One of the aspects of Japanese culture that tea practitioners have to make a decision about is the wearing of kimonos. Tea was developed during a time when everyone wore kimonos on a daily basis, and even today, the movements are intended to be done by someone wearing a kimono – everything from the way the sleeves fall to where you place the various items that you carry into the room (like the wiping cloth or fukusa and the papers we use to eat sweets, or kaishi).
Today, particularly for Westerners, the question of whether or not to wear a kimono is a personal one, and in my experience a lot depends on where you study and how your teacher feels about kimonos. If you go to Kyoto to study at the main Urasenke school, you’d be expected to wear a kimono to class every day. At branch schools, like the one at New York, kimonos are optional for lower-level classes and required for higher-level ones. If you’re studying with a private teacher, then your experience may vary.
I was taught that the proper etiquette is to always wear a kimono if you’re teaching a class, and that it’s optional if you’re taking a class (unless it’s one of the high-level classes I mentioned above). However, I know of people who choose to never wear a kimono, even when teaching. Others wear kimonos so often that they feel uncomfortable doing tea at all in Western clothes.
It’s very much a psychological thing. Some people – both Japanese and Westerners – prefer to wear kimonos, either because they like them or because they feel it adds to the tea experience. Some people prefer not to wear them because they’re so formal, or because they’re difficult to put on, or because they can be restrictive. I know a Japanese woman who doesn’t like to wear kimonos because she feels that people associate tea with geishas, and she doesn’t like feeling as if she’s put on display.
To me, kimonos are like formal wear for tea – if it’s a formal occasion, be it a gathering or a special class, or if I’m teaching – I wear a kimono. If it’s a more casual setting, I’ll wear Western clothes. But I can see that there are many different perspectives on kimono, and I respect whatever decision that others make.
In the coming weeks I’ll talk more about life with kimonos, especially as it relates to tea. If you’re interested, please feel free to post questions!
Friday, July 23, 2010
Wednesday, June 9, 2010
Feeling the Heat
We’ve had a heat wave the past couple of weeks here, and being in an open-air house with no air conditioning, we really feel it when we’re doing tea.
Moving from our old tea house, with central heat and air, where the windows were all covered with screens, to doing tea in a house where we’re in touch with the elements, has really deepened my appreciation for why we do thing the way we do. For example, in the summertime we try to use bowls that are wide and open, which dispel the heat of the water faster and cool off the tea. Another classic example is the fact that the brazier that heats the water is shifted to a position farther away from the guests than in the winter.
But it’s more than that. Doing tea, even in lessons (maybe especially in lessons) requires a lot of concentration, and that’s really hard to maintain in hot weather. We all find ourselves making silly mistakes or forgetting things that under normal circumstances we’d have no trouble remembering.
I think that’s why, in the tea world, summer is considered a good time to do “casual teas” – using more playful, non-traditional items like glass bowls, and avoiding long and formal gatherings. It’s just too hot to be serious right now!
The worst heat of the season is still to come in July and August, and there are all kinds of season things that we can do to suggest coolness – to psych ourselves into not feeling so hot. But I think the real secret of doing tea in this season is to start by accepting our environment the way it is, and rather than complaining about it, to work with what we’ve got.
Moving from our old tea house, with central heat and air, where the windows were all covered with screens, to doing tea in a house where we’re in touch with the elements, has really deepened my appreciation for why we do thing the way we do. For example, in the summertime we try to use bowls that are wide and open, which dispel the heat of the water faster and cool off the tea. Another classic example is the fact that the brazier that heats the water is shifted to a position farther away from the guests than in the winter.
But it’s more than that. Doing tea, even in lessons (maybe especially in lessons) requires a lot of concentration, and that’s really hard to maintain in hot weather. We all find ourselves making silly mistakes or forgetting things that under normal circumstances we’d have no trouble remembering.
I think that’s why, in the tea world, summer is considered a good time to do “casual teas” – using more playful, non-traditional items like glass bowls, and avoiding long and formal gatherings. It’s just too hot to be serious right now!
The worst heat of the season is still to come in July and August, and there are all kinds of season things that we can do to suggest coolness – to psych ourselves into not feeling so hot. But I think the real secret of doing tea in this season is to start by accepting our environment the way it is, and rather than complaining about it, to work with what we’ve got.
Tuesday, May 4, 2010
What's in a Name
Recently myself and another of our tea people, Drew Hanson, received our chameis, or tea names.
It’s hard to exaggerate what a huge moment this is in the life of a tea ceremony practitioner. It’s a bit like a graduation in that it symbolizes the fact that you’ve completed a certain course of study – you’ve worked your way through increasingly difficult levels of tea practice and, more than that, you’ve worked to develop your inner self as well.
