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LIFE / Travel
Aug 12, 1999

Making a pilgrimage to an expo

KUMANO, Wakayama Pref. -- Ordinarily, I am not an "expo" kind of person.
CULTURE / Music / MUSIC NOMAD
Aug 10, 1999

Exotic rhythms spice up world-music scene

Exotic and tropical are words that are overused in the descriptions of music from foreign cultures -- they are more appropriate for tourist brochures. However, with musicians set to tour Japan from Hawaii, Bali and Congo, those descriptions are actually fairly fitting, and should provide the perfect...
COMMENTARY / World
Aug 8, 1999

Japan makes its mark in U.S.

ALFRED BALITZER Special to The Japan Times The town of Kanab, population 4,500, is located on a two-lane highway between Zion National Park and Lake Powell in southern Utah. The country is filled with breathtaking scenery -- tall, lonesome bluffs, massive rock formations the color of copper, natural...
LIFE / Style & Design / BEAUTY EAST AND WEST
Aug 5, 1999

Want to be a love goddess? Indulge in a fragrant bath

It should come as no surprise that in almost every culture, the goddesses of beauty have also been the goddesses of love. They are also often goddesses of the arts, and of such essentials to life as mirth, happiness and laughter. These goddesses are not actively worshipped in many parts of the world...
JAPAN
Aug 3, 1999

Yasuda Kasai CIGNA eyes 5% of 401(k) market

Staff writer
EDITORIALS
Jul 25, 1999

The growing threat of suicide

Over the last three years Japan has witnessed a steady, seemingly inexorable, rise in the national suicide rate. Many of these deaths are attributable to financial worries caused by the prolonged economic slowdown. It is well known that Japanese culture has never condemned the taking of one's own life,...
COMMENTARY
Jul 24, 1999

The 'Third Way' once again

LONDON -- "The Third Way" has become the height of intellectual fashion. But what on earth is it?
CULTURE / Art / CERAMIC SCENE
Jul 24, 1999

New and old blended in earthy harmony

One of the greatest challenges facing any Japanese artist is to mix tradition with meaningful innovation. Many artisans merely imitate the past with little originality -- a rehashing of past masters that leaves many of Japan's great artistic traditions in stagnation.
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Jul 20, 1999

Screening for image and reality

THE DOUBLE SCREEN: Medium and Representation in Chinese Painting, by Wu Hung. London: Reaktion Books, 1996, 296 pp., with 170 illustrations, 20 in color, 14.95 British pounds. Just what is a traditional Chinese painting? This is the question asked and answered in this magisterial work of imaginative...
CULTURE / Music
Jul 20, 1999

Lotus Sutra gets rhythm on Ono's 'Gyo'

As much as it is tempting to believe the adage "like father, like daughter," sometimes a person like Toshiro Ono comes along to turn the saying on its head.
EDITORIALS
Jul 1, 1999

Serving justice in Turkey

To no one's surprise, a Turkish court earlier this week found Kurdish rebel leader Abdullah Ocalan guilty of murder and treason and sentenced him to hang. The 14-year war waged by Kurdish separatists has claimed more than 30,000 lives; the measures taken by the Turkish government to combat the insurgency...
JAPAN
Jun 29, 1999

Jobs, welfare must be cut, Ishihara says

Tokyo Gov. Shintaro Ishihara pledged Tuesday to rebuild the capital's finances by breaking taboos and taking drastic steps, including trimming the number of civil servants and streamlining its elaborate social welfare programs, and gave a stern "no" to relocating the capital.
CULTURE / Music
Jun 29, 1999

Beating powerful drums of tradition

Honoo Taiko, an all-female Japanese taiko drumming troupe from Ishikawa Prefecture, is ready to set the stage ablaze July 12 as they kick off their seven-city world tour in Tokyo.
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Jun 29, 1999

'Kaempfer's Japan': Tokugawa Edo as never before

Engelbert Kaempfer, German physician and historian, first arrived in Japan in 1690 to take up the position of physician at the Dutch trading agency on the island of Deshima in Nagasaki Harbor. Although Japan had already secluded itself, the Dutch traders were allowed a certain amount of freedom. This...
JAPAN
Jun 25, 1999

