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BASEBALL / BASEBALL BULLET-IN
Mar 20, 2005

Who says you can't teach old baseball teams new tricks?

"New" is the watchword for Japanese baseball in 2005.
MORE SPORTS
Mar 20, 2005

Hawks take flight

Jolbert Cabrera homered for the second straight day Saturday as the Softbank Hawks stretched their preseason winning streak to three games with an 8-3 victory over the Yakult Swallows.
Japan Times
LIFE / Travel / NATURE TRAVEL
Mar 20, 2005

One man's vision is a paradise of plants

Tim Smit, still in his 30s but already a millionare record producer for artists including the Nolan Sisters and Barry Manilow, moved from London to "retire" in rural Cornwall, south-west England in 1987. He had the vague idea of opening a recording studio. Or a rare breeds farm. Or something.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Music
Mar 20, 2005

Scott Herren

Many major American hip-hop artists profess admiration and even envy for the experimental glitch mastery of the European electronica artists who make up the roster of Warp records. If there's a missing link between the two sensibilities it's probably Atlanta native Scott Herren, who records for Warp...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Mar 20, 2005

The earnestness of being important

THE HEREDITY OF TASTE, by Natsume Soseki, translated by Sammy I. Tsunematsu, introduced by Stephen W. Kohl. Boston: Tuttle Publishing, 2005, 201 pp., 1,300 yen (paper). MY INDIVIDUALISM and THE PHILOSOPHICAL FOUNDATIONS OF LITERATURE, by Natsume Soseki. Translated by Sammy I. Tsunematsu, introduced by...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Mar 20, 2005

Native soul drifts back home

HUDSON: A Collection of Tanka, by Kisaburo Konoshima, translated by David Callner, text in English and Japanese. Tokyo: The Japan Times, 2004, 135 pp., 2,500 yen (paper). It was 34 years ago, in 1970, that the Meiji Era-born Japanese-American Kisaburo Konoshima (1893-1984) published "Hudson" (Tokyo,...
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Mar 20, 2005

The undeniable legacy left after Japan wreaked havoc

RACE WAR! White Supremacy and the Japanese Attack on the British Empire, by Gerald Horne. New York and London: New York University Press, 2004, 407 pp., 4,478 yen (cloth). Racism is a particularly dirty issue of World War II in Asia that is often swept under the carpet. Tokyo's claim that Japan stood...
Japan Times
Features / WEEK 3
Mar 20, 2005

Samba viva samba! Matsudaira style!

With the mercury rising to 17 degrees, March 8 was unusually warm for the time of year in Tokyo. Spring was in the air. At Tokyo Dome that evening, though, it was distinctly subtropical as 20,000 people broke out into a midsummer-style sweat.
CULTURE / Books / THE ASIAN BOOKSHELF
Mar 20, 2005

Expectations in the Sundarbans

THE HUNGRY TIDE, by Amitav Ghosh. HarperCollins, 2004, 403 pp., £10.99 (paper). Piyali Roy, the daughter of Bengali immigrants to the United States, is spotted standing on a railway platform. She is dressed in the clothes "of a teenage boy." The man who distinguishes her from the crowd, as a stranger...
Japan Times
Features / WEEK 3
Mar 20, 2005

Money makes money for savers of note

It's neither pretty nor fancy, and it's made of garbage. Yet a recent addition to the plethora of piggy banks available to the nation's would-be penny-pinchers is proving particularly popular with hard-core fans of the Japanese saying that goes: "Kane no aru tokoro ni kane wa nagareru (Money flows to...
Japan Times
Features / WEEK 3
Mar 20, 2005

Can machines can care

Whether selling Scarab beetles for kids or punctuating the path up Mount Fuji, vending machines are one of Japan's most idiosyncratic features. Although some question the "waste" of energy involved in the ubiquitous mechanized retail outlets -- about 2.6 million alone are hawking beverages -- their onward...
CULTURE / TV & Streaming / CHANNEL SURF
Mar 20, 2005

TBS celebrates its 50th anniversary with a new version of "Seishun no Mon" and more

This week TBS celebrates its 50th anniversary with a new version of "Seishun no Mon (The Gate of Youth)," one of the great publishing successes of the postwar era. Written by Hiroyuki Itsuki, the seven-volume novel, originally published in 1969 and 1970 in serial form, went on to sell more than 20 million...
EDITORIALS
Mar 20, 2005