In another sense, it’s almost like taking on a new identity. It’s not just the new name itself (which, in times past in Japan, the tea practitioner might actually have used as his everyday name); along with the name, we get permission to wear the Urasenke crest on our kimonos, in the place where (for a Japanese person) the family crest would go. It’s a little bit like being adopted into a very large family.
My tea name is Somon. The first syllable, “So,” is the same for every tea practitioner who gets his or her tea name from Urasenke. It comes from Sen no Rikyu, the founder of the Urasenke lineage (and the lineage of every other major tea school in Japan). His Buddhist name was Soeki, and that was also the name that his friends and associates used when talking to him. We use the “So” from that name in our tea names; it’s difficult to translate, but the same character is often used in words relating a religious sect or teaching.
The second character of a person’s tea name often comes from their given name. For example, the “mon” in my name comes from the “mo” in my given name, Morgan. There are a number of different characters that could be read “mon,” but in my case, the character is the same as “crest,” as in a family crest. My Japanese language teacher says that the name has the feeling of someone who’s a symbol of a spiritual teaching.
Of course, the name is meant to be an inspiration to work harder rather than a description of my current state. Still, it feels like a huge responsibility, especially since I feel like I have so much left to learn. Tea ceremony is an art that you could study for a lifetime and still keep learning, but getting to this point really kind of throws a light on everything that I’ve done, and everything I still have left to do. I feel different, and I think I need to hold on to that feeling so that I can keep trying to get better.
It’s hard to exaggerate what a huge moment this is in the life of a tea ceremony practitioner. It’s a bit like a graduation in that it symbolizes the fact that you’ve completed a certain course of study – you’ve worked your way through increasingly difficult levels of tea practice and, more than that, you’ve worked to develop your inner self as well.
In another sense, it’s almost like taking on a new identity. It’s not just the new name itself (which, in times past in Japan, the tea practitioner might actually have used as his everyday name); along with the name, we get permission to wear the Urasenke crest on our kimonos, in the place where (for a Japanese person) the family crest would go. It’s a little bit like being adopted into a very large family.
My tea name is Somon. The first syllable, “So,” is the same for every tea practitioner who gets his or her tea name from Urasenke. It comes from Sen no Rikyu, the founder of the Urasenke lineage (and the lineage of every other major tea school in Japan). His Buddhist name was Soeki, and that was also the name that his friends and associates used when talking to him. We use the “So” from that name in our tea names; it’s difficult to translate, but the same character is often used in words relating a religious sect or teaching.
The second character of a person’s tea name often comes from their given name. For example, the “mon” in my name comes from the “mo” in my given name, Morgan. There are a number of different characters that could be read “mon,” but in my case, the character is the same as “crest,” as in a family crest. My Japanese language teacher says that the name has the feeling of someone who’s a symbol of a spiritual teaching.
Of course, the name is meant to be an inspiration to work harder rather than a description of my current state. Still, it feels like a huge responsibility, especially since I feel like I have so much left to learn. Tea ceremony is an art that you could study for a lifetime and still keep learning, but getting to this point really kind of throws a light on everything that I’ve done, and everything I still have left to do. I feel different, and I think I need to hold on to that feeling so that I can keep trying to get better.
Wednesday, April 14, 2010
Sakura Season!
This past weekend was Philadelphia’s Sakura Matsuri, the cherry blossom festival, so of course it was a busy weekend for us. On Saturday, Drew Hanson, one of our teachers, did a demonstration at the Morris Arboretum that was covered by the local news (he ended up on television!), and was attended by 60-70 people. I was helping one of our other teachers, Taeko Shervin, doing two smaller demonstrations at the Japanese House. I don’t have any photos of Drew’s demo yet, but here are some from Taeko-sensei’s:
The demonstrations took place on the veranda of the house, overlooking the koi pond. Here’s a shot that gives you a sense of where everybody was:
And us serving sweets:
And if you’re wondering what they saw as they were sitting there, here’s a photo of Taeko-sensei doing tea (I’m standing behind her). She was doing a type of tea ceremony called shikishidate, a type of tea ceremony intended to be done outside picnic-style.
And, just for the fun of it, a shot of the newly redesigned tsukubai (water basin for washing hands) outside the tea room at the Japanese House:
The next day we all came together for Sakura Sunday, which is the culmination of Philadelphia’s three weeks of cherry blossom-related events. There were Japanese cultural activities, music, and general merriment all around the Horticultural Center, which is the location of one of the major cherry tree plantings in the area. Unfortunately, because of the unusually warm spring, the cherry blossoms were almost completely finished blooming by festival time (except for the late-blooming double-blossom variety), but we were very lucky to have absolutely gorgeous weather for both days.
