A day with a bit of everything

Today was going to turn out to be one of the busiest days of the trip. The first thing we all learned was that we would be splitting up into groups. One group would go with Dr. Peng, while the other would go with Dr. Laurence. The three activities we would be participating in that day was going to a Buddhist altar maker, Zazen mediation, and going to a traditional Japanese sweet shop. The basic setup would be that, in the morning Dr. Peng's group would go to the sweet shop, while Dr. Laurence's group would go to the altar maker first. Both groups would then meet up at the Buddhist temple for the Zazen mediation and then the groups would switch and go to the other visit. There was one main difference though. Dr. Laurence's group would be accompanied by our TV friends and they would be recorded for the documentary that was being filmed about us. Dr. Laurence's group included Carol, Matt, Andy, Charles, Laura, and myself.

One of the altars

Since I was with Dr. Laurence, we went to the altar maker first. Right from the beginning, the shop was impressive. There was a big statue on the outside of the building and some of the different altars were some of the first things you saw when you entered the store. We were told here that the altars were mostly used by families to honor their loved ones that passed away. We also learned that most families will pass their altar down for generations. This means that, in order to help themselves stay in business, the shop also offered services in repairing and cleaning altars. Personally, I could not believe the level of detail and the amount of work that was put into each altar. Every altar was its own work of art and very impressive. At the end of the tour, we were given the opportunity to try the gold coating technique they use on altars. Basically, a wooden surface is given a very thin layer of a kind of liquid, set aside to dry, and then the gold strips are put on it. It is not as easy as it sounds though. The gold strips are extremely thin, must be picked up with wooden tongs since they would be destroyed by human hands, and separated by thin strips of wax paper. Just trying to pick up one of the gold strips could prove to be extremely frustrating. I really enjoyed having the opportunity to experience this technique and I was quite pleased with how my bowl turned out in the end.

After we had a chance to buy anything from the store, we were off to the nearby Buddhist Temple. The other group was already there and waiting for us. The first thing we were taught when we arrived was how to use the water basin in order to purify ourselves, which is something you are supposed to do before entering the temple. Once inside the temple, we went straight to learning how Zazen mediation worked. Zazen mediation is supposed to be done at least twice a day and is supposed to help with stress. The proper stance is to sit cross legged on a pillow that is folded in half on the group. Both hands are placed palm-up, with the right hand on top of the left and the two thumbs meeting to form a circle. The back is supposed to be straight and the eyes are supposed to be partially closed throughout the session. Our session began after the monk hit the gong and turned off the lights and ended after the gong was hit again and the lights turned back on. We ended up doing two sessions, a fifteen minute session and an eight minute session. The first session was kind of difficult because my body was not used to just sitting in this kind of position and also because both of my legs ended up falling asleep. The second session was not as difficult and I actually found myself enjoying it. While I do not think I will be doing this twice a day, taking the time to try this mediation out at home is something I might do, especially since it was nice to just sit down and not really think about anything for a while.

Once our time at the temple was up, we split back into our groups. Our group went off to the final stop at the Okinaya Japanese Sweet Company. This business has been around for, if I remember correctly, 150 years and the owner was the 8th generation of the family that started the business. We started by learning about the traditional Japanese sweets, Wagashi, and how they were normally used in formal tea ceremonies. The Wagashi sweets themselves are basically little works of art. I was amazed by all of the different kinds of sweets and just how easy the masters made them look to make. We were given the chance to make three different kinds of sweets ourselves. The owner wold first do a full demonstration, which would sometimes be so fast that I would miss what happened, and then the owner would actually make the sweet with us. While mine really did not look at all like the owner's, I was pretty happy with how they turned out. Next, we picked one of our sweets to eat and then we all participated in the traditional tea ceremony. How this works is, everyone uses a kind of bamboo stick to cut the sweet and eat the smaller pieces. Once the sweet is gone, you drink the tea, but in order to show respect to the host, you have to find the front of the cup and then rotate it so you do not drink from the front section. Not only that, but you are supposed to take three to four sips to drink the tea and slurp the tea up on the last sip. It was all really quite a fun experience.

At the sweet shop

With all of the days activities done, we all headed back to the hotel. We all left soon after we arrived though. This was because we were all headed out for our final group dinner. We were also joined by our television crew friends, the owner of the sweet shop and his wife (who are personal friends of Dr. Laurence) and the interpreter we had at the Buddhist altar maker. The dinner was a lot of fun and I enjoyed being able to talk with everyone and see what their opinions were. Overall, everyone really enjoyed both businesses we went to and to have the chance to try out the mediation. Also, because this was our final group dinner, Dr. Peng handed out certificates to everyone at the end of the dinner. Today really was a very busy day and I was quite glad to be able to go to sleep once we were back at the hotel.