A flock of Emiews

I t must say something about the times when a news release heralding yet another piece of cutting-edge Japanese technology makes us scratch our heads and think how quaint and last-century it sounds. That happened last week when we read about Hitachi Ltd.'s rollout of a wheeled humanoid robot that it...
Features / WEEK 3
Mar 20, 2005

Quake amateurs shake skeptical pros

With surprisingly little fanfare, the Japan Meteorological Agency, which keeps tabs on tens of thousands of earthquakes a year, has been setting up a network of ultra-sensitive electronic motion detectors that will pick up on the kind of minute seismic quivering that heralds a major quake.
JAPAN / Media / MEDIA MIX
Mar 20, 2005

Training men in sex education is the key to unlock women-only cars

On the same day that now former Liberal Democratic Party lawmaker Kazuyoshi Nakanishi was arrested for indecent assault in Roppongi there was a similarly themed news story buried in the back of the dailies that put his misdemeanor in perspective. Officials of JR East Japan announced that they are planning...
COMMENTARY / THE VIEW FROM MOSCOW
Mar 20, 2005

Artwork unfurled without a destination

MOSCOW -- To be popular with art historians, you have to be a dead Italian male. Everyone else is suspect to tenured professors and critics, particularly if the work is going to last for just 16 days and is made of nylon and steel. Such was the case with a revolutionary project by Christo and Jeanne-Claude,...
Features / WEEK 3
Mar 20, 2005

On a wing and no fare

When Momoko Sasaki goes traveling, she literally "goes an extra mile" to enjoy perks that few of her peers have likely ever dreamed of.
SOCCER / PREMIER REPORT
Mar 19, 2005

Reaction of Chelsea, Mourniho to Frisk incident laughable

LONDON -- Woe betide the next referee who makes what is perceived to be a bad decision against an English team.
BASEBALL / MLB
Mar 19, 2005

Strained hamstring hampers Giants' Uehara

Koji Uehara is suffering from a strained right hamstring and has been told by doctors to refrain from pitching for a week, the Yomiuri Giants right-hander said on his official Web site Friday.
EDITORIALS
Mar 19, 2005

Whimsical article of faith

The ongoing takeover battle between Livedoor Inc. and Fuji Television Network offers food for thought regarding "market capitalization," now a favorite topic of conversation among executives of information-technology firms and Internet service providers. Market capitalization, which is calculated by...
COMMENTARY / World
Mar 19, 2005

Roh publicly belittles alliance with U.S.

HONOLULU -- In a little noticed speech, President Roh Moo Hyun of South Korea has once again disparaged his nation's alliance with the United States and cast doubt on whether this partnership should continue. Roh told graduating cadets at the Korean Air Force Academy that South Korea was fully capable...
COMMENTARY / World
Mar 19, 2005

Curing the plague of piracy

CHIANG MAI, Thailand -- For years now piracy in the Malacca Strait has been one of the top problems facing the Asian region. A recent Japan Times editorial very succinctly dealt with the potential dangers that it presents, especially with regard to Japan. My purpose here is to consider possible ways...
BUSINESS
Mar 19, 2005

Cabinet OKs bill to delay M&A reform

The Cabinet approved a set of bills Friday to update Japan's corporate law, with one of them featuring a one-year delay for easing restrictions on foreign companies involved in mergers and acquisitions of Japanese firms.
BUSINESS
Mar 19, 2005

Japan, Russia closer to completing WTO talks

Japan and Russia have moved closer to completing bilateral negotiations on Russia's accession to the World Trade Organization, sources said Friday.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / PERSONALITY PROFILE
Mar 19, 2005

P. Sivakami

CHENNAI, India -- Eight years ago, P. Sivakami went from Tamil Nadu to Tokyo to serve as Egional director of the Indian Tourist Office. She was in her early 40s then, usually dressed in a sari but often in slacks and a sweater, and still wearing her hair long and loose. She took her two young sons with...
BUSINESS
Mar 19, 2005

Nakagawa seeks action on oil prices

Shoichi Nakagawa, minister of economy, trade and industry, indicated Friday that oil-consuming nations should discuss ways to deal with increases in crude oil prices at a ministerial meeting of the International Energy Agency slated for May.
BUSINESS
Mar 19, 2005

Tanigaki backs Wolfowitz candidacy

Finance Minister Sadakazu Tanigaki on Friday backed the nomination of U.S. Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz as the next World Bank chief.

Longform

A store clerk tries to cool things down in front of their shop by spraying a hose.
Is extreme weather changing the way Japan shops?