A few Sundays past, Sister spent the afternoon at a Japanese Tea Room in her town. She recounts her experience in detail, explaining the nuances of the ceremony. The link is to a video of the tea ceremony and is provided by Robert Moran and Vimeo. Please enjoy.
http://vimeo.com/2843872
"Inside the jar, the moon and the sun continue…" (this is what I remember of Ritsuko’s description of the scroll today: 2.7.10) She said that the tea room is ‘the jar’ and when inside, it is like time stands still because your focus is on every single movement and symbol of ‘tea’. Ritsuko said there is a Chinese story of a man who crawls into a jar and lives for many years. The story tells of his encounters while away from the busy world.
Since my last visit, Ritsuko’s tea room has been completed and I had no idea what to expect. The addition is beautiful and simple. It was explained that the son of a local builder, who was integrally involved with the Japanese Tea House in the Botanical Gardens, built the room for Ritsuko. He visited the spot when it was almost complete and then died suddenly a month later. When the garden area is complete, guests will enter this way leaving their shoes (and swords, if we were in Japan) outside the entrance. The door to the room is about 3 x 3 and yes, everyone crawls into the room. This is VERY Japanese in that it equalizes everyone; no one is greater than another. Tea rooms are small limiting the number of guests to 3 or 4 and there is a seating arrangement, like everything else of which I have no grasp.
Ritsuko’s room is 4 ½ tatamis. In the center of the room is a brazier sunken in the floor. The bottom is covered in sand; in the center you place special charcoal (which she reminded us can cause carbon monoxide poisoning) and there is a whole ceremony for laying the charcoal. The charcoal is placed within the confines of 3 iron stands onto which is placed the pot with lid for the heated water.
Once you enter the tea room you remain on your knees and sort of slide from one point to another. If you walk in, as we did, you are reminded not to step on the seams of the tatami mats (course I’m thinking, ‘step on a crack…’) the reality is that the seams are fragile and are also markers for the ceremony. Each person wears clean, white socks and you sit on your knees or pillows. If frail or fragile (as I am, I couldn’t fold my foot under me) you may sit on a stool. This is a bit embarrassing since now you are higher than others in the room and Japanese expend an awful lot of effort trying to make one another comfortable and at ease. There are times when you talk and times you simply try to become one with the making of the tea. I wanted to ask lots of questions and during the first session a friend whispered constantly, explaining what was happening.
When the hostess is ready she enters the room, bowing on entry and then turning to bow again to the doorway – hhhmmm… She may have to make several trips into the room with her instruments and this will require her to get up and down from her knees as many times as needed. She brings in a container with a lid which holds cold water and places it JUST so (one student actually physically counted the number of strips of tatami before placing the vessel in what she deemed the correct spot.) She will bring in a vessel or bowl which will be used to clean the other items, a ladle, stand, wooden whisk, the actual bowl or setting she has chosen for her tea. Some tea is as thick as mayonnaise and other is thin and frothy but as far as I can tell all tea is served in what we could call bowls – not, tea cups. Finally the tea itself, in a special container and the implement used to measure tea into the bowl. This seemed to require 3 trips since you don’t use a tray and you don’t try to make it all in one fell swoop, as I would do (the lazy man’s load as mother would call it).
Beyond the entrance the hostess uses, there is a beautiful area of shelving and a sink at floor level. On the shelves are several tea bowls and the implements one uses to prepare the tea. Ritsuko has a wonderful combination of pottery and china as well as larger bowls or platters that may be used for the sweets you share prior to the tea.
The ritual is so involved that even parts of the conversation are always the same, like asking about the particular type of tea, etc. When the sweet is passed you remove the papers and pick you carry in your kimono or tea ‘bag’ (like a flat purse) and you place your sweet onto your paper wiping the chopsticks on the corner of one piece of the paper after serving yourself. In a kimono one carries a fan. This is never opened but used to indicate beauty and to welcome the hostess and other guests into the room by its placement on the tatami mat. I don’t recall what Ritsuko was wearing at my previous visit but I think perhaps just regular clothing. Today she had on a beautiful kimono the color of cinnamon. On the back was a small symbol about which I wish I had asked. I love how they stick things in the giant sleeves and again in the surplice where it crosses over the chest and their fan and silk pieces ride along tucked into their belt.
Of course before serving you bow. There’s a great deal of bowing and the placement of your hands on the mats is also ritualistic. You eat your sweet with your pick . When finished, you wipe your pick with your paper; remove the upper most piece of paper from your stack and return the unused pieces to your kimono. I’m not sure what you do with the soiled piece; my friend took mine; folded it very small and sequestered it somewhere.
NOW, you focus on the tea. The hostess has been symbolically cleaning items using a piece of silk that is folded in a certain manner and rides around inside her belt. Even if you don’t wear a kimono you wear a belt which serves as a holder for this cloth and for another beautiful piece which you use beneath your tea bowl so that the bowl is separate from the tatami mat. The silk piece with which you symbolically clean and present items to your guests must be handled in particular ways for each type of tea. You open it one way for thick tea and another way for thin tea. The folding and replacement of this piece of cloth is a very big part of the process and during both sessions Ritsuko would work with her student directing them to use their thumb sometimes and their forefinger at other times. All of this begins with a ritual examination of the piece of silk and ALWAYS begins with the edge with no seam at the top. This edge symbolizes harmony and the hostess proceeds from here to closely examine each edge of the cloth. When satisfied, the cleaning begins.
