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Japan Times
BUSINESS / TAKING A CHANCE
Sep 20, 2007

Soccer pitchman scores big in small-market Niigata

Sunny but not too hot, the weather on the afternoon of May 6, 2001, was perfect for watching a soccer match. But there were only 4,800 people on hand to see Albirex Niigata take on Yokohama FC in the 18,671-seat Niigata City Stadium.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Art
Sep 20, 2007

Seeking collectors in Shanghai, not censors

Shanghai Exhibition Center is a massive, Stalinist birthday-cake of a building surrounded by newly constructed glass-and-steel skyscrapers in Shanghai's center. Originally know as Palace of the Sino-Soviet Friendship, from Sept. 6 to 9, the exhibition center had within its walls a new, capitalist friend,...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Stage
Sep 20, 2007

Butoh flowers of life and decay

There is a muscular eloquence to Junichi Kakizaki's constructions. He describes himself as a floral artist — not an ikebana (flower arrangement) master — and has won awards for his interpretation of the traditional Japanese art form. He considers his works to be contemporary art — either installations...
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Sep 20, 2007

Faces of the screen queen

The screening of "I'm Not There" at the Toronto Film Festival earlier this month left many in the aisles whispering "Academy Award" in reference to just one member of the ensemble cast — Cate Blanchett.
JAPAN
Sep 20, 2007

Ishihara's new right-hand man settles in

All eyes were on Naoki Inose as his new career as a politician got into full swing Wednesday with the opening of the first session of the Tokyo Metropolitan Assembly.
EDITORIALS
Sep 20, 2007

A vital graying society

The nation is now in the midst of the Week of the Aged. As the theme suggests, the government and the people must rack their brains to figure out how to build a graying society full of vitality. The internal affairs ministry's report says there were an estimated 27.44 million people aged 65 or over as...
COMMENTARY / World
Sep 20, 2007

Filipinos respectful of a star's conviction

BANGKOK — Joseph Estrada, the disgraced former president of the Philippines, faces the prospect of spending his remaining years in prison after a special court in Manila found him guilty of amassing around $15 million in bribes and kickbacks. During the 30 months he ruled his country, from mid-1998...
BUSINESS
Sep 20, 2007

House Foods to raise prices by 10%

House Foods Corp., a processed foods maker, said Wednesday it will raise prices on its curry, instant noodles and other products to offset higher prices for edible oil, wheat, grain and spices.
JAPAN
Sep 20, 2007

Security Council resolution sought

of international society," Yosano said. The government is now trying desperately to extend the Maritime Self-Defense Force's refueling activities in the Indian Ocean, which is part of the U.S.-led mission called Operation Enduring Freedom. The special law permitting the MSDF mission expires Nov. 1.
COMMENTARY
Sep 20, 2007

Another Japanese prime minister falls

LOS ANGELES — Japan is of gigantic importance to the United States and to the world. This nation — of 127 million people squeezed into one relatively small island — developed into the second-largest economy in the world.
COMMENTARY
Sep 20, 2007

Decline of the Liberal Democratic Party?

LONDON — Sixty-two years after Japan surrendered to the United States at the end of World War II, many things have changed, but not Japan's subordination to the U.S. Despite having the world's second-biggest economy, Japan is still a pygmy on the international stage, and its foreign policy is still...
BASEBALL / Japanese Baseball
Sep 19, 2007

Takeda settles down, pitches big game

The Hokkaido Nippon Ham Fighters still aren't getting much run support, but as long as they keep winning they'll take what they can get.
Reader Mail
Sep 19, 2007

Statistical generalizations miss

I feel that author Agnes Chan shows very limited knowledge about India. In her Sept. 6 article, she makes sweeping statements such as: "Fifty-four percent of Bombay's 16 million residents live in the slums. Only 25 percent live in what would pass in developed countries as apartments and houses."
EDITORIALS
Sep 19, 2007

New penalties for cooking the books

The revised Certified Public Accountant Law will go into effect by April 2008, enabling authorities to deal strongly with audit corporations involved in irregularities. It is hoped the revised law will help halt accounting fraud. But it must also be realized that severer administrative action is not...
Japan Times
ENVIRONMENT / WILD WATCH
Sep 19, 2007

Serendipity twice over

On a calm evening, I looked out from my balcony toward the mountains to the west, beyond Sapporo. Those distant peaks stretched in an apparently unbroken chain, from the gently sloping flanks of volcanic Mount Tarumae at the southernmost end, rising and falling northward in a bold, time-weathered horizon...

Longform

Mamoru Iwai, stationmaster of Keisei Ueno Station, says that, other than earthquake-proofing, the former Hakubutsukan-Dobutsuen (Museum-Zoo) Station has remained untouched.
Inside Tokyo's 'phantom' stations — and the stories they tell