Tea Ceremony Kyoto Experience: Hear from Our Delighted Visitors

Thank you for having us. It was truly our pleasure. What a wonderful experience this has been. Learned so much about not just the ceremony itself but all of the education you gave us about the history and what it means and what the purpose was. It was very interesting. Yes, it was just beautiful. It wasn't just a tea ceremony. It was so educational about the history and the meaning behind it and the implements and just more than we had imagined it would be and we're very grateful to to get to participate with you today and learn from you. Thank you. I would say I was also, to be honest, I didn't know what to expect and I thought, well, could this be uncomfortable? It's a very, frankly, foreign experience for us but you made this very comfortable, very engaging, very easy experience. It's so much more about the interaction, the formality, the learning about the instruments that are used. The tea is almost secondary to a tea ceremony. I had no idea. For me, very similar. It's all of the things around it. I think it makes me think of other things in our lives too and what is the meaning and the symbolism and the thought that went into things that maybe we do all the time naturally and haven't really stopped to think about everything that goes into it. Learning from you, everything that goes into the tea ceremony really just made it so much more meaningful than what I imagined it would be. They felt very much to me like this wasn't just another Sunday afternoon for you where I've got to do a tea ceremony. You were very engaging and I can tell that you're very passionate about this and thank you for sharing such beautiful utensils with us. The tea was delicious. And the tea was good. Thank you. Absolutely loved it and found out that I actually do like matcha tea. The information, the presentation was absolutely more than we could have hoped for and more than we expected. It's a wonderful way to give us memories to last forever, I think. Thank you. It was wonderful. It was very pleasant to have you explain all the processes, all the steps, the symbolisms behind them, the meanings behind them. It gave a deeper understanding and appreciation to the whole process. It was very good. Totally agree. Very informative. Very detailed and just the whole process is very eye-opening. Very enjoyable experience. Would highly recommend to any of our friends who are coming to Kyoto. Thank you so much for showing up. I very much loved the thick matcha, so that was very enjoyable. Bitter at first, however, after the second sip, it was very nutty, roasty and very enjoyable. And it's something that you can't experience anywhere else. I agree. Something you definitely can't experience anywhere else. It's very different to all the tea I've had before, but I can understand how there's many layers of taste and depth to it that needs to be unpacked as you try to drink it. But yes, it's very enjoyable. I guess once we understood that we're all participants in this ceremony, it makes sense for us to have an obligation to do certain parts from our own too, which sort of drew out the need to do certain things to enjoy the ceremony itself. That's what I like about it. Wonderful. It was wonderful to see both your and Steve's devotion to the practice. Embrace the spirit of hospitality. I think it was a very special experience and made us really appreciate this element of Japanese culture. And while you definitely presented the formality of it, I think you were very nurturing and guiding us and instructing. So it was nice to kind of have both elements of it to see the practice, but then to also kind of take part of it. And we had no prior introduction to it. You made it very comfortable, right? I think it's one of those things that you said, if there was the wrong practitioner, it could have been a much more uncomfortable process where you were focused on the formality and not actually on the learning of the experience. Yeah, all of that, I thought it was very insightful. It wasn't just the how to do something, but the why you do it. So I really appreciate that in the open-ended discussion. I love the depth of the conversation that happened. I think it was really interesting to take part of and to experience both sides of that. So thank you for sharing. I like the way you interpreted the ritual. I actually like what you said, that this is not for solipsism. It's a ritual where you're deeply concentrated, but you also acknowledge everyone you meet, which is another kind of concentration. I like that very much. So I run a research project. We meet at least once a week to send scientific results to each other. But I would also like to do something more ritualistic. So if I could do something, maybe not quite as ritualistic as this, but still has that flavor, that would be nice. I need to think about what we can do, because it's something that everyone is sharing. Everyone can learn to do it, whether they are good at programming or doing equations or whatever. That should not matter. It should just be doing something together.