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January 01, 2025
 

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SUPERNATURAL

Students from Agatsuma’s butoh workshop, also part of Sumi-Yume, will be joining her and professional butoh dancer Tomoshi Shioya for this weekend’s shows.
CULTURE / Stage
Nov 8, 2024
Butoh dances to the sounds of Hokusai’s hometown
Performances of the avant-garde dance form are part of a program dedicated to the revered artist and celebrating the local community in Sumida Ward.
Located in the Otemachi neighborhood, the 'skull mound' of Taira no Masakado is said to be the source of ills and misfortunes of any who would disturb the site.
LIFE / Travel
Oct 26, 2024
Take a Halloween stroll through Tokyo’s dark history
Tokyo has no shortage of creepy places to check out this Halloween, and the good news is that many are conveniently accessible.
A city as rich in history as Kyoto has accumulated plenty of hair-raising tales perfect for your Halloween perusal.
LIFE / Travel
Oct 26, 2024
Japan’s ancient capital houses a millennium of ghosts
August is the traditional period in Japan when the worlds of the living and the dead overlap, but who’s to say spirits don’t make an exception for Halloween?
For centuries, Japanese people have been scaring themselves with horror stories as a way of cooling down during the stifling summer months.
CULTURE / Books
Aug 16, 2024
New tales in translation to give you chills and thrills this summer
Recent fright-filled releases with supernatural creatures, shrewd sleuths and creepy killers provide welcome relief from the sweltering heat.
A boy skateboards past Yanaka Cemetery in Tokyo’s Taito Ward. A perfectly peaceful spot the rest of the year, it becomes a place children may test their courage during the Bon holidays.
LIFE / Language / BILINGUAL
Aug 8, 2024
Japanese cities turn into ghost towns during the Bon holiday period
As people return to their hometowns to pay their respects to their ancestors, children may try to test their nerves with a "kimodameshi."
Whether you get your goosebumps from horror movies, the dark or even historical battle sites, there are lots of ways to express fear in Japanese.
LIFE / Language / BILINGUAL
May 31, 2024
Using intransitive verbs to make Japanese ghost stories extra spooky
Since intransitive verbs don't need to take a subject, they are best at describing things that happen of their own accord.
In a Kyoto long past, the "hyakki yagyō" (100 demon night parade) haunted a sleepy corner of Kyoto. Now, one enterprising monster enthusiast has won a small batttle to keep the march alive.
LIFE / Travel
Apr 17, 2024
Kyoto’s demon night parade lives to haunt another day
Held this year on April 20, an ancient Kyoto monster march has overcome obstacles to continue going bump in the night.
Abe no Seimei (Kento Yamazaki), an apprentice at a school of mystic arts, gets wrapped up in a murder investigation in “The Yin Yang Master Zero.”
CULTURE / Film
Apr 4, 2024
‘The Yin Yang Master Zero’: Imaginative action film casts a dazzling spell
Shimako Sato’s VFX-heavy, big-budget fantasy about practitioners of mystic arts goes beyond the genre standard.
A serviceman, wearing prosthetic legs, walks past Ukrainian flags symbolizing fallen soldiers on the Independence Square in Kyiv, on Oct. 30.
WORLD / Politics
Nov 2, 2023
'When will it end?': Ukrainians turn to psychics for war forecasts
Military forecasts by Ukraine's most popular soothsayers rack up hundreds of thousands of views on YouTube and TikTok.
The classic Japanese ghost story often features a vengeful female ghost.
PODCAST / deep dive
Oct 12, 2023
[Rebroadcast] Japan’s got ghosts
This week we discuss a few horror movies before “Uncanny Japan” podcast host Thersa Matsuura tells a classic Japanese ghost story.
A performer going by the name “Tanefukube” leads shishi-odori dancers during Tono Meguritoroge’s grand finale at Rokko-shi shrine.
LIFE / Travel
Sep 30, 2023
Dancing with ghosts at Tono’s rural folk festival
The Tono region is Japan’s go-to setting of scary stories to tell in the dark.
Japan Times
JAPAN / History / JAPAN TIMES GONE BY
Jun 3, 2023
Japan Times 1923: This may be a true story, but again, it mayn’t
Some mysterious behavior from a jar of ashes 100 years ago makes the front page of The Japan Times. Then, 25 years ago, a conference believes newsprint will win out over the internet.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Books
May 7, 2023
‘Japanese Yokai and Other Supernatural Beings’: Ghosts and ghouls in all their macabre glory
Ukiyo-e expert Andreas Marks digs deep into the folklore of Japan’s most terrifying creatures, detailing 100 supernatural beings with lavish illustrations.
