Tag - hokkaido

 
 

HOKKAIDO

According to the Sapporo District Meteorological Observatory, no avalanche warning was issued for the Mount Yotei area, nor was it snowing heavily around the time of the incident. The police and fire department are investigating the details of the accident.
JAPAN
Mar 11, 2024
Two dead, one injured in avalanche at Hokkaido ski town
The victims were part of a group of six who were backcountry skiing on Mount Yotei.
Plaintiffs who have filed a lawsuit over Japan's separate surname rule head into the Tokyo District Court on Friday.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Mar 8, 2024
Group files lawsuit over Japan law that mandates couples share a surname
Similar lawsuits have been filed before, but public opinion appears to be shifting in favor of allowing couples to have separate surnames.
1924
JAPAN / History / Japan Times Gone By
Mar 1, 2024
Japan Times 1924: Japan nice but men dress in queer ways
A piece by women visiting Tokyo gives us a century-old take on what tourists in the 1920s thought of "weird Japan."
A photograph taken by a local resident shows a man being held down by police officers near a convenience store in Sapporo on Sunday.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Feb 26, 2024
Police describe how fatal stabbing at Sapporo convenience store unfolded
The suspect was arrested at the scene after the attack, which killed one store employee and left two others injured.
Eleven portraits of Ainu chieftains, completed in 1790, are now held by the Museum of Fine Arts and Archaeology in Besancon, France. There were originally 12 paintings in the original set, collectively known as the “Ishu Retsuzo,” but one has disappeared.
JAPAN / History / Regional Voices: Hokkaido
Feb 26, 2024
The ongoing mystery of the Ainu portraits in France
A former Hokkaido journalist is hoping to find out how portraits of Ainu chieftains from 1790 made it to Europe.
When Fighters interpreter Shinju Sakuma set her mind on becoming a language liaison in sports, she picked a sport she enjoyed watching and an employer who thinks outside the box.
BASEBALL / Japanese Baseball
Feb 26, 2024
Rookie female interpreter provides voice for foreign baseball stars in Japan
Shinju Sakuma, who will graduate from Rikkyo University in Tokyo this spring, is believed to be the first female interpreter in NPB history.
A convenience store in Sapporo, where a man was arrested after allegedly stabbing three people on Sunday morning
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Feb 25, 2024
One dead after stabbing at convenience store in Sapporo
Police arrested the suspected assailant at the scene of the crime in the city's Kita Ward.
Director of the Akan International Crane Center, Miyuki Kawase, says tourism is incredibly helpful for the birds, but the people who come to take pictures of the birds have to remember they are still wild animals.
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / 20 QUESTIONS
Feb 24, 2024
Miyuki Kawase: ‘Experience, whether happy, sad or painful, makes you grow’
The director of the Akan International Crane Center in Hokkaido tells us how she found herself in a career centered around the symbolic white birds.
The sport was created in the town of Kushiro in 1978 by former Olympic ice hockey goalkeeper Katsuji Morishima, who married two things every East Hokkaido resident has — a pair of rubber rain boots and a love of ice hockey.
MORE SPORTS / Ice Hockey
Feb 22, 2024
A pastime in frozen Hokkaido: Rubber boots ice hockey
No skates are needed for Hokkaido's unique brand of ice hockey, which is a popular way to stay active during the north's long winters.
Kasai Rinkai Park on Wednesday in Tokyo's Edogawa Ward. Temperatures are expected to rise to 18 degrees Celsius in Tokyo on Monday.
JAPAN / Science & Health
Feb 19, 2024
Forecast of sudden drop in temperature raises health concerns
The mercury is expected to rise to around 20 degrees Celsius before plunging by more than 10 degrees midweek.
Tourists in Tokyo's Asakusa district ditch their jackets amid unseasonably warm temperatures in the capital and across Japan on Thursday.
ENVIRONMENT / Climate change / OUR PLANET
Feb 18, 2024
Preparing for the hottest year Japan has ever seen
In 2023, summer heat persisted across Japan well into the fall. Predictions by scientists indicate 2024 could be even worse.
A Banei Keiba horse race takes place at the Obihiro racecourse in Hokkaido on Dec. 9. The unpredictable stop-and-start drama of the world's slowest horse race has drawn new fans.
JAPAN
Feb 18, 2024
'Suspense' of slowest horse race wins new fans in Japan
At the Banei Keiba races in Hokkaido, spectators cheer on workhorses moving at the pace of a brisk human walk.
Blue sheets cover snow huts to protect them from the rain during an annual festival in Yokote, Akita Prefecture, on Thursday.
JAPAN
Feb 17, 2024
Unusually warm weather in northern Japan puts damper on winter events
The Meteorological Agency has also forecast temperatures in early March to likely be higher than usual.
At the Akan International Crane Center, just north of the city of Kushiro proper, visitors can see the majestic red-crowned crane — a symbol of Hokkaido.
JAPAN / Society / Longform
Feb 17, 2024
Faces of the north: A Hokkaido town grapples with depopulation
Residents of Kushiro face an issue that more and more communities in Japan are having to deal with. The city may be young, but it's rich with tradition.
Established in December 2021 in the middle of the pandemic-fuelled gaming craze, Sega Sapporo Studio is remarkable for growing amid a recent slump in the industry.
LIFE / Digital
Feb 17, 2024
Sega developers say new Sapporo studios lead to better lives
Aside from quality-of-life benefits that come from living outside a major metropolis, Sapporo also has a history of game development.
Naoko Motooka began hunting 10 years ago. Her hobby is one way Hokkaido hopes to curb a current boom in the deer population.
PODCAST / deep dive
Feb 15, 2024
Hunting in Hokkaido; Taylor Swift comes to Tokyo
You probably don’t think of guns when you think of Japan, but Hokkaido’s hunters do.
People relax at a park in the city of Fukuoka on Tuesday as high temperatures were recorded across the country.
JAPAN
Feb 14, 2024
Unseasonably warm temperatures set to continue across Japan
Temperatures in the Kinki, Tokai, and Kanto Koshin regions hovered around 18 C, reaching 19 C in Kanagawa Prefecture and 20 C in Chiba Prefecture.
The village of Kamoenai in Hokkaido
JAPAN / Politics
Feb 14, 2024
Hokkaido areas named for second-stage survey on nuclear waste disposal
The town of Suttsu and the area off its coast will be surveyed, as well as the area within the village of Kamoenai excluding a zone around a volcano.
Visitors at the Sapporo Snow Festival on Feb. 4
JAPAN
Feb 12, 2024
Sapporo Snow Festival crowds recover to pre-COVID levels in 2024
The recovery of visitor numbers has been helped by inbound travelers to Japan, according to the festival's executive committee.
An Ito Yokado store in the city of Fukushima. As part of its structural reform, Ito-Yokado will focus on urban areas including the Tokyo metropolitan area.
BUSINESS / Companies
Feb 10, 2024
Struggling unit of 7-Eleven's parent company to exit central and northern Japan
The Seven & I Holdings unit will close five of its 17 stores in the regions and hand over 11 to other supermarket operators.

Longform

Akiko Trush says her experience with the neurological disorder dystonia left her feeling like she wanted to chop her own hand off.
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