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Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / G7 Ise-Shima Summit Special
May 25, 2016

Ise area is known for a wide variety of delicious cuisine

According to the Nihon Shoki, the second-oldest book of Japanese history, around 2,000 years ago Princess Yamato-hime was ordered by her father, Emperor Suinin, to find a new, permanent shrine for the most important deity in the land, the great sun goddess Amaterasu Omikami. The princess, taking her...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
May 21, 2016

Arita ware: Traditional Japanese porcelain has an international history

This year is ostensibly the 400th anniversary of Arita-yaki (Arita ware). An Arita city webpage tells us it was in 1616 that a forcibly relocated Korean farmer, Yi Sam-pyeong, discovered the white clay kaolin and then fired Japan's first porcelain. Other scholars have dated the first firing to 1610,...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Books
May 21, 2016

Reading kimono: the lexicon of dress

How Karun Thakar, a passionate collector of textiles, acquired his assortment of kimono is a story in itself. Exposed to fabric techniques in his mother's couture shop in Delhi, Thakar's growing curiosity repeatedly took him to Istanbul and Peshawar as he amassed of a seminal collection of Gujarati silk...
Japan Times
OLYMPICS
May 18, 2016

Sports Agency chief Suzuki getting to grips with task

With this summer's Rio de Janeiro Olympics just around the corner, sports are currently very much in the spotlight.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
May 18, 2016

'Wolf Girl and Black Prince': The dogged persistence of teen love

Girls go for bad, abusive guys, while relegating nice, decent ones to the dreaded "friend zone": A misogynistic lie or the cold, hard truth? Ryuichi Hiroki's "Wolf Girl and Black Prince" seems to say the latter, starting with its premise. A naive, socially inept high school girl agrees to become the...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
May 12, 2016

Art Fair Tokyo to feature more overseas representation and lower prices at this year's event

Every year, Tokyo becomes a hot spot for art and, every year, newcomers to the scene consider taking the plunge and buying their first piece. Now in its 11th year, Art Fair Tokyo hopes to make things a little easier on first-time buyers.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
May 11, 2016

'After the Storm': Koreeda's tempestuous family affairs

Hirokazu Koreeda has a reputation abroad as the one director of his generation carrying on the humanist tradition of Japanese cinema's 1950s and '60s Golden Age. This is not totally off the mark — he often returns to that favorite Golden Age theme, family dissolution, but his take on it is quite different...
Restaurants
May 11, 2016

Spring gourmet special

Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
May 10, 2016

Ito Jakuchu: Quite the rare bird

The best time to see Ito Jakuchu's work was back in 2000 or 2006, when there were two major exhibitions that aimed to re-evaluate the underappreciated 18th-century Kyoto painter.
Japan Times
LIFE / Food & Drink / OBJECT-ORIENTED
May 6, 2016

The in and outs of a woven table

In a quiet corner of Tokyo's bustling Ginza district is a shop devoted to Japanese crafts that has been in business since 1933. Among the founding members of Takumi are no lesser personages than Soetsu Yanagi, Kanjiro Kawai and Shoji Hamada — the trio also responsible for founding Tokyo's Mingeikan...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
May 4, 2016

'Victoria': One girl, one city, one take, one dud

Shortly after finishing a column the other day where I focused on Oscar-winning cinematographer Emmanuel Lubezki and the beauty and power of his long single-take shots, I sat down to watch arty suspense flick "Victoria," which was shot entirely in one take. If films like "Birdman" or "The Revenant" display...
Japan Times
LIFE / Lifestyle
Apr 30, 2016

Heel! A ruff guide to Japan's top dogs

Behind the scenes of the country's largest dog show.
COMMENTARY / World
Apr 27, 2016

Why China's censors silenced a Net sensation

China's leaders, so determined to export their culture to the world, are instead cultivating a neutered entertainment industry with their censorship.
Japan Times
BUSINESS / Companies
Apr 24, 2016

Fed up with bland cars, automakers tap anime for 'J-factor' inspiration

Some of Japan's top automakers, with a reputation for quality performance wrapped in often bland design, are turning to the country's pop culture to give them the "J-factor" and help set them apart in a world of growing look-alikes.
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel / HOTELS & RESTAURANTS
Apr 21, 2016

Showing gratitude to mothers; tasting the best of traditional cuisine; enjoying a ladies night out

