Chapter 8 Simplicity and Silence

Simplicity and Silence (wabi sabi)

Autumn sun on stone poems –

simple letters carved on the back,

graceful script on the face.

Wabi can be simply translated as frugal, simple or plain in appearance. Sabi means quietness, stillness, silence. But when we say wabi sabi there is the implication of a deeper meaning. Some masters of tea ceremony say wabi sabi can be expressed as being quiet and serene but it is much more than just that. It is the whole attitude toward life which derives from that state of mind.

Practicing shodō both develops and requires wabi sabi. Every step fosters deep silence. First you make the ink. You put a little water in the well of the mortar. It has to be just the right amount. If you put too much, the ink will be too thin and will run, and if you do not put enough, it will be too thick and will not flow properly on the paper. Next you take the ink stick and pull a little water up onto the grinding area and begin rubbing in a circular motion. It takes a long time to make ink of the right consistency. You cannot rush this step. If you are patient, the sound and sensation of the ink stick rubbing against smooth stone and water is very soothing. Once you have made your ink for that session, you take a piece of practice paper and fold it like a fan to make columns. You place the poem or sutra you wish to copy nearby. Then you dip your brush into the ink. If you get too much ink, your strokes will be too wide or will soak into the paper too much. With too little ink, you will not make a smooth, continuous stroke. You have to judge the size of your strokes so that the poem will fit the paper without looking cramped or too spaced out. You practice writing the poem until you feel ready to make a copy on nice paper. It is important to practice enough but it is also important to create a finished piece, even if it has “mistakes.” The finished piece is a record of where you are at that moment, including the perfect and the imperfect.

Shodō is like Zen. One time I went to China as an international guest, representing Japan at a calligraphy competition. The Chinese lady next to me was writing big characters with a big brush on a big piece of paper. I was very nervous because I write small pieces. When I sat down, I blanked out and when I came to, my piece was written and it was perfect. I did not know what I was doing until I finished. There is a Buddhist saying, “Out of nothing comes creation, out of creation comes nothing.”

In the past, all these arts were connected: ikebana, shodