The entrance to 弘道館

A picture of the garden

Arriving early we helped chopping the vegetables  we were going to eat later that evening

The Tokonoma (床の間)

After helping with the preparations those of us who arrived early got the chance to wear Japanese Kimono (着物). Though I have been here for nearly a year now this was actually my first time to try one on, so it was quite exiting..

Getting dressed is a lot of work! Luckily we did get help..

Those of us who got the chance to wear Kimono (+ Alex in Samurai outfit..)!

Alex got to dress up like a Samurai.

Me in Kimono

Before entering the room of the tea ceremony we had to wash our hands outside in the garden fountain (つくばい -> 蹲)

Our teacher seems to collect things that has a special background and history. This tea cup was actually used by David Beckham under the World Cup in Berlin 2009.!!!)

Our teacher (to the right) talking about the different tools being used during a tea ceremony

After the tea ceremony was over the room was made into a much less formal party-room instead. The Nabe some of us had helped preparing earlier the day was brought in, and we had a huge nabe-party!
This is probably one of my best school days ever, haha..

Getting ready for a nabe party!

A picture from our table.

Every semester Ritsumeikan offers some special traditional art classes which are aimed at exchange students following the SKP program. The classes offered vary from semester to semester, and the traditional art classes offered during the spring semester is Shamisen (三味線), Ikebana (生け花) and Wagashi (和菓子). Wagashi is the word for Japanese confectionery, and this is something especially Kyoto is famous for.

Our teacher explaining how to make sakuramochi

For making sakuramochi (桜餅) we divided red bean paste into small balls which we then wrapped in mochi rice. Just as easy as it sounds like. (^_^)v

Red bean paste almost covered by mochi

Alex and mochi.

After rolling the mochi so that they are nice and round you just wrap them in two sakura leaves, and voila!, there you have a finished sakuramochi..

Sakuramochi ready to be eaten!

A random pic from the wagashi studio. These are used to make wagashi-sweets with pattern.

Mochi ready to be wrapped..

This is how it looks like when a mochi has been wrapped in bamboo leaves.

But one mochi is not enough for this style though; you need to wrap three of them which you afterwards bind together to make the final chimaki.

After wrapping three mochi in bamboo leaves our teacher showed us how to bind them together.

And there you have it: Chimaki made by me, Alex and Ericka.

Thank you for reading! Please feel free to leave any comments or questions below
Anette

• All blogposts from Ritsumeikan
• All my blogposts about Japanese Culture Classes offered by Ritsumeikan:
  Wagashi (confectionery) (spring semester)
  Calligraphy (autumn semester
  Ceramics (autumn semester)
  Ikebana (flower arrangement) (spring semester)