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Japan Times
Features
Feb 19, 2006

An innocent abroad brings his twisted genius to Japan

I first heard about Momus, the alter-ego of the Scottish musical maverick Nick Currie, in 2002, when a writer friend directed me to an article that Currie had written on the coolness of Tokyo's up-and-coming Nakameguro district.
EDITORIALS
Jan 29, 2006

Much ado about an old Chinese map

A little squall ruffled the staid world of historical scholarship earlier this month after a Beijing lawyer and amateur collector produced a tattered, bamboo-paper map that at first glance appeared to undermine an axiom of Western history. The map, which Mr. Liu Gang said he bought in a Shanghai bookshop...
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE ZEIT GIST
Jan 17, 2006

Finding space in gay Japan

At first glance, homosexual life in Japan can seem quite repressed. Public displays of affection are next to nil, gay Japanese men often live secret lives and it's hard to notice a gay presence at all unless by venturing into Tokyo's "gayborhood," Shinjuku Ni-Chome.
Japan Times
Features
Dec 18, 2005

Festive fun with forgotten Futa

It's 9:58 on a chilly Wednesday morning, and it looks like I am the first of the day's visitors to Chiba Zoological Park.
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Sep 25, 2005

Help the disabled, but don't deny them

Several years ago, the government discussed state-sponsored care for people with disabilities. The idea was to assist mentally and physically disabled people in leaving publicly-funded facilities and entering society; or, at least, that was how it was presented.
Japan Times
JAPAN
Aug 9, 2005

Koizumi calls election for Sept. 11

Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi dissolved the House of Representatives on Monday and called a general election for Sept. 11 a few hours after the House of Councilors voted down the government-sponsored postal privatization bills.
COMMUNITY / Issues / THE ZEIT GIST
Jun 28, 2005

Visa crackdown -- don't get burned

Last year The Japan Times ran an article entitled "Students pay price in visa crackdown" about Americans put through the wringer on minor infractions.
COMMENTARY
Apr 18, 2005

Japan, China wasting time

Recent mass anti-Japanese protests in Chinese cities have plunged Sino-Japanese relations to their lowest since diplomatic ties were normalized in 1972. Stones thrown by demonstrators damaged the Japanese Embassy in Beijing on April 9. Japanese-owned businesses in other cities were likewise attacked,...
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Feb 20, 2005

Ah-choo! Picked up an allergy to the hay-fever industry

Last week the pharmaceutical company Riken announced that it was developing a new desensitivity treatment for serious allergy sufferers. The treatment program would entail fifty or so injections over a three-year period, which is quite a reduction in time. I should know. I received biweekly or monthly...
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Dec 12, 2004

Lord Shrimp gets deep-fried over New Year's special

While surfing for coverage of the most recent NHK scandal on commercial television, I naturally had my radar tuned for expressions of schadenfreude, especially on the wide shows, where commentators enjoy a little more freedom to be critical. But there hasn't been much gloating. Last Monday, the host...
SOCCER / PREMIER REPORT
Dec 11, 2004

Controversial Hoddle given one more chance by Wolves

LONDON -- "You and I have been physically been given two hands and two legs and a half-decent brain. Some people have not been born like that for a reason.
JAPAN
Nov 11, 2004

Unidentified submarine intrudes near Okinawa

An unidentified submarine briefly entered Japan's territorial waters off the Okinawa Islands early Wednesday, and Maritime Self-Defense Force patrol aircraft were sent to track it.
LIFE / Lifestyle / MATTER OF COURSE
May 20, 2004

Schools sounding false alarms over child safety

A few weeks ago my younger son came home from school all excited. "Mom! Guess what?" he shouted from the entranceway as he kicked off his shoes. "The ku gave us a gohan buza!" I had been hard at work on an article and was a little slow making the transition to his eclectic mix of languages. Why would...
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Nov 30, 2003

Japan is not sending the 'right stuff' to Iraq

If ever there was a time to discuss the constitutional legality of Japan's Self-Defense Forces, it's now. The SDF has done peacekeeping work, but it's never been placed in a country like Iraq, which for all intents and purposes is still at war.
JAPAN
Oct 25, 2003

Japan Highway chief sacked

Land minister Nobuteru Ishihara officially sacked Japan Highway Public Corp. President Haruho Fujii on Friday, calling him an obstacle to the government's plan to privatize the debt-strapped entity by 2005.
JAPAN
Oct 23, 2003

