A singing and dancing performance staged by the Taiwan Aboriginal Art Group at the 6th MIFA International Exchange Festival in Tokyo on Sunday earned the acclaim of the audience.

When current participants in the Japan Exchange and Teaching (JET) Program gather, the discussion often focuses on English teaching methods. When the program's U.S. alumni get together, however, talk often turns to a weightier subject: U.S. foreign policy towards Japan.

If I were able to travel back in time and tell my teenage self that I would one day be enthusiastically welcomed in Manhattan as a lecturer on Japanese anime, fashion and music, the younger me--a fan of films set in the Big Apple--would never believe it. But in October I did indeed speak as an invited guest at the New York Anime Festival.

A swath of cables released by WikiLeaks show that Iceland looked to fellow pro-whaling nation Japan to bolster its case to ease the international ban on whale hunting. But Japan was hard-pressed to help.

South Korea and Japan have held their first talks on creating unprecedented agreements to share military intelligence and equipment. It is something the United States has encouraged because of recent attacks blamed on North Korea and Pyongyang’s continuing nuclear threat.

Besides the many fairs and festivals being hosted in the city this winter, comes the rare opportunity to witness Dolls of Japan, an exhibition of unique traditional Japanese dolls.

Mr. Zuckerberg, the 26-year-old Facebook chief executive and co-founder, may be the man of the moment in the United States and much of the rest of the online world. But here in Japan, one of the globe’s most wired nations, few people have heard of him.

Could world peace be sparked by a small group of children hoping to share a little goodwill with those who are less fortunate? Japan’s Kumon Institute of Education is trying to prove just that with its annual Ambassador of World Peace program.