Aoi and I left a while ago to go to Moto's tea making class. When we got there we got to meet the Sensei and introduce ourselves. He's a very nice guy, Randall Channell. Originally Canadian, he's very famous in Japan for he is one of the few Gaijin (foreign) tea masters. So we got to sit (on our knees-painful) and Moto served us tea. Its funny because its very precise. Even the way you sit. Sensei made us sit up really straight (he told us we looked like cats). You get a small dessert when you sit down and then someone will prepare the tea.
After Moto made the tea, Sensei told me I should try. Its so much work. You have to walk into the room with your right foot, and hold certain things certain ways. Basically I hardly remember any of the steps due to the fact there were so many. But basicall it goes like this.
Get everything together on a tray. Put tray next to door holding it properly, bend down on knees. Get bronze bowl (used to put in dirty water in cleaning process). Walk into room with right foot, left foot, right foot, kneel down. From then on it involves a whole bunch of steps like making sure the tea powder bowl is at the 11pm position on the tray, fold the hankerchief in thos fashion, use it to pick up this, put it a 9pm position.
Im uploading the pictures which will hopefully give a better idea of what it was like. It was fun!
