I think you bow again once you're in the room, and if you do, you have to place the sensu in front of you while doing it. Finally you pick it up again, stand up and walk (actually shuffle because you're usually in a kimono) to the scroll hanging on the wall, sit down in seiza with sensu in front of you and admire the beauty of the scroll (I think you bow again). Then you turn to the ikebana and so the same thing (in our room the ikebana is next to the scroll, so you just slide slightly to face it). After admiring both, you stand up and walk towards the tea set/ the place the host makes tea, and sit down in seiza in front of it with sensu again. We are told to take a sort of 90 degree turn to do this in our class. You admire the pot containing the boiling water and the small pot containing the green tea powder (macha). You can now stand up and shuffle elegantly to your place as guest and sit down in seiza. Guests are always seated in order of prestige, with the most important guest next to the host and the next important on that guest's left, etc. The most prestigious guest does everything first: enter first, eat and drink first, etc.). When you walk to your 'seat', you walk into it, then turn around counter-clockwise to the front and sit down in seiza (so that your butt never passes by the guest on your right who is higher in status to you). The last guest to enter closes the sliding door (in 2 shots: first until there are only a few inches of space between the door and frame, and the second time entirely--this way you don't slam it). The sound of the door closing is heard by the host, who now knows it's about time to enter and start the ceremony.
(My sensei showing everyone how to make tea):
When the host enters and sits, everyone bows (including host). The host now begins procedure of cleaning utensils, etc. Then the host places some okashi (sweets) on a plate with wooden chopsticks and passes the plate to the first guest. This guest bows to the second guest (as a way of saying I'm going to start ahead of you) and uses the chopsticks to place an okashi onto his napkin (all guests carry a sensu and napkin). Before placing the chopsticks back the guest wipes them on the corner of his napkin and then passes the plate to the second guest. Picking up napkin with left hand, the guest can now eat using right hand. Everyone goes through this procedure (this is why it takes so longgg):
Since there are so many of us we split our class into 2 groups and while one is eating and drinking, the other group helps take plates and refills them with more okashi, take used tea cups (more like bowls actually), etc. When this happens, we exchange a bow like below:
Another type of okashi (we get a different one every class!) :D
First time our class learned to make tea. First you put a little macha powder into the bowl (it will be drunk out of this bowl) using a certain utensil. Then you spoon some hot water into the bowl (and you have to hold that long spoon a certain way--I found it difficult).
Then you mix it! Pretty simple actually. My first time I mixed too gently; you kind of mix it the way you mix eggs after cracking them and before pouring it into a pan to make an omelette; you want the powder to be mixed well into the water before drinking (which I didn't do so I felt bad for the person who had to drink my tea) :P
I took a video so you can see it in action! I apologize in advance for the blurriness: http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=10151110462926733
I just thought the kimonos looked really pretty from the back lol:
Now from where I left off: traditionally in Japanese tea ceremony (sadou) all the guests drink from the same bowl but in our class we all get individual ones. First bows are exchanged between the host and guest receiving tea. Then you bow to the guest on your right (as a way of asking if they want one more sip or in our case, bowl of tea--mou ippuku ikaga desu ka). The first guest doesn't do this obviously. Then you bow to the guest on your left (again as a way of saying I'm going to go ahead and drink first--osaki ni choudai itashimasu). Finally you pick up the bowl and hold it up a little above you as way of saying thanks or as a sign of respect to the host. Before drinking though, you have to rotate the bowl twice clockwise. Traditionally you take a sip, compliment the host, and then take another sip or two before passing it to the next guest. In our class we have to finish the tea in 3 sips and for the last sip it's polite to make a slight slurping sound to show you finished the whole thing (and presumably liked it). Then you take your napkin or thumb and pointer finger and clean the place on the bowl you drank from. This is especially necessary in traditional sadou because everyone drinks from the same bowl. After that you admire the bowl before rotating it twice counter-clockwise and setting it in front of the next guest (or in our class, just in front of us).
So yeah, tea ceremony is a very long process and even more so because everything is done so slowly. It's also a lot harder than most people think because it's so complex and every small detail matters. The entire ceremony is actually much more elaborate than I have described, but our class is only once a week so we don't have enough time to learn the entire thing. In fact most Japanese people do not know the tea ceremony, although it is highly respected. Those who do it have been practicing for years and consider it a hobby.
Here's my classmate posing beside the hanging scroll and ikebana. Every class two girls get to wear a kimono for sadou; can't wait for my turn! :D
The male version of a kimono:
So 2 weeks ago my dorm-mates played a prank on me by changing my birthday on Facebook to October 23rd without my knowing, and the next day (they changed it on the 22nd) my friends surprised me with cake! I was shocked because for one it wasn't my birthday, and two they were able to get it on such short notice! Even though I was highly annoyed at my dorm-mates, I was also really happy to have such nice friends. The cake (it was more like a pastry) was extremely good especially because it was chocolate ha ha:
But since I felt guilty that they bought it on my fake birthday, I made them eat it with me, and fed them Indian style ^_-
And yeah we were eating lunch in the lecture hall again lol
They also got me this; it was kind of like another pastry, also very good. The top line is my name in katakana (writing system used for foreign words).
Two days later my 2 Chinese friends decided to make nabe for dinner and invited me to eat with them.
The 3 of us :)
I took another video! http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=10151110475196733
The next day was the day of the Halloween party at one of dorms and to advertise for it, they wore their costumes and paraded around campus. I took a group picture:
The other half:
One of my dorm-mates; I don't recognize the character she is cos-playing as, but I thought she was beautiful:
The Americans xD
Since I didn't have a costume I borrowed her police uniform costume (you can see the badge by my purse strap lol) and in return I gave her an Indian outfit I had brought with me to Japan. I thought it really suited her! :)
Here's a full length picture (I'm too lazy to make it vertical):
After the party, my dorm-mates and I went out for dinner in Sakae to this Mexican restaurant.
My friends are pretending to enact a scene from a movie I think; I don't know it looked cool. Also notice the mask lol:
Soft taco! It's been too longgggg
Quesadilla! I missed you so muchhhhhh
Excellent salsa, although could have been spicier ;)
All of us (yes we went out in our costumes)
On the way back to the station, we walked by these dancers practicing outside a building. This seems to be pretty common I think which is interesting because at least where I'm from in America, you don't see people practicing dance outside at night by the street (loitering on public property? I don't know why). We walked up to them and struck up a conversation because one of my dorm-mates loves dance and wanted to know more about what they do and when they meet so he could perhaps join them. I took a video of my friend giving us a demonstration of one of the many different types of dance he does; you can see the dancers practicing in the background (they chose this particular building because they could see their reflection)
http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=10151122672906733
And to end the post, I saw my Japanese classmate's bag and decided to take a picture of it. Japan has a lot of merchandise like t-shirts, bags, mugs, etc. that have English written on them because to them Western stuff is cool; but the reason why it's funny is because almost always the English is either grammatically wrong, spelled wrong, and/or just doesn't make any sense what so ever to native English speakers. This bag is actually one of the better ones I have seen, but still doesn't make complete sense. I will try to find better examples when I next go shopping =P <teehee>
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