KURUME, Fukuoka — Japanese high school students have created a video to encourage young people in Kentucky, where scores were killed by recent tornadoes. The students have finished editing the video and it will be emailed to a Kentucky high school Wednesday.   In the video, shooting for which took place Friday, 233 students from Miichuo High School in Kurume,….Read more

A thought-provoking novel penned by a respected writer 32 years ago suddenly became a bestseller in July, with almost 110,000 new copies printed this year alone on top of the 270,000 sold over the past three decades. What kind of people bought Tsutsui Yasutaka’s Zanzo ni Kuchibeni wo (Lipstick on Afterimage), which describes a world in which one hiragana character….Read more

Ebara Miki NHK World Chief International Correspondent / Executive Producer   The massive earthquake and tsunami that hit northeastern Japan in March 2011 claimed more than 18,000 lives, including those of two young Americans: Montgomery Dickson and Taylor Anderson.   They worked under the government-sponsored Japan Exchange and Teaching program, and had become much-loved members of their respective communities. Ten years later, their legacies continue….Read more

In a sign of the times, the Mie prefectural board of education patrols the internet instead of schools and classrooms looking for bullying linked to children and students in the prefecture.   Under the specialized app put in operation in June last year, when comments connected to bullying and other inappropriate posts are discovered by citizens, they are kept as….Read more

“You made a choice to join the imperial family by marrying Dad. But Mako and I didn’t have another option. We were born into it. All we want is an ordinary life!” This is what Princess Kako (right) allegedly told her mother during a quarrel over the controversial marriage between her older sister Mako (left) and commoner Komuro Kei, whose….Read more