Showing gratitude to mothers
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel
Apr 16, 2016

Minimalist family 'camping' in the foothills of Mount Fuji

The birds are singing, the wind is rustling in the forest and sunlight is filtering through the treetops. So far, so idyllic — until my 3-year-old releases a primal bird-scattering shriek as she thrusts an axe into a piece of wood.
Japan Times
CULTURE / CULTURE SMASH
Apr 16, 2016

Anime biz sings the praises of shows

The first time I attended AnimeJapan, the industry's annual spring showcase in Odaiba, Tokyo, it was called the Tokyo International Anime Fair. Members of the public couldn't enter during the first two days, amateur cosplay (costume play) was prohibited, and while there were some presentations, most...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Books / ESSENTIAL READING FOR JAPANOPHILES
Apr 16, 2016

'Tokyo Portraits' gives a face to the unbowed underclasses of the metropolis

The translated captions in Hiroh Kikai's highly original photo book "Tokyo Portraits" match the equally arresting images taken between 1973 and 2008. "A man who didn't have the money to buy a train ticket," reads one, "A man wearing shoes over his bare feet, who said he was doing academic research by...
Japan Times
JAPAN / Society
Apr 8, 2016

Law on women in the workforce lays bare the task ahead

As an ambitious graduate from an elite university, Kyoko Fukushima was aiming for the top when she got a job at one of Japan's big trading houses — often working late into the night alongside her male colleagues. Ten years and two kids later, she found her responsibilities downgraded to paper shuffling,...
Japan Times
WORLD / Science & Health
Apr 7, 2016

Exoskeleton suit mimics life's creaks, weaknesses at 85 to boost awareness

With the push of a button, a perfectly healthy 34-year-old museum-goer named Ugo Dumont was transformed into a confused 85-year-old man with cataracts, glaucoma and a ringing in his ears known as tinnitus.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / TELLING LIVES
Apr 6, 2016

Tokyo violin maker's apprentice fulfills lifetime dream at 81

Japan Times Community article rekindled Tokyo academic's thwarted 70-year ambition to craft a thing of beauty.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Apr 5, 2016

'Revalue Nippon Project: Hidetoshi Nakata's Favorite Japanese Kogei'

April 9-June 5
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Apr 3, 2016

Twice carries K-pop's flag into its debut Japanese gig

The halcyon days of Hallyu (the Korean wave) in mainstream media are long over, but the impact South Korean pop culture has had on Japan is still evident. Just look at K-pop outfit Twice, which features three Japanese members and has experienced massive success after debuting late last year.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Voices / FOREIGN AGENDA
Apr 3, 2016

An open letter to Japanese womankind

Some advice on how to take the best parts of the stereotypes without becoming one yourself.
LIFE / Travel / HOTELS & RESTAURANTS
Mar 31, 2016

Trying Japanese accommodation; enjoying the many flavors of Italy; celebrating history of Arita porcelain

Trying Japanese accommodation
COMMENTARY / Japan / THE VIEW FROM NEW YORK
Mar 31, 2016

'I became temporarily blind, deaf and paralyzed'

Michi Kobi's acting career reflected the way the U.S.-Japanese relations changed over the years.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Mar 30, 2016

'Bitter Honey': Fishing for the love of a writer

Films about elderly men falling for elusive young women (and utimately regretting it) go back to "The Blue Angel" (1930). One Japanese example is Kaneto Shindo's 1992 "Bokuto Kidan" ("The Strange Tale of Oyuki"), a biopic about writer Kafu Nagai and the prostitute he came to love. Unlike the deluded...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Mar 29, 2016

Stitches in time make fashion sublime

All artistic practices inevitably borrow from the past, but fashion, in particular, seems to revel in revivals. Whether skillfully appropriated or brazenly duplicated, the familiar frequently finds its way back to the runway, be it in 1940s wide pants, '50s flared skirts, '60s babydoll dresses, '70s...

Longform

Eme-Ima Kitchen is one of over 10,000 kodomo shokudō in Japan. A term first used in 2012 to describe makeshift eateries offering free or cheap meals to disadvantaged kids, it now refers to a diverse range of individuals, groups and organizations working to provide not only food but a sense of belonging to both children and adults.
Japan’s ‘children’s cafeterias’ are booming — but is that a good thing?