THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, August 10, 1995 TAG: 9508080099
SECTION: NORFOLK COMPASS PAGE: 16 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY DAWSON MILLS, CORRESPONDENT
LENGTH: Medium: 84 lines
THE REDEDICATION of Kitakyushu Park, the Japanese garden at the Norfolk Botanical Garden honoring Norfolk's long-standing sister city relationship with Kitakyushu, Japan, brought several members of the same family together despite the many miles between Norfolk and Japan.
In honor of the rededication of the park, originally created in 1962, the largest delegation from Kitakyushu ever to visit Norfolk came to participate and host an afternoon-long festival Saturday. The group included the mayor of Kitakyushu and other city officials as well as Japanese arts and cultural emissaries: martial arts experts, musicians, students and tea masters who demonstrated the traditional Japanese tea ceremony.
Yoshie Kato, from Kitakyushu, was one of the tea masters. For her the trip had special significance: Her daughter, Reiko Ando, is the wife of a manager at the Mitsubishi Chemical America Chesapeake facility. She and her husband, Tatsuo Ando, and their two children, daughter Mariya, 14, and son Kozo, 18, have lived in Norfolk for four years. Mariya is a rising eighth-grader and Kozo a rising senior at Norfolk Collegiate.
Several hundred spectators, many in coats and ties, and most of them standing, braved the afternoon sun on one of the hottest days of the heat wave. They were summoned from throughout the gardens to the official ceremony outside Baker Hall by a stirring and powerful performance by the Kokura Gion Drum Corps.
The dedication ceremony featured remarks in English by Norfolk's Mayor Paul Fraim and by Kitakyushu's Mayor Sueyoshi, rendered in Japanese by translator Makiko Shibata. The official ribbon-cutting, opening the newly renovated garden, by the mayors and Anne Ruffin, president of the board of the Norfolk Botanical Garden followed. Afterward, the tea masters began their ceremonies in Baker Hall.
The tea ceremony, incorporating many subtle customs and traditions, takes about 20 minutes to complete. Approximately 30 members of the public at a time were ushered into the room, where they sat in rows of chairs, classroom style, while the ceremony was performed by two tea masters, assisted by several others, on a raised wooden platform. The women wore kimonos; the lone man, Tsutomo Koba, also wore traditional Japanese dress.
Many years of study are required before the tea masters are permitted to perform the ceremony. Kato has been performing it for about 45 years.
Mayors Fraim and Sueyoshi and their party sat in the front row at the first ceremony. Tea, explained one of the tea masters, would be served only to those sitting in the first three rows; the others had to merely observe.
Three small sweets were passed to each spectator, including those who didn't receive the tea. The tea, one of the tea masters announced, was slightly bitter; the sweets were to be eaten before drinking it.
At the second ceremony, Kato and a dental student from Kitakyushu, Junko Ono, sat on the platform to perform the ceremony. They brewed the tea, dark green in color, served in large cups without handles, resembling soup bowls; it had an excellent flavor, sure to please any tea-lover. After overseeing the filling of all of the cups, both women bowed deeply toward the spectators, signaling the end of the ceremony.
A question-and-answer period followed. Someone asked where the tea service is practiced in the United States. There are branches of Ura-Sen-Ke performing the tea service here, according to one of the masters; the nearest is in New York. According to a Japanese woman, there is a Japanese house on the peninsula where the ceremony is performed twice annually.
The lobby of Baker Hall was suddenly filled with the strains of ``Sakura, Sakura,'' a traditional Japanese melody, as Mizuki Iwasaki's skilled fingers brought a Koto, a traditional Japanese musical instrument, to life. Out front, a martial arts team performed on an array of blue mats laid over the concrete. Despite the heat, visitors continued to stream through the reopened garden, admiring its delicate landscaping, flowering plants and trees, footbridge, ponds and shade. ILLUSTRATION: Photos by DAWSON MILLS
Karla Faulk, left, and her husband, Richard Faulk, enjoy the tea
ceremony in Baker Hall.
The Kokura Gion Drum Corps entertained spectators at the
rededication of Kitakyushu Park.
Yoshie Kato, left, and Junko Ono perform the tea ceremony at Norfolk
Botanical Garden.
by CNB