May 19

We had our first chashaku carving practicum today. The guy who taught it made it look so easy. We got out our blades and began slowly shaving away small pieces of the bamboo strips to make the bent tea scoop that we use when we lift tea from the tea container and put it in the tea bowl. It’s basically a wooden scoop or spoon just for tea. These items are always made by hand and you can tell a lot about a person based on how this utensil is formed. Is it narrow or thick? Is it rough or smooth? Is it too long to be useful? Is it well-balanced? Did the person make long, confident strokes with their blade or short, hesitant ones?

I’m attaching a picture of mine. It ended up being way to thin and too short, but I was proud of it all the same. This chashaku will be exchanged via an Urasenke school program with a tea group in Fukushima. We will be receiving one back from them as well. I did writing on the tube myself which says the name of the scoop and my name. As you know Fukushima had the terrible earthquake and issues with the nuclear plant, so any chashaku I get back from there will have a deeper meaning attached to it that I can think about every time I use it. (And no, it won’t be radioactive, our teachers told us this already.)

Every chashaku is always given a name by the person who carved it. This one I called “Ame o tanoshimu,” or literally, enjoying the rain. I selected this gomei (poetic name) because, to me, it is a good example of how rain is a symbol of cleansing and purifying both literally and metaphorically. I also said that it rains a lot where I come from in America. This was written in an explanation letter which will be translated and sent along with the chashaku tube. I hope someone is able to use it and enjoy it!

May 25

We had O’iemoto’s monthly lecture / address to the school. In these situations, we show up to school in our best kimonos and wear the little earbuds that have a translator telling us what he is saying. It made me feel like I was in the United Nations! It’s pretty cool. As I reread some of the notes I took in my pocket moleskin, I see that he mentioned some great things to keep in mind for anyone let alone “tea people:”

He said that when things become too complex, return to your base: take a moment to notice the feeling in the air, the space around you, the conditions all around. When the wind blows you over, don’t make excuses for the wind. Just try, try. Then it was a mistake you didn’t have to make. Failures, mistakes lead to success. Recover from them. You can see you have more to learn and can grow even more. Then you won’t have regrets. Throw away the thoughts in yourself, your personal feelings about things that bother you. Take the animosity, the pride and throw it away.

He also said to consider all that has come before to lead to this one moment. For example, consider when you drink water to think about the snow melting in to water, flowing down the mountain to the river, leading to the reservoir, going around and around and finally ending up in our bodies. Or the seed that grows in to a plant which bears fruit which winds up on our table and sustains our lives. Or, in the tea room with guests, all of the ancestors who came before both you and your guests who brought you to this one shared moment in time which will never come again. Take value in every moment, in every minute.  …wow… I’m not learning about “just tea” here. I’m learning about how to live a beautiful, reflective, life of gratitude.

May 26 – First Student Chakai

We had our first Keiko Chakai of our sempai, Anna. She did a remarkable job with all the preparations and all of the guests (there were 7 of us) had a wonderful time. A chakai is like a party that is similar to something (in Western culture) that Martha Stewart would create: it has every detail planned out from the invitations to the decorations to the food. However, unlike western culture, a chakai has spiritual goals as well. It is trying to create harmony between guests.

The details that the host has prepared are supposed to make the people in the room feel special but without saying anything explicit. An example of this, is that our first guest is from Hawaii, and our host selected a natsume (tea container) with a hibiscus flower on the top. She noticed and thanked the host for being so thoughtful in selecting this particular item. There are thousands upon thousands of things the host could have picked from, and yet, she selected this one tiny thing because she knew it would bring her guest pleasure.

Our lovely host was wearing a beautiful obi she borrowed with matryoshka dolls on it, a nice nod to her heritage and the shared heritage of one of her other guests.

I experienced this feeling my first time coming to Urasenke with Kevin for a short visit and in my letter asking for permission to come, I mentioned that in Portland the daffodils had just started to bloom. When I came to Japan about 6 weeks later, the tea bowl that I received my delicious tea in had daffodils on it. Was it a coincidence to serve me that bowl? Absolutely not. They had made a note, somewhere way back when, that daffodils were blooming in Oregon and that bowl was served to me. It was a small gesture. It didn’t cost them anything, so to speak. And yet that gesture spoke droves to me. The key thing, the thing that makes it unique to this culture, is that after I had drunk my tea and returned that bowl, the host DID NOT come in and say “did you notice what was on the bowl?” That would have been the western thing to do. The host just lets it go unsaid and the guest may make an observation about it. Sometimes your guests might not even notice that you made the gesture in the first place. But the key is that you know. And that’s something that’s intuitive, it really can’t be taught.

