Japanese tea ceremony or CHAKAI is a traditional and interesting Japanese custom. This ceremony was held in an old beautiful garden and performed by a few women wearing national costume of Japan named KIMONO. Pparticipating as a guest in a formal tea ceremony requires knowledge of the prescribed gestures and phrases, the proper way to take tea and sweets, and general deportment in the tea room. Before drinking green tea, a piece of a traditional sweet named WAGASHI is given to each participant. Eating this sweet before drinking will cause the tea to become tastier. The interesting part is how to drink green tea? You should put the tea bowl on the palm of your left hand and then rotate the bowl three times in clockwise direction. After drinking, you should rotate the cup three times but this time in under clockwise direction and then put the bowl in front of yourself and thank the host in its Japanese way for his/her reception as you can see in the pictures. This procedure is done while the hosts and gusts are kneeling on their lower legs which is the traditional formal way of sitting in Japan named SEIZA. This sitting style is difficult for some non Japanese people like my friend Tillek!!!!!!!!
These beautiful pictures have bee taken from the garden at which tea ceremony was held. Drinking a cup of hot tea in a cold afternoon was really desirable.