As tea ceremony is an important aspect of Japanese culture, we often have classes in our school where the students can experience it for themselves! Whereas in many countries we are happy to just throw a bag of Lipton into some hot water, the Japanese art of serving tea is a very involved and complicated process, which can take years of study! This kind of beauty attracts people to Japanese culture.
At first the students were given a demonstration by our resident tea ceremony teacher, who has studied the art for countless years. Along with showing the method of preparing tea, she also taught us about proper expressions and manners.
After that, it was time for the students themselves to give it a try! The teacher makes it look easy, but they all soon learned how difficult the art is!
In the end, all of our students gained a new appreciation for drinking tea! Having this kind of experience can actually be challenging if you don't know someone in the practice, so our students are quite lucky to be able to have such a seminar!