

Nikushokukei danshi are here to save the day . . . and hopefully boost the sagging national birth rate.
BUSINESS
Oct 13, 2012

Lexus U.S. sales off target amid BMW challenge

Toyota Motor Corp. said its Lexus model, dethroned in 2011 as the best-selling luxury auto brand in the United States, may miss its U.S. sales target this year amid fierce competition from BMW AG.
Japan Times
JAPAN
Oct 12, 2012

Award-winning Born a global success

Participants from around the world attending the Annual Meetings of the International Monetary Fund and World Bank Group in Tokyo were treated to award-winning sake during a hospitality event in the glitzy Ginza shopping district on Oct. 11.
Japan Times
BASKETBALL
Oct 12, 2012

Iwate likely to emerge as power in Eastern Conference

In the rapidly changing bj-league, the Eastern Conference welcomes a pair of new franchise — the Gunma Crane Thunders and Tokyo Cinq Reves — to the fold this season, while the mighty Hamamatsu Higashimikawa Phoenix, a three-time finalist and two-time champion, shift to the Western Conference....
Events / Events Outside Tokyo
Oct 12, 2012

Tea ceremony party holds more in store than just a quick drink

Whether you're a practitioner of the Japanese tea ceremony or not, the annual Tokyo Grand Tea Ceremony abounds with opportunities for cultural enlightenment.
EDITORIALS
Oct 11, 2012

Carefully weigh firefighting reforms

The government is pushing a plan to integrate local firefighting headquarters so that each headquarters will have about 300,000 or more people under its jurisdiction. The government should consider whether this plan is appropriate in enhancing the ability to fight fires and improve disaster management...
BUSINESS
Oct 11, 2012

French banker says Europe on track

The eurozone is properly addressing the cause of its financial crisis, though weaknesses persist and challenges remain, Bank of France Gov. Christian Noyer said Wednesday in Tokyo.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Oct 11, 2012

Magical Mistakes goes all natural on new album, 'Everything Uncertain'

Shiga Prefecture-based musician Erik Luebs, who works under the moniker Magical Mistakes, wanted to record the majority of sounds on his new album, "Everything Uncertain," by himself. Save for a few vocal snippets and 808 bass drums, his newest full-length leans heavily on natural sounds from the world...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Oct 11, 2012

Taking a nostalgic train of thought

Train travel inspires nostalgia. There's no escaping it. It conjures up memories of childhood — playing beside the rail track at the bottom of the garden or with a miniature railway at home. However, politics and societal change have influenced and produced more controversial images of rail travel...
EDITORIALS
Oct 11, 2012

Proud moment for Japanese science

The Nobel Assembly at Karolinska Institutet in Stockholm on Monday announced that Dr. Shinya Yamanaka of Kyoto University will share the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 2012 with Dr. John B. Gurdon of Cambridge University. We heartily congratulate Dr. Yamanaka on winning the world's most well-known...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art / Japan Pulse
Oct 9, 2012

Today's J-blip: nezo art

Do Japanese babies dream of exotic art?
EDITORIALS
Oct 9, 2012

Diet must get to work

Although both the ruling Democratic Party of Japan and the No. 1 opposition Liberal Democratic Party have chosen their new party leaders, the ruling and opposition forces still cannot agree on when to start an extraordinary Diet session. The primary responsibility rests on Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda....
COMMUNITY / Voices / HAVE YOUR SAY
Oct 9, 2012

Call to stop dolphin hunt in Taiji makes waves

Some of the many readers' letters The Japan Times received in response to the Sept. 11 Hotline to Nagatacho column, "Stop the annual Taiji dolphin massacre, make your children proud" by Deb Bowen-Saunders:
JAPAN / Media / BIG IN JAPAN
Oct 7, 2012

Tabloids return fire, urge China business pullout

On Sept. 29, the 40th anniversary of the restoration of diplomatic relations between China and Japan, Sankei Shimbun editorial writer Ryutaro Kobayashi asked how it would be possible for Japan to continue discussions with a China that had "lost its national dignity."
CULTURE / Books
Oct 7, 2012

Exploring the garden of absolute infinities

Tenryu-Ji: Life and Spirit of a Kyoto Garden, by Norris Brock Johnson. Stone Bridge Press, 2012, 368 pp., $39.95 (hardcover) If the Western garden is bulging with organic matter, the Japanese one is animate with deities, allegory, symbolism and mythology, hinting at a greater depth, a place of divine...
CULTURE / Books
Oct 7, 2012

Seen through the victim's eye

THE STORY OF MY ASSASSINS, by Tarun J. Tejpal. Melville House, 2012, 544 pp., $27.95 (hardcover) Tarun J. Tejpal's "The Story of My Assassins" begins, "The morning I heard I'd been shot I was sitting in my office. ..."
Japan Times
BASKETBALL / ONE-ON-ONE WITH ...
Oct 6, 2012

Newton confident Ryukyu will contend for another title

The Japan Times features periodic interviews with players in the bj-league. Jeff Newton of the Ryukyu Golden Kings is the subject of this week's profile.

Longform

A man offers prayers at Hebikubo Shrine in Tokyo's Shinagawa Ward. The shrine is one of several across the country dedicated to the snake.
Shed your skin and reinvent yourself in the Year of the Snake