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Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Apr 14, 2007

When life's a drag, wear a costume

Do you think Japanese people are too serious? Do you ever speak to someone in Japanese only to have them just stare back at you in confusion? Do you find living in Japan downright depressing sometimes? You may need help. You may be a gaijin.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / VINELAND
Apr 13, 2007

What the Japanese are drinking

Recent government data confirm that Japan remains a nation of beer drinkers, with beer and beer-like beverages accounting for nearly two thirds of the 9 billion liters of alcohol consumed last year.
Reader Mail
Apr 11, 2007

Not a matter of appearances

" 'Multicultural Japan' remains a pipe dream" (March 27 article) to Chris Burgess because he appears to be puffing on the wrong end of the ideological ruler that he uses to conclude that Japan is not ready for foreigners. Ready or not, they have been coming pretty steadily, and will keep coming so long...
LIFE / Language / BILINGUAL
Apr 10, 2007

Pass the pills to get me through spring's upheavals

Most things go through upheaval in spring, especially so in Japan.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE ZEIT GIST
Apr 10, 2007

Reported stalking cases likely just tip of iceberg

The day started like any other. The alarm clock rang at 7 a.m. and Laura Fitch, a Canadian then 28 years old, made her sleepy-eyed way to the shower to freshen up before brewing her first coffee of the day.
EDITORIALS
Apr 8, 2007

The annual 'hanami' rethink

Though it happens every year, cherry blossom season still functions as a vibrant experience in Japan. As the blossoms open up, somehow, so do people. Time spent walking or partying under the falling petals makes most people slow down to reconsider what is essential in life. It may be just a bunch of...
CULTURE / Books
Apr 8, 2007

Broadening the literary view of choosing a purposeful death

SUICIDAL HONOR: General Nogi and the Writings of Mori Ogai and Natsume Soseki, by Doris. G. Bargen. University of Hawaii Press, 2006, 289 pp., $42 (cloth) The name of Maresuke Nogi (1849-1912) reverberated through the world twice: when he subdued the Russian fortress at Port Arthur (Luxu) during the...
COMMENTARY / World
Apr 8, 2007

Ruing the death of Russian womanhood

SOUTH BEND, Indiana -- Valentina Tereshkova, the first female Soviet cosmonaut -- indeed, the first woman to go into space -- recently celebrated her 70th birthday. In an interview, she stated her only wish: to fly to Mars, even with a one-way ticket. It was an implicit wish for a spectacular form of...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / PERSONALITY PROFILE
Apr 7, 2007

Pamela Bodle

The Yokohama International Women's Club is holding its 52nd Azalea Tea from 10:30 a.m. on April 19 at the Hotel New Grand Yokohama.
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Apr 6, 2007

Fast-food binge continues to take Japan

After years of staying slim on a humble diet of fish, vegetables and rice, Japanese are developing a sweet tooth. That's proving a business opportunity for Krispy Kreme and other chains from the U.S., a nation famous for knowing a thing or two about fattening food.
Events / Events Outside Tokyo
Apr 6, 2007

Film festival marks genocide

Seven films, six of them unreleased in Japan and all of them shot in Rwanda, will be screened as part of the Memories of Rwanda Film Festival, taking place April 7-20 at Uplink Factory in Shibuya, Tokyo. The festival's program aims to inform viewers about how the 100-day-long genocide, which took the...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE ZEIT GIST
Apr 3, 2007

Veggies of the world unite

Yakitori, "donburi," "shabu shabu." Pig feet, cow tongue, whale bacon. Even salads in Japan are usually topped with chicken, wee fishies or eggs.
Japan Times
LIFE
Apr 1, 2007

Drawing on experience

Cartoonists in Japan are as abundant as the cherry blossoms at this time of year -- but Rieko Saibara is probably the only one who has both a lyrical and rebellious side to her work -- along with an astonishing power and what has been called a "lethal poison.''
COMMENTARY / COUNTERPOINT
Apr 1, 2007

Words to win hearts and minds the Japanese way

Over the years, the Japanese language has been called many things: inscrutably ambiguous, frustratingly vague and positively untranslatable.
BUSINESS
Mar 30, 2007

Sapporo investors approve poison pill

Sapporo Holdings Ltd. shareholders Thursday voted two-thirds in favor of the company's proposed takeover defense measures.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Mar 29, 2007

Magnum's 60 years of Tokyo

Known for its independent stance on photography, the agency Magnum Photos has been home to some of the world's most prominent photojournalists, starting with its legendary founders, Robert Capa, Henri Cartier Bresson, David Seymour and George Rodger.
Japan Times
LIFE / Digital
Mar 28, 2007

'Splume' -- Japan gets its own world of avatars

Judging by Newton's Third Law of Motion the great English scientist really must have gazed into a crystal ball and seen the Japan of today. His famous law states that for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. For every anonymous concrete apartment block and crisp white shirt locked in...
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE ZEIT GIST
Mar 27, 2007

'Multicultural Japan' remains a pipe dream

In February, education minister Bunmei Ibuki called Japan "an extremely homogenous country." Eighteen months earlier, now Foreign Minister Taro Aso described Japan as having "one nation, one civilization, one language, one culture, and one race." What was notable about these comments is that they were...
COMMENTARY
Mar 27, 2007

A Japanese sense of humor?

Japanese and Germans are thought by some "Anglo-Saxons" to have many similar qualities, including a lack of a sense of humor and a tendency to take themselves too seriously. I don't think the former is fair; the latter is closer to the mark.
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Mar 25, 2007

The fanned flames of fashion

Japanese Schoolgirl Inferno: Tokyo Teen Fashion Subculture Handbook, by Patrick Macias and Izumi Evers, illustrations by Kazumi Nonaka. San Francisco: Chronicle Books, 2007, 148 pp., profusely illustrated, $16.95 (paper) Fashionable clothing on young women is often seen as an indication of the state...
CULTURE / Books
Mar 25, 2007

Traveling light at heart, heavy in mind

JAPANESE FOR TRAVELLERS: A Journey Through Modern Japan, by Katie Kitamura. Penguin, 258 pp., 2006, £7.99 (paper) When Katie Kitamura's parents left Japan for the United States they left behind three different generations: Katie's cousins, her aunts and uncles, and her grandparents. In "Japanese for...
EDITORIALS
Mar 23, 2007

Try learning from a critical mistake

It was revealed last week that Hokuriku Electric Power Co. failed to report a "criticality accident" at a nuclear-power plant in Shiga, Ishikawa Prefecture, eight years ago. The accident involved a 15-minute uncontrollable fission chain reaction.
JAPAN
Mar 22, 2007

Substance, not usual campaign noise

and Yoshito Hori, head of the Globis Group, look on at a March 2 event in Tokyo's Chiyoda Ward promoting use of platforms known as manifestos in politics. PHOTO COURTESY OF WASEDA UNIVERSITY
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Mar 22, 2007

Beck: Too much information for an hombre to handle

Beck talks about his upcoming tour of Japan, a stockpile of songs that grows faster than he is able to record them and a trans-Pacific collaboration that will just have to wait
Japan Times
JAPAN
Mar 21, 2007

Costly family plots giving way to common, no-upkeep crypts

Misako Kubo and Sachiko Sakurai are the best of friends. The two seniors sing side-by-side in a chorus group, go out for lunch and dinner together, and even pray for each other.
EDITORIALS
Mar 21, 2007

Educators need support, not orders

A report presented by the Central Council for Education to education minister Bunmei Ibuki on revisions to three education-related laws favors increased government control over education. Regrettably, under pressure from the education ministry, the council spent only about a month on discussions that...

Longform

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