Context brings the brightest minds to your living room with perspective-shifting online lectures.

Performing A Japanese Tea Ceremony:  Live Learning Experience with Kana Hattori

Performing A Japanese Tea Ceremony: Live Learning Experience with Kana Hattori


No events are scheduled at this time. Want to be notified when it’s back? Click the blue button to the right and we’ll notify you.

Can't make this time? A video recording will be sent to all participants after the seminar.

Ready to take a breath and feel Zen? Join this virtual Japanese tea ceremony where participants will also learn how to properly whisk matcha.

The Japanese tea ceremony is not only about making and drinking tasty, healthy matcha but also about calming the mind and the heart, focusing our heart on what's in front of us, and living in the moment. In a way, this is Zen meditation through tea.

This Conversation is a half lecture (history and philosophy) and half matcha-making experience. Whereas our other tea ceremony focused Conversation, Zen in the Art of Japanese Tea Ceremony with Kana Hattori, is 100% lecture explaining the Zen philosophy running in the Japanese tea ceremony, this one aims to have participants actually "experience" the Zen philosophy with more active engagement in a virtual tea ceremony.

Participants can choose (1) just watch and learn, (2) learn how to whisk matcha the best way with a limited number of utensils, and (3) fully engage in a ceremonial, meditative method of making matcha with full utensils. No matter what you decide to do, you will have meditative, calming moments during the tea ceremony experience, and feel the Zen philosophy explained in the lecture. You will also learn how to properly drink matcha.

Led by a qualified instructor of Urasenke Tea Ceremony School, Kana Hattori, this Conversation will give participants the opportunity to really experience the philosophy of Zen in the art of Japanese tea ceremony. Designed to inform curiosity as well as future travels, participants will come away with an increased understanding of what the Japanese tea ceremony is about, feeling calm but yet uplifted.

All the items below are what you can prepare if you would like to join matcha-making during the seminar.  If you just want to watch and learn, you don't have to prepare anything!

Items to join just matcha whisking:

  • "Matcha" powdered green tea: ceremonial grade, NOT culinary grade.  Also preferably a Japanese one for the authentic experience.
  • Bamboo whisk (a cooking whisk will NOT do…please use the bamboo one designed for matcha whisking)
  • Bamboo scoop or a teaspoon
  • Matcha bowl (rice bowl/ any small bowl will do) (x2)
  • Small kitchen cloth or handkerchief
  • Hot water (about 500ml or 17 oz)

Bonus items to perform every step of the ceremony:

  • A tray or placemat 
  • Small cup to use as tea container: it is best to sift the matcha powder prior to tea making to remove clumps and make it easy to whisk into smooth foamy tea, so if you have a fine-mesh tea strainer, it is recommended to sift the matcha powder through the strainer into the small cup.  But if you don’t sift matcha powder, that’s also okay.  It’s recommended but not indispensable.
  • Another small kitchen cloth or handkerchief

Kana is a qualified tea master of Urasenke Tea Ceremony School and is an experienced national-licensed guide. She holds a BA in English from Doshisha University, Kyoto, and another BA in Japanese Classical and Traditional Arts from Kyoto University of Arts and Design. She enjoys playing the shamisen, a 3-stringed traditional music instrument that geisha ladies also play, and also performing Noh, 650-year-old Japanese classical theater. The Zen philosophy—to live in the moment—has always been a core tenet of her life.

This conversation is suitable for all ages.

90 minutes, including a 30 minute Q&A.

Customer Reviews

Based on 1 review
100%
(1)
0%
(0)
0%
(0)
0%
(0)
0%
(0)
A
Agnes Gancz (Cherry Hill, US)

Guest did not leave commentloved it!

Customer Reviews

Based on 1 review
100%
(1)
0%
(0)
0%
(0)
0%
(0)
0%
(0)
A
Agnes Gancz (Cherry Hill, US)

Guest did not leave commentloved it!