Fujii to spill the beans at Ishihara's OK

If he can get land minister Nobuteru Ishihara's permission, Japan Highway Public Corp. President Haruho Fujii is ready to reveal what went on behind closed doors when he was at the former Construction Ministry.
CULTURE / Books / THE BOOK REPORT
Mar 27, 2003

Libraries under attack

Are public libraries stealing the livelihoods of Japanese authors? So say writers and publishers as the number of books borrowed climbs while sales of books and magazines steadily decline.
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Jan 19, 2003

Amateurish TV? Well let it be, just let it be

The Jan. 16 issue of Shukan Bunshun carries an article that lists and describes the 10 worst TV specials broadcast during the New Year's holidays. Coming up with a Worst 10 is not difficult, since practically any special broadcast during the New Year's break could qualify for a list of the 10 Worst Programs...
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT / OUR PLANET EARTH
Jan 9, 2003

Emphasizing the positive

Perhaps more than any other individual today, Junko Edahiro is striving to share Japan's environmental successes with the world.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY
Dec 10, 2002

One of the real good guys

How do you describe one of the real "good guys." For those of us 'kids' growing up in Tokyo there was one very special person.
JAPAN
Sep 25, 2002

Scholar from Japan held in China prison

The prisoner smiled at his 13-year-old son through a window in the hot meeting room of the No. 3 prison in Urumqi, the provincial capital of the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region, one day in August.
COMMENTARY / World
Aug 25, 2002

Republican 'criticism' no war-stopper

LIMASSOL, Cyprus -- An interesting debate broke out in Washington last week about the possible war against Iraq. The discussion isn't just about whether to go to war; it has morphed into a quarrel about whether top Republicans are breaking ranks with U.S. President George W. Bush and seeking to reverse...
ENVIRONMENT
Aug 25, 2002

Your planet needs you!

From the depths of our oceans to our atmosphere's ozone layer, there is little doubt that the global environment is taking a beating. Even so, most of us are still waiting for someone else to take action, which is why the United Nations World Summit on Sustainable Development starting this week in Johannesburg,...
COMMUNITY / How-tos / LIFELINES
Aug 15, 2002

A load of computer clubs and a wad of financial advice

This column may be produced in Tokyo, but the newspaper circulates nationwide and indeed is read online worldwide. So we feel we are not doing our jobs properly to focus on Tokyo alone. While we have heard of a Macintosh computer group in Osaka, there must be others -- and in Nagoya, Fukuoka and Sapporo,...
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
May 12, 2002

The free press exercise their muscles

In addition to being Japan's Constitution Day and the United Nations' Press Freedom Day, May 3 marked the 15th anniversary of the unsolved murder of Asahi Shimbun reporter Tomohiro Kojiri in Kobe.
JAPAN
Apr 8, 2002

Asian issues carry much weight on global stability

NAGO, Okinawa Pref. -- There were times when relations between the European Union and Japan suffered from having a narrow focus, centered on economic matters.
COMMENTARY / World
Mar 23, 2002

A silver lining in Gujarat state's riots

The death of around 800 people in the recent riots in Gujarat state was a sobering reminder of the primeval passions and tribal savagery that can be unleashed so ferociously at a moment's notice in India. They were an antidote to the unbridled optimism that saw only an emerging information-technology...
JAPAN
Sep 20, 2001

Koizumi starts preparations so SDF could support U.S.

Japan will prepare for the dispatch of its Self-Defense Forces to lend noncombatant support to U.S. forces should Washington take retaliatory action against terrorists, Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi announced Wednesday.
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Aug 12, 2001

'Model' family vs. maternal love: a nation judges

Last week, the Japan Office of the Nevada Center for Reproductive Medicine announced that a 60-year-old Japanese woman gave birth to a healthy baby at Jikei University Hospital in Tokyo. Though the woman's identity and the child's gender were not revealed, the mother released a statement through the...
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Jul 29, 2001

Talking about the weather is no longer so boring

We tend to take weather forecasts with a grain of salt. Some people leave their umbrellas at home unless the probability of precipitation is over, say, 40 percent, while others keep a collapsible in their bag at all times because they don't know what to believe. We know it's raining because we are getting...

Longform

Atsuyoshi Koike, the president and CEO of Rapidus, says there is a “sense of urgency” when it comes to Japan’s efforts in manufacturing semiconductors. “We have to make sure we are successful,” he says.
Atsuyoshi Koike’s big game: Fourth down and 2 nanometers to go