Japan Times
LIFE / Lifestyle
Apr 22, 2023
A Japanese island where the wild things are
From badgering nuisances to downright evil forces, yōkai fill some of the most colorful corners of Japanese folklore. These artists are dreaming up even more.
Japan Times
LIFE / Language / BILINGUAL
Oct 28, 2022
If there's something strange in your neighborhood, it could be a yōkai
Yu014dkai can take any form as they are our fears and imaginations made manifest. They make for easy scapegoats, and can be used as warnings to keep children on their best behavior.
Japan Times
LIFE / Lifestyle / Longform
Sep 19, 2022
Pitch black: A therapeutic walk into total darkness
Night treks help people in Japan reclaim a primitive fear and reverence toward a world without light.
Japan Times
CULTURE / Books
Aug 8, 2020
Chilling Japanese ghost tales with contemporary twists to help you beat the summer heat
Here's a look at modern takes on Japanese ghost stories that will give you chills and thrills during Japan's spookiest time of year.
JAPAN / History
Apr 11, 2020
Looking for solace in Japanese mythology during a pandemic
Amid growing anxiety over an invisible pathogen that has so far claimed tens of thousands of lives worldwide, some Japanese are turning to faith and mythology for solace.
WORLD / Society
Mar 11, 2020
Belief in witchcraft hampers drive to end female genital mutilation in Guinea, campaigners say
Belief in witchcraft is hampering efforts to eradicate female genital mutilation (FGM) in Guinea, where almost all girls are cut, campaigners said on Tuesday.
Japan Times
WORLD / Science & Health
Sep 6, 2019
DNA hints the Loch Ness 'monster' might be giant eel
Scotland's fabled Loch Ness monster could possibly be a giant eel, scientists said on Thursday after an intensive analysis of traces of DNA in the Loch's icy waters.
Japanese Princess Kako turns 30
As an adult member of the Imperial Family, Princess Kako has performed various official duties at home and abroad this year.
How OnlyFans turned into a global empire bent on redefining porn
OnlyFans CEO Keily Blair gestures during the Axios BFD event in New York on Oct. 12, 2023.
From geisha to oshikatsu, toxic tropes fuel sex industry
An advertisement in Tokyo's Kabukicho, Japan's largest red-light district. The country is home to a thriving adult entertainment industry and has recently seen a boom in sex tourism fueled by the weak yen and availability of red-light services.
What caused South Korea's most deadly plane crash?
National Assembly Speaker Woo Won-shik offers joss sticks at a memorial for the victims of the Jeju Air crash in Muan, South Korea, on Monday.
Biden announces $2.5 billion in fresh military aid to Ukraine
U.S. President Joe Biden
Japan news images of 2024: Upheaval, resilience and breakthroughs
A person walks down a street in Wajima, Ishikawa Prefecture, in the days following a magnitude 7.6 earthquake, which struck off the coast of the Noto Peninsula on Jan. 1, 2024. More than 500 deaths have been attributed to the event, which was the worst quake since the Great East Japan Earthquake on March 11, 2011.
Japan defense spending goals hit by inflation, weak yen and political uncertainty
Ground Self-Defense Force members conduct a military drill next to an anti-ship missile unit on Miyako Island in Okinawa Prefecture in April 2022.
Japan’s weather in 2024: Record temperatures hurt people’s health and wallets
People cover themselves with umbrellas during a hot summer day in Tokyo's Ginza district in August. Temperatures shot up in early July, even before the official end of the rainy season, and the high temperatures persisted well into the fall.
How Hokkaido quietly became a culinary treasure trove in 2024
The central Hokkaido city of Asahikawa made headlines this year when one of its suburbs was named as the best place to live in Japan — a ranking earned in part due to the community's many outstanding restaurants and cafes.
Bling-Bang, baby: The J-pop soundtrack of 2024
Hip-hop duo Creepy Nuts' uptempo “Bling-Bang-Bang-Born” quickly became a TikTok favorite after its release days into 2024, which helped turn the song into a Billboard Japan Hot 100 topper for 19 weeks before rising up viral streaming charts around the world.

Podcast

One of the many entrances to the Kabukicho neighborhood in Tokyo’s Shinjuku Ward.
Kabukicho: Tokyo’s ‘stadium of desire’

Longform

Members of the Wajima City Morning Market Association pose for a group photograph on the site where the market once stood.
In the wake of disaster, the revival of Wajima's market brings hope
By Alex K.T. Martin

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