After the symbolic cleaning, comes the ritual rinsing of the tea bowl and the whisk. This too is a process and the water used is discarded into a special bowl which is partially hidden behind/beside the hostess.
The angle at which the hostess sits (on her knees), the placement of her arms and hands all figure in to the overall picture. Ritsuko regularly indicates that the student should move a tad this way or that. Wiping the edge of the cleaned bowl is done with your fingers at a certain point with a sort of flourish. Finally, it is time for the tea to be prepared. The preparation of one bowl of tea, which will be shared by as many as three guests can take a full hour. Again there are times when it is appropriate to talk and times when it is only appropriate to focus on the hostess. Her one goal is to make you, the guest, feel honored by her efforts. Every sound you hear or don’t hear, every smell and every sight are all significant parts of the service. There are times when an implement is intentionally touched to the side of a vessel and there are times when the same implement may be used with the no sound at all. I became a bit mesmerized watching the steam rise from the heated water.
From my seat, I was looking directly at the pot in the brazier. Behind the pot closest to the opposite wall was the hostess. In the corner of her area is a screen, today’s screen was plain and stood about 3 feet high. Ritsuko has several screens and interchanges them depending on mood, theme, season, etc. The screen seems to have no use other than beauty; there is nothing behind it since it sits flush with the wall.
The tea is measured into the bowl using a skinny little implement whose name I do not know. Water is added from the heated pot using a wooden ladle and the replacement of the pot’s lid and the placement of the ladle, after use, are all part of the ceremony. At one point, maybe at its first use, the ladle is held in front of the hostess in the ‘mirror’ position – as if you are reflecting on what is about to happen. Once the water and tea are together the hostess uses the wooden whisk to combine the elements to the correct consistency. Ritsuko explained that normally a whisk would only be used once but due to monetary constraints her students clean and use the whisks over and over. They are lovely little accessories and it was all I could do not to touch it. I have only seen green tea being prepared but perhaps there are other types and blends. The tea is in powder form and the flavor reminds me of grass. When the tea is ready, the hostess sits it near you, not right in front of you. The guest then bows to the hostess and fetches the tea in a specific way. You must turn the bowl 2/3rds of the way around so that the part that was facing you is no longer doing so and you must place the bowl on the stiff, silk napkin you carry in your belt. Each of these tasks is completed while holding and placing your hands in a certain manner on the bowls sides (more than I could grasp during my 2 sessions).
Drinking the tea is done in 3 sips and the last sip should include a type of slurp. During my first visit I wanted to be sure I slurped approvingly and of course, I choked resulting in a coughing frenzy that lasted until I got home that afternoon, very embarrassing. This time I was careful NOT to slurp in any way, shape or form since I didn’t want a repeat of my past performance but I was careful to try to drain my bowl with 3 drinks. There isn’t much tea in the bowl but the prospect of insulting the hostess haunted me! During the second session, three people drank from the same bowl one after the other. Even though they wipe their area and turn the bowl I still find this habit repulsive. I was glad that I was not included in this session as I do not want to drink after another, especially since we were all sniffing due to the weather!
Once the tea is finished the service is not over. The bowl and implements are cleaned again with the hot, little pre-folded cloths. The tea and the implement used to measure the tea is placed on a mat for the guest’s perusal. Finally, everything is put in order and the hostess begins the process of removing all her items from the area.
Can you imagine? An entire tea ceremony may last 4 to 5 hours. There is a full meal and more symbolism than I can imagine. Guests are on their knees, (if healthy) with the exception of a break near the end, the entire time. During the break the food items would be removed and the prep for the actual ‘tea’ portion would begin. The guests would be allowed to be excused into the garden area for a smoke, a bathroom break, or a stretch.
Ritsuko instructs both men and women in this ritual and it is a lifelong learning process. For years there was nothing written about the ceremony – every piece had to be explained and taught from one person to another. I cannot imagine the patience this would require from both parties, the teacher and the student. Now, even though there are written descriptions, some of the aspects must still be taught, rehearsed, practiced and learned simply by ‘doing’ over time. Ritsuko and a couple of students travel to watch others perform and were discussing things they had seen and heard during a recent trip to Atlanta to watch a man who is considered one of the greats! (Whatever that means…) They shared a laugh when Ritsuko repeated a question that someone in his audience asked: “if I drop the ladle when I am dipping water, what should I do?” It seems the great one replied: “you pick it up and proceed” – I mean I’m not Japanese but what else could you do?
Two books were suggested that I might enjoy which give some insight into ‘tea’. One by the anthropologist, Jennifer Anderson: An Introduction to the Ritual of Tea and another, an essay by Tanizaki: In Praise of Shadows, both of which I was able to find as used books thru Amazon. Now I look forward to deepening my very limited understanding of this ceremony that is so like meditation to me.
When leaving Ritsuko’s home, I noticed the flow of water in front of her driveway. We had experienced a couple of rainy days prior to this and a stream of water was making its way down her street in front of everyone’s house. The water was moving quickly enough to have tiny wavelets. After being immersed, so to speak, in the watery aspects of tea I was thrilled that I was mindful enough not only to notice the water but to notice the curls and imagine that I could hear the sound it might be making. Starting my car and heading back into reality was tough but I chose to be appreciative of the hours I been fortunate enough to spend in Ritsuko’s little sanctuary.