Our teacher Hamana-sensei told us this story about how thoughtfulness can’t be taught but it can be observed and absorbed by others. His example was that he started to cough in lecture and a student got up and got him a glass of water. However, it was winter time and the water wasn’t just tap water. It was warm tea drinking temperature, so it was soothing to someone with a sore throat. He didn’t tell this as an example to shame us in to not paying attention to the needs of our teachers, but rather as an example of something to emulate. It cost nothing for that student to leave the room and bring water. No money was spent and no gift was given. But that tiny gesture spoke loads to this teacher and he still tells that story.

Here is a nice picture of me wearing kimono kneeling at the tsukubai cleansing my hands before entering the tea room.

May 7
We have had some days off several public holidays on Friday April 29 and May 3-5. Since last I wrote I’ve done quite a lot. Some of us on Saturday, April 30 went to an Art of Zen exhibit at the Kyoto National Art Museum. I learned the story of Daruma (the little red ball guy with scary eyes) is a ball because the real Daruma (important person in Zen history) supposedly sat staring at a wall for nine years until his arms and legs atrophied and fell off. Also he cut off his own eye lids because he was frustrated he kept falling asleep during meditation. Thus, the “scary eyes” on the little dharma dolls. In actuality he was a founder of the Zen sect of Buddhism.

We made the shift to wearing kimono full-time beginning in May. We have only a handful of kimono, so slowly we will begin to acquire more. For those of us who are tall and curvy it is very difficult to find affordable kimono that will fit. Luckily I came with one kimono that fits well enough and there is our scholarship kimono, which will be necessary to keep pristine for special events. Other than that it’s about shopping for things slowly and as the seasons dictate. Wearing the most appropriate seasonal kimono is an art on to itself! Luckily the school doesn’t care if your kimono is not truely 100% in season (i.e. that your obi has specific motifs that are relating to what is blooming in nature, etc.) but as long as you are wearing kimono presentably, you are good.That’s another thing I’m glad I learned before I came here: How to dress myself in kimono in under 30 minutes. It REALLY allows me to sleep longer in the mornings and every minute of sleep counts here.

I also went to a sencha demonstration at Nijo castle. I’ve never seen a sencha tea ceremony a nd it was fascinating. They had two different schools present in two of the famous closed to the public tea rooms at this beautiful shogun castle in the heart of Kyoto. The tea was served in these small sake sized cups and you only sipped about a thimble’s worth of tea. Very interesting but tasty.

Todaiji Temple Kenchashiki
The highlight of this week was absolutely the tea offering made by Daisosho and Urasenke to the Todaiji Temple in Nara. Daisosho is the retired grand tea master and his mission of spreading peace through a bowl of tea is why he created the Midorikai program in the 60s. He is the reason why us foreign students are allowed to be here. Two other students and myself went to the event. We were up at 4:45 am to make it in time to enjoy the first seki (tea gathering). We went to all four tea gatherings, one tenshin meal, and one offering to the temple by Daisosho himself! Our legs were so tired by the end. I can’t explain what a pleasure this day was. The dogu (utensils) were all museum pieces. We are talking pieces from the 1600s up to the present. Perhaps a 1,000 people in kimono!

And the location! Todaiji holds the record as the largest wooden structure in the world! It houses a massive, giant Buddha statue inside. Without the tea event being held there this would be a special place. Also you can feed the wild deer who are the protected spirit animal deities that roam around. Amazingly we had the opportunity to greet Daisosho-sama twice. He is 93 but still as healthy as ever! He came over and greeted us and shook our hands. This is a big deal. It would be like President Obama coming over and shaking your hand – NO JOKE! He is that much of a honored person in this world.

Later on in the day when we were waiting for the second seki to begin, we saw him and his handlers again. He saw us again and called over the official photographer and we had our picture taken with him. He is such a genuinely kind and caring individual. Sort of like the Dalai Lama or Mother Teresa…someone who just embodies all that is good and kind in this world. And it wasn’t that he just noticed us or greeted us. It’s the fact that he does this kind of stuff all over the world, to all sorts of people and he genuinely
means it. He isn’t doing it to win elections or make money. He does it because he wants to do it. I can really respect that characteristic,  that honesty, in a person.

Other matters
I’ve been exploring the possibilities of improving my Japanese while I’m here. I took an online lesson through a webhost called iTalki. I had researched that company when I was wanting to improve my Swedish. I found a nice Japanese coach through that site who was really good who I think I will work with occasionally. I also enrolled in a
Conversational course forJapanese residents that is available at the Kyoto Prefectural International Center. The web independent course will be great to have a place to practice specific things I need for my time at Urasenke, whereas the conversational class will give me confidence and experience just conversing (normally) with people.
Hopefully it will help focusing on language growth a few hours a week! I suppose it’s better than nothing,  onsidering how much I have to use my VERY limited Japanese here. Both classes assume that I know how to read and write hiragana and katakana, so glad that I worked on learning those alphabets while I was still in the US. Now just to put those letters (pictographs?) together to make words!