Ep 14 Big Blog Adventure

It would be foolish to travel all the way to Japan and not experience a tea ceremony. The Blogs are not fools. So impressed was Mr Blog, that he recounted in detail the entire 45 minute ritual for Mate-Mike-Spoiltheparty-Blog. 

Here is the short version...

A venerable, well established tea house had lowered its standards far enough to admit us.

On entering the bamboo and paper-walled room, Mr Blog noticed a few things were missing, carpets, seating, tables, plug-in kettles and sugar. Instead there were tatami mats, cushions and a woman in a kimono with some pottery.

Sitting cross-legged (or at least the nearest the blogs could manage) the centuries-old ceremony was explained by our host. A mix of Zen, socialising, honouring guests, cultural conversation and tea drinking.

The tea is made following a very srict method and takes years to perfect. The host judges the temperature of the water in the kettle (non plug-in) from the sound of the bubbling water. The tea is a green powder which is whisked with a carefully crafted bamboo whisk. The cup is presented to the guest with both hands and with the decoration on the cup facing the guest. The guest drinks the tea and turns the cup so the decoration faces the host.

(And there is so much more.)

Back to Mate-Mike-Spoiltheparty-Blog, who, hearing all the above says...

"Forty-five miuntes for a cup of tea? You could have gone to Costa for that!"

Ep 13 Big Blog Adventure

Some things in Japan began life outside Japan.

One of those is the wooden stirrer for stirring your tea/coffee. For hygiene reasons the stirrer is individually wrapped. 

For avoidance of doubt about what the wrapper contains, (for English speakers), the contents are described in English. 

However the translation took an unexpected turn ...

Stirrers in Japan are referred to as...

Join the Blog campaign "Rename all stirrers in the UK as Muddlers" The world will be a better place!

Ep 12 Big Blog Adventure

These posts are affecting Mrs Blog's cognitive functions. After reading two consecutive episodes on weird food...she decided to have a bowl of granola with lashings of double cream for breakfast.

Having survived a bento box full of dead things looking back at him Mr Blog was all ears and eyes for the tour of the tea plantation. Just as well because there was a mountain (pun intended) of information to absorb. 

(To assist the reader it is summarised in the bullets below)

• Eastern Mountain Teas is a plantation on a big mountain with a trail up it of 4.8 km 
• At the top of the mountain is a Shinto shrine
• Japanese people like to visit shrines at the top of mountains repeatedly
• Records are kept which show that two people have been up Tea mountain 20,000 times
• One old fella managed his 2,000th ascent when he was 94
• One old lady and her daughter were walking up the trail while we were there
• They didn't make it because the old lady took a tumble
• We were part of an impromptu rescue involving four tourists, one guide, two tea plantation workers and a small Suzuki people carrier designed for 8 people
• With 9 people it makes sense to put the youngest (the old lady's daughter) in the boot, squash the shaken old lady in between two plantation workers and hope for the best
• Everyone was very happy when we got back down to the plantation 
• Not everyone was happy with the tea because it tastes very bitter

Episode 11 Big Blog Adventure - Food worse than Veggie

(It seems appropriate that this post should be about food given the veggie update in the last one)

Japanese food is the stuff of legend so the Blogs were keen to sample all that the country had to offer. That is, until we were handed our "Bento boxes" on a coach trip from a mountain railway to a tea plantation.

Our guide, Eric, was quickly tucking in and savouring the contents whilst offering helpful advice like,

"There's a whole fish in here, you can eat all of the fish, the head and everything!"

Mr Blog opened his box slowly and sure enough found a whole, dead, cold fish looking back at him. Next to it was a section of the box filled with what looked like red crisps with nigella seeds (but without  his reading glasses on, Mr Blog was only 90% sure). Next to this was a collection of translucent crunchy noodles with sesame seeds, something that looked like a shrivelled kiwi fruit and a rice ball.

Mr Blog munched and crunched and only later found out,

1. the red crisps were shrimps (the seeds were there eyes)
2. the translucent noodles were whitebait (the seeds were their eyes)
3. the shrivelled kiwi fruit was a salted plum that made your face pucker up to half its normal size, and
4. the rice ball was a ball of cold rice
5. Mrs Blog didn't eat very much

Had he known then of the delights of Tofu Chilli without chilli, Mr Blog might have gone vegetarian before arriving at the tea plantation.