We were set up in one of the Horticultural Center’s greenhouses, surrounded by plants, underneath a little tent for shade. We had people lining up to get in about half an hour before each demonstration, and due to the limited space we could only fit 50-60 people in the room, but there were more standing in the doorway looking in.
This first photo is Taeko-sensei doing the same procedure again (Drew is sitting behind her):
This is the first demonstration; the first guest (drinking in this shot) is Mary Lynn, one of our students; the other two guests are volunteers from the audience:
This photo is from our second demonstration; the first guest (with the bowl in front of her) is Terry, another of our students, and the other two guests were festival volunteers from Philadelphia University. I’m on the right, acting as assistant (hanto):
In this last shot, Mary Lynn and Drew are serving tea to the Cherry Blossom Queen and her entourage, who flew in from Japan as special guests of the festival:
We’re always grateful to have so much interest during cherry blossom time, and to be able to enjoy the beauty of the season. I hope that you had some wonderful cherry memories too!
The demonstrations took place on the veranda of the house, overlooking the koi pond. Here’s a shot that gives you a sense of where everybody was:
And us serving sweets:
And if you’re wondering what they saw as they were sitting there, here’s a photo of Taeko-sensei doing tea (I’m standing behind her). She was doing a type of tea ceremony called shikishidate, a type of tea ceremony intended to be done outside picnic-style.
And, just for the fun of it, a shot of the newly redesigned tsukubai (water basin for washing hands) outside the tea room at the Japanese House:
The next day we all came together for Sakura Sunday, which is the culmination of Philadelphia’s three weeks of cherry blossom-related events. There were Japanese cultural activities, music, and general merriment all around the Horticultural Center, which is the location of one of the major cherry tree plantings in the area. Unfortunately, because of the unusually warm spring, the cherry blossoms were almost completely finished blooming by festival time (except for the late-blooming double-blossom variety), but we were very lucky to have absolutely gorgeous weather for both days.
We were set up in one of the Horticultural Center’s greenhouses, surrounded by plants, underneath a little tent for shade. We had people lining up to get in about half an hour before each demonstration, and due to the limited space we could only fit 50-60 people in the room, but there were more standing in the doorway looking in.
This first photo is Taeko-sensei doing the same procedure again (Drew is sitting behind her):
This is the first demonstration; the first guest (drinking in this shot) is Mary Lynn, one of our students; the other two guests are volunteers from the audience:
This photo is from our second demonstration; the first guest (with the bowl in front of her) is Terry, another of our students, and the other two guests were festival volunteers from Philadelphia University. I’m on the right, acting as assistant (hanto):
In this last shot, Mary Lynn and Drew are serving tea to the Cherry Blossom Queen and her entourage, who flew in from Japan as special guests of the festival:
We’re always grateful to have so much interest during cherry blossom time, and to be able to enjoy the beauty of the season. I hope that you had some wonderful cherry memories too!
Monday, April 5, 2010
Gratitude
I think it’s an almost universal truth that we don’t appreciate our teachers enough – at least, not while we’re students. This is true in a lot of areas, but particularly in a practice like tea ceremony, where you spend so much time learning from a single teacher or (in the case of a branch school) a single group of teachers.
I was thinking about this lately in the context of taking lessons from my own sensei. When I was a student – or I should say, when was a beginning student – I didn’t have a sense of how much I didn’t know, or how lucky I was to have such experienced teachers. I find myself now wishing I’d asked more questions, taken better notes, and most of all, that I’d let myself be in the moment more.
I think the ultimate lesson that students learn, though, is that if you want to be a good student you have to move beyond just being a student and really practice. It’s only when you need to plan your own tea gathering, for example, or teach a class that the holes in your knowledge become obvious. And its only when that happens that you realize how important it is to always keep learning – and be a better student this time.
I was thinking about this lately in the context of taking lessons from my own sensei. When I was a student – or I should say, when was a beginning student – I didn’t have a sense of how much I didn’t know, or how lucky I was to have such experienced teachers. I find myself now wishing I’d asked more questions, taken better notes, and most of all, that I’d let myself be in the moment more.
I think the ultimate lesson that students learn, though, is that if you want to be a good student you have to move beyond just being a student and really practice. It’s only when you need to plan your own tea gathering, for example, or teach a class that the holes in your knowledge become obvious. And its only when that happens that you realize how important it is to always keep learning – and be a better student this time.
