A full schedule

Barely back from Thailand and my life in Japan has taken off in several directions, all very interesting. I may have mentioned the English Café, a small group that meets once a month to practice their English, but did I tell you that the host of this group is also an ikebana and tea ceremony master? This is the case and she has invited me to come to her house for lessons. Today I went after classes and joined two of her students in learning the tea ceremony and then in attempting to arrange flowers in the ikebana tradition or style. My knees are in pretty bad condition and getting worse form lack of practice, so the big challenge in all this is that the Japanese do theses things in seiza (sitting on the knees). The sensei kindly got me a stool and let me sit cross-legged most of the time, but I have to do some stretching to be able to continue. It was so interesting to see the tea ceremony, the utensils, the hundreds of little ritual details that go together to create a quiet, solemn ceremony. I enjoyed trying to communicate with the young ladies as well and one asked me if I would give her private English lessons. At the end of the lesson, the teacher loaned me a vase and frog to take home so I could keep my flowers at home!

Once the lessons were done, I went upstairs to have dinner with her family, the daughter with the three adorable children. The daughter’s husband is away in Tokyo getting training for a new job so it was just mom and the three little ones: two boys aged 10 and 7 and a little girl age 4. I had fun entertaining the kids while the dinner was being prepared and then we all sat on the floor around the low table and had an absolutely delicious meal. On the table was miso soup, a dish with sweetened rice, raw scallops, avocado and cooked shrimp, three kinds of sashimi, tuna, scallops and another fish I couldn’t name, and a salad, all of it delicious and eaten with gusto. Shortly after sitting down to eat we were joined by a younger sister and later, her mother, my teacher. While I only grasp parts of most conversations, it was so good just be “part of the family” for a short while and hear the day to day kinds of things people talk about. When it was time to go, every one came out to see me off on my bicycle, making sure I could manage the flowers and the vase in the basket on the front of my bike.

All of this follows on the heels of a very busy Saturday in which I had my second calligraphy class. I love the class and teacher. She speaks no English so we make do, but she is patient and kind. I'm starting with the writing that elementary kids learn, then I'll move to middle school writing and on the high school levels and beyond, if I make that much progress. It's relaxing and I don't care if her elementary age students look at me a little strangely, an old lady just learning her letters! This time I was on my own, no friend from Yamasa to interpret for me, but it worked out fine, the sensei had her grandson and daughter there and they helped with their halting English when I got stuck. The grandson has come up with a kanji (Chinese character) name for me, as calligraphers need one to sign their work. I was thrilled. Apparently he is quite talented at inventing names that have nice meanings and still sound sort of like your real name. He's only fourteen, but seemed to enjoy the challenge of figuring out a name that would work. When I can write it I’ll let you see!

Another addition to my schedule is an English class that I’ll be teaching on Wednesdays to a group of women from the Cultural Exchange Organization. The same group that gave us a cooking class just before I left for Thailand. Did I mention that? It was so much fun, but I haven’t had the time to even think about it since.

So, in short, it now appears that I am meeting some of my goals in coming here: to experience some Japanese culture first hand, to meet Japanese and try speaking with them in my halting Japanese, and to teach English and earn a little money to help pay for all these cultural things, which come with some overhead. For example, the brush for doing calligraphy is about $30.00. Today’s flowers were $10. If I get serious about the tea ceremony I could spend a LOT of money on the accoutrement. Probably I won’t go there, but the calligraphy is something I can see really getting into, if I have time. 

The pictures included here come from earlier events, an ikebana show I went to last month and the cooking class.

Matane…