Nuclear plants feared vulnerable coastline targets

MIHAMA, Fukui Pref. — A North Korean submarine runs aground on the nuclear plant-dotted shores of Fukui Prefecture and 11 commandos armed with antitank rockets storm ashore.
CULTURE / Music / PLAY BUTTON
Jun 25, 1999

J rockers want free Tibet, wherever that is

"Tibet . . . hmm . . . it's a foreign country, I know that," mused one young man.
CULTURE / Film
Jun 25, 1999

Lost opportunity of the disco daze

If there were ever a high-water mark of hedonism, it would have to have been located at some New York or L.A. disco in the late '70s. In this pre-AIDS, post-Pill era of guilt-free sex, drug use was widespread and largely tolerated, gay culture was coming out of the closet and sexual mores were loosening...
JAPAN
Jun 24, 1999

Ministry wants flag, anthem promoted in textbooks

Social studies textbooks must help instill respect for the Hinomaru flag and the "Kimigayo" de facto national anthem among the nation's children, according to the results of last year's textbook screening released Thursday by the Education Ministry.
JAPAN
Jun 21, 1999

Norway ambassador leaves satisfied after five-year term

John Bjornebye, who is leaving for Oslo today after nearly five years in Tokyo as the Norwegian ambassador, expressed satisfaction that the two countries' relations have become more globally oriented.
JAPAN
Jun 21, 1999

U.S. NPO interns see future in collaboration

The key to prosperity for both U.S. and Japanese nonprofit organizations may be collaboration with appreciation for cultural differences, according to 12 American interns who have completed one-month internships at Japanese NPOs.
JAPAN
Jun 16, 1999

Okinawa ruins targeted for heritage status

The government will nominate a group of ancient monuments in Okinawa Prefecture for inclusion on the World Heritage List, the Foreign Ministry said in a statement Wednesday.
JAPAN
Jun 10, 1999

Appliance recycling comes to fore

A throwaway society has produced mountains of waste, creating a nightmare that all dumps in this country may be filled in the next seven to eight years.
JAPAN
Jun 9, 1999

C&W wins IDC stakes

Toyota Motor Corp. and Itochu Corp. on Wednesday announced their decisions to sell their 17.7 percent stakes in International Digital Communications Inc. to Britain's Cable and Wireless PLC.
JAPAN
Jun 9, 1999

Local governments, businesses form Kansai council

OSAKA — Local governments and business organizations in Kansai and surrounding areas set up a joint council Wednesday to revitalize the regional economy.
LIFE / Travel
Jun 9, 1999

Adventurer forced to the last resort

I'm not into resorts Period.
COMMENTARY / World
Jun 8, 1999

Recovery hinges on fast action

Following U.S. Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan's comments suggesting a change in U.S. monetary policy, the surging U.S. stock market has apparently entered an adjustment phase. To prevent the booming U.S. economy from overheating, it is necessary to fine-tune monetary policy.
CULTURE / Film
Jun 4, 1999

Somewhere over the airwaves

Once upon a time, back in the '50s, there existed a "better" America, a wholesome utopia of crew cuts, unquestioning white-bread conformity and mom in the kitchen baking apple pies.
COMMENTARY / World
Jun 2, 1999

France's Corsican question

PARIS -- "France," according to one of its best-known poets and political thinkers, Paul Valery, "is the most heterogeneous country that ever existed." The present tragedy in Kosovo makes this sound hyperbolic, yet there is an element of truth in it. The French who live on the shores of the Mediterranean,...
LIFE / Digital / CYBERIA
Jun 2, 1999

But are you experienced?

Remember how online art used to be one of ballyhooed features of our new and improved lives on the Internet? We talked of visiting faraway museums, browsing rarely seen masterpieces, hyper-annotated with curatorial notes and historical contexts. Similarly enticing was the promise of new media and art...
COMMENTARY / World
May 23, 1999

Save whales with science, not sentiment

The death of Lennie's pet mouse in John Steinbeck's "Of Mice and Men" conveys the tragedy and guilt that overpowers us all when good intentions produce the exact opposite of what we hoped to accomplish.

Longform

Visitors walk past Sou Fujimoto's Grand Ring, which has been recognized as the largest wooden structure in the world.
Can a World Expo still matter? Japan is about to find out.