Wednesday, March 17, 2010
Licensed to Tea
In tea ceremony, as in many other Japanese arts, there is a system of ranking to mark a student’s progress in tea. It’s a little bit like the belt system in karate, except that instead of a physical symbol like a belt, what the student receives is a license to study the next level of tea.
At the beginner level, the students learn how to prepare thin tea and thick tea, and a number of different variations on those basic temae (procedures for preparing tea). Students also receive a separate license to study the portable temae known as chabako (“box tea”). This may seem pretty straightforward, but it’s not just about memorizing a sequence of movements, it’s about perfecting your technique and starting to absorb the philosophy of tea, and so it can be years from the time a student starts taking lessons until he or she is ready to move on to the next level. After that, there’s an intermediate level known as konarai, a more advanced level known as shikaden, and finally a series of high-level licenses known collectively as okuden. At each level, the temaes get progressively more complex and require more specialized knowledge and equipment. Only after mastering all off these levels does a student receive his or her chamei (“tea name”), which means that he or she has truly become a tea person, and can teach and practice tea independently of his or her teacher.
The licenses themselves are special documents – they’re handwritten in Japanese calligraphy, with the name of the student, the date, and the seal of Urasenke’s Oiemoto (Grand Master). The application has to be made by the teacher and sent to Kyoto, and it can take anywhere from six months to a year for the license to come back (usually closer to six months). In our group, when licenses arrive, the teacher reads them out in the tearoom and then formally presents them to the student.
Different teachers approach licenses differently. Some teachers will move a student through the different levels very quickly; some will take their time and make sure that the student is fully prepared before before allowing them to advance. I think on average, depending on the teacher and the student, it takes between ten and fifteen years to get to the chamei level. (This is assuming that the student is studying part-time. It’s possible to got to Kyoto and study full-time at Urasenke, in which case you would get to the chamei level in about three years.)
Of course, the vast majority of students who begin studying tea ceremony don’t make it to the chamei level – not that it’s so difficult, but it does require a lot of time and patience, and it takes a certain kind of person to be that dedicated to tea. I was thinking about that this past weekend as one of our students received her konarai license – a true achievement in tea, and one that she well earned. I was really proud to see her advance, especially since she worked so hard to get there. It’s been a real privilege to watch her blossom and continue on her journey in tea.
At the beginner level, the students learn how to prepare thin tea and thick tea, and a number of different variations on those basic temae (procedures for preparing tea). Students also receive a separate license to study the portable temae known as chabako (“box tea”). This may seem pretty straightforward, but it’s not just about memorizing a sequence of movements, it’s about perfecting your technique and starting to absorb the philosophy of tea, and so it can be years from the time a student starts taking lessons until he or she is ready to move on to the next level. After that, there’s an intermediate level known as konarai, a more advanced level known as shikaden, and finally a series of high-level licenses known collectively as okuden. At each level, the temaes get progressively more complex and require more specialized knowledge and equipment. Only after mastering all off these levels does a student receive his or her chamei (“tea name”), which means that he or she has truly become a tea person, and can teach and practice tea independently of his or her teacher.
The licenses themselves are special documents – they’re handwritten in Japanese calligraphy, with the name of the student, the date, and the seal of Urasenke’s Oiemoto (Grand Master). The application has to be made by the teacher and sent to Kyoto, and it can take anywhere from six months to a year for the license to come back (usually closer to six months). In our group, when licenses arrive, the teacher reads them out in the tearoom and then formally presents them to the student.
Different teachers approach licenses differently. Some teachers will move a student through the different levels very quickly; some will take their time and make sure that the student is fully prepared before before allowing them to advance. I think on average, depending on the teacher and the student, it takes between ten and fifteen years to get to the chamei level. (This is assuming that the student is studying part-time. It’s possible to got to Kyoto and study full-time at Urasenke, in which case you would get to the chamei level in about three years.)
Of course, the vast majority of students who begin studying tea ceremony don’t make it to the chamei level – not that it’s so difficult, but it does require a lot of time and patience, and it takes a certain kind of person to be that dedicated to tea. I was thinking about that this past weekend as one of our students received her konarai license – a true achievement in tea, and one that she well earned. I was really proud to see her advance, especially since she worked so hard to get there. It’s been a real privilege to watch her blossom and continue on her journey in tea.
Thursday, February 18, 2010
A Room of One's Own
Anyone who practices tea ceremony for long enough inevitably come to a point where they want to create their own tea space. The tea room is an absolutely crucial part of tea ceremony – the architecture, the design, the colors and shapes all contribute to the mood of a tea ceremony. Anyone who’s been in a tea room will testify that there’s no substitute. And lo, after fifteen years of tea ceremony, I’ve finally arrived at a time and place where I can create one of my own.
