Omotesando, Tokyo is home of the St. Patrick’s Day Parade for Japan biggest city. This year’s parade is on March 14 and starts from Omotesando Hills; it runs from 2 p.m. till 4 p.m.

Tokyoites aren’t the only ones that think they have a little Irish in them. Other areas in Japan also hold parades and more.

The first delivery of at least 850 canisters of high-level radioactive vitrified waste arrived Tuesday morning by ship from the U.K. in Rokkasho, Aomori Prefecture, where it will sit in storage for decades before being buried deep underground. Antinuclear activists argue that with no local government yet willing to host a final disposal site and concern over the international security and environmental risks of transporting so much nuclear waste between the U.K. and Japan, the shipments should end.

The Oscar win for documentary “The Cove” is not getting much applause in Taiji, the port city in western Japan where Louie Psihoyos and his crew secretly filmed the annual dolphin slaughter.

“This film has mistakes of fact,” mayor Kazutaka Sangen told local press. “I’m surprised that it won the award even though its content is not truthful.”

Tokyo-based Medallion Media will release the doc in Japan this summer.

The words “Japan, wine exporter” have a somewhat unlikely ring but that is the aim of a new organisation, Koshu of Japan, which is keen to shine an international spotlight on a grape variety that is often dismissed within its native country.
I have just made my second visit in 12 years to Yamanashi prefecture, the Bordeaux of Japan in terms of winemaking. Except it reminds me more of Switzerland than Bordeaux. Every square metre in the heavily populated Kofu basin overlooked by Mount Fuji is cosseted. Individual vineyards are tiny, …

Preparatory education for university entrance examinations is an important rite of passage for many Japanese teenagers. This period of preparation can be a time of profound personal growth, confidence-building, and personal triumph for many of these ambitious youths. Toward that end, Tokyo-based, Mustard Seed Academy (MSA) recently celebrated the debut of its new campus in Shizuoka City last month, introducing to the community a unique approach to preparatory education in Japan. According to author, school dean, and senior English instructor Hajime Nakazawa, “If students deeply experience their worth and value, …

Japan’s government will keep a US military base on Okinawa, meeting the demands of the Obama administration, even if that means alienating a coalition partner and local people, a vice defense minister said.

Okinawan residents, who want the Marine base moved off the island, will be offered compensation in return for accepting the government’s decision, Akihisa Nagashima, said in an interview in Tokyo yesterday, without elaborating. His remarks are the most definitive by a member of the government indicating that Japan will keep the facility on Okinawa.

Kirsten Dunst is eating up Akihabara in a new video which covers the Vapor’s “Turning Japanese.”

Pictures of her were taken a few months back in cosplay and “Akihabara Majokko Princess” must be the final result. The famous Japanese artist Takashi Murakami produced the video.

Hotel packages featuring two meals but no overnight accommodation have been growing in popularity since autumn. Such plans are taking off among people who are keen to enjoy their holidays without traveling to distant locations and who would rather enjoy a hotel’s facilities for several hours without staying the night. For example, Hakone Kowakien Yunessun Inn, a hotel in Hakonemachi, Kanagawa Prefecture, offers a two-meal daytime plan for 6,500 yen per person for a room that usually costs 15,000 yen as part of a two-meal, overnight-stay package. The deal also …

Sapporo Snow Festival at Night with Beautifully lights!

Iolani Palace [Photo by tmaeda_japan]

Gundam [Photo by あくあ]

Gundam [Photo by あくあ]

Michael Jackson [Photo by tmaeda_japan]
Highlights Reel

Chibi Maruko-chan [Photo by あくあ]

Northern Zoos [Photo by 悪さー]

Northern Zoos [Photo by 悪さー]

The Place Where Dreams Come True [Photo by minkara]

Masatoshi Shimbo has always felt more than a bit paternal toward the changeling Roppongi district, the inner-city neighborhood where he grew up and his family made its real estate fortune. But Roppongi often breaks his heart, over the decades turning from a U.S. servicemen’s haunt into a respectable business district and then back to disrepute — the gentle women in kimonos giving way to mobsters and drug dealers. Good or bad, in this famously safe city, Roppongi stands out: elegant one block, seedy the next, a multicultural meeting spot known …