What an Incredible day today!
All thanks to my friend and neighbor Amy. Thank you thank you thank you....
The day began with beautiful sunny weather, a bit chilly but nothing a coat won't fix. Amy and I met at the hall and proceeded to her Ikebana class.
What is Ikebana?
Ikebana is a type of Japanese art of flower arrangement. The key is to allow each stem, leaf, and flower to coexist with each other in a minimalistic yet elegant way. This art form dates back over 500 years. I was lucky enough to be taught by an actual ikebana sensei (teacher) today. She has had many years of experience and people from all over the world come to be taught by her.
I was first provided with a shallow dish, half filled with water and a square floral frog in the middle. The frog is used to hold up the arrangement. You start out with the stems. The longest stem should be over 2x the length of your dish, and represents the "father". The other stems should be shorter than the "father" and those stems represent the rest of the family adult members. The trick is to place each stem straight into the frog and then slant is away from you. After the stems comes the leaves. The leaves represent the children and should be placed in front of the "parents". The children should be half the length of the stems. Finally comes the flowers. The flowers are to be placed in between the parents and the children to bind the union of the family.
I first watched sensei create an ikebana. After, she asked me to put one together on my own. Here is a side by side comparison (can you tell which one is the one I made?):
After ikebana, Junko-san, Ota-san, Amy, and I went over to Ota-san's house for lunch and to visit her garden. On our way to her house, she had a surprise for Amy. We all went to her Buddhist temple, where the resident monk showed us how to zazen. Zazen is a form of meditation practiced in Zen Buddhism and it is supposed to calm the body and the mind so that the practitioner is able to concentrate enough to experience insight into man's existence and thereby gaining enlightenment. In its simplest explanation, the practitioner sits on a cushion, either in a full lotus or half lotus position, with a straight posture, and hands in cosmic mudra (placing right hand over the left hand with thumbs touching forming a circle). A bell rings signaling time for zazen, and if desired, the monk may perform Kyosaku on you, which is him standing behind you and hits your right shoulder with a wooden stick once as a means of encouraging or reinvigorating the practitioner. It was a truly humbling experience and I wish I took more pictures, but all I got was the meditation room, which is called the zendo.
After zazen, we went to visit Ota-san's garden. Now, I have been to more than a few people's homes in Japan, and hands down she has the most beautiful home in Japan I have ever visited. For starters, all the houses in her neighbourhood belongs to her family. Secondly, every house is huge with a large garden, which is very unusual given how expensive land is there, and she lives very close to downtown Nagoya. Third, her house has a detached palace. I'll explain later.
Ota-san's garden. She has many different trees, shrubs, and flowers. There were ume (plum) trees, rapeseed blossoms, daffodils, wisteria, sakura (cherry blossom) trees, and many more. It was just beautiful. They were all so beautiful and wonderfully kept.
Then she treated us to an awesome lunch at her detached palace. The detached palace is a 2 storey home the size of a normal mid size home in Canada (~1500 sqft) on her property. It is fully self-contained with a bedroom, living and dining rooms, kitchen, and bathroom. It was designed by Ota-san herself. The house is beautiful. It has many windows framed with dark brown wood on each wall, and a round window out to the immaculate garden. Junko-san says this is meant to bring peace and tranquility to the home. The palace is normally occupied when her son and his family visit her from Tokyo, which is a couple of times a year. There were beautiful paintings and furniture everywhere, and everything felt as if they belonged in a museum because all the pieces were old and had history. Just amazing. And I'm sure my description is not doing it any justice whatsoever.
The lunch was great. It was the traditional hitsumabushi lunch, which is charbroiled slices of unagi (eel) on top of a bed of seasoned rice. It is usually served with soup that you pour onto the unagi/rice. It was soo delicious, especially served with Japanese champagne and very good sake, and ended with the sweetest strawberries I have ever tasted along with little cakes and green tea. I ate so much and it still wasn't over...
This is what a typical hitsumabushi looks like. I just took a picture of the place setting - I didn't want to be too much of a nerd taking pictures of everything...
After lunch, Ota-san learned I had never been to a Japanese tea ceremony, so she decided to show me how to make the tea. Her mother was a tea ceremony master, which is a very prestige title because it takes a long commitment to accomplish.
How to make a traditional cup of tea:
Step 1: Rinsing with hot water to warm the bowls. Important to swish around the bowl.
Step 2: Sifting the tea powder and there's me with Ota-san while she's making tea.
Step 3: Place a teaspoon full of sifted tea into each bowl:
Step 4: Whisking with a bamboo whisk. It's all with a light wrist action around and around the bowl. Ota-san was so nice she let me use the whisk for my own cup. This is typically not offered to the guest.
Step 5: A finished bowl of tea. I couldn't wait to try it so no picture. The tea was delicious and apparently it's full of vitamin and anti-oxidants. Bonus!
I really enjoyed spending time with the ladies today. They are all such extraordinary women. Ota-san has many talents. For example, she made these and teaches people how to make them:
They were all handmade and hand stitched. A paddle like that on the right would take approximately 3 months to finish and cost a lot of money. It's a lot of dedication and fine craftsmanship to do something like that.
Junko-san speaks very good English and teaches English to students and professionals. She just recently fully retired and is enjoying life to the fullest. She visits her many friends everyday. Good for her.
I wish I could be like any of the ladies I met today. They were all so gifted and talented and hard-working in their own rite. Today was a great day.
Note: I did not take many pictures at Ota-san's place because I felt like it would invade her privacy, so that's also the reason why I am not posting any pictures of her house here.
No comments:
Post a Comment