If I were going to do this in the absolutely proper way – hire a Japanese carpenter trained in traditional design techniques who is an expert in all of the multitude of rules that apply to the creation of a space like a tearoom and buy only the most traditional materials imported from Japan – I could easily spent tens of thousands of dollars on this room, maybe as high as a hundred thousand dollars. Needless to say, that’s a bit out of my budget range. So, like most American tea practitioners setting out to create their own tea space, I’m pulling together the resources I can and doing it with a little help from my friends and family.
At this point, I’m just beginning the design phase, which in a lot of ways is the most important part. You have to think about every detail – not just the layout of the room, but where the light is coming from, what’s illuminated and what isn’t, what the guests will see when they enter the room; what they’ll see when they’re sitting and drinking tea. How will the hanging flower vase look when a guest is sitting in front of the alcove? Is there a way to adjust the temperature if the room is too hot or too cold? Is there enough ventilation if you’re using a charcoal fire to heat the water?
In my case, we’ve set aside a room in the house that’s going to be the tearoom; there’s just enough space to create a room of four and a half tatami mats (the smaller of two “standard” sizes) with an alcove and a separate mizuya or preparation area. I’d like the room to include a sunken hearth – used in the wintertime to bring the fire closer to the guests and keep them warm. In order for that to happen, we’d have to either cut a hole in the floor (not a popular option with my significant other) or create a raised floor within the room, which is the more likely scenario. The problem with that is that it lowers the ceiling to just a little more than six and a half feet, which should be okay for most guests, but it makes the issue of lighting fixures more important.
The other big design question is how to deal with window access. The way the room is currently laid out, the alcove would be next to the window, so the window would be behind an interior wall (which I’d want to do anyhow because there’s a radiator right in front of the window, and I want to hide that). I can put a window in that wall to let the light through, but then there’s the question of how to access the window if we need to open it or do repairs. What I’m thinking is that instead of a wall, we could install a pair of sliding doors with shoji, so that the light comes through and it provides easy access. Would it look strange to have a door where there’s no actual exit? I think the function would probably trump form in this case.
Anyhow, I’m sure I’ll be writing lots more about this in the coming months. Questions and feedback are certainly welcome!
If I were going to do this in the absolutely proper way – hire a Japanese carpenter trained in traditional design techniques who is an expert in all of the multitude of rules that apply to the creation of a space like a tearoom and buy only the most traditional materials imported from Japan – I could easily spent tens of thousands of dollars on this room, maybe as high as a hundred thousand dollars. Needless to say, that’s a bit out of my budget range. So, like most American tea practitioners setting out to create their own tea space, I’m pulling together the resources I can and doing it with a little help from my friends and family.
At this point, I’m just beginning the design phase, which in a lot of ways is the most important part. You have to think about every detail – not just the layout of the room, but where the light is coming from, what’s illuminated and what isn’t, what the guests will see when they enter the room; what they’ll see when they’re sitting and drinking tea. How will the hanging flower vase look when a guest is sitting in front of the alcove? Is there a way to adjust the temperature if the room is too hot or too cold? Is there enough ventilation if you’re using a charcoal fire to heat the water?
In my case, we’ve set aside a room in the house that’s going to be the tearoom; there’s just enough space to create a room of four and a half tatami mats (the smaller of two “standard” sizes) with an alcove and a separate mizuya or preparation area. I’d like the room to include a sunken hearth – used in the wintertime to bring the fire closer to the guests and keep them warm. In order for that to happen, we’d have to either cut a hole in the floor (not a popular option with my significant other) or create a raised floor within the room, which is the more likely scenario. The problem with that is that it lowers the ceiling to just a little more than six and a half feet, which should be okay for most guests, but it makes the issue of lighting fixures more important.
The other big design question is how to deal with window access. The way the room is currently laid out, the alcove would be next to the window, so the window would be behind an interior wall (which I’d want to do anyhow because there’s a radiator right in front of the window, and I want to hide that). I can put a window in that wall to let the light through, but then there’s the question of how to access the window if we need to open it or do repairs. What I’m thinking is that instead of a wall, we could install a pair of sliding doors with shoji, so that the light comes through and it provides easy access. Would it look strange to have a door where there’s no actual exit? I think the function would probably trump form in this case.
Anyhow, I’m sure I’ll be writing lots more about this in the coming months. Questions and feedback are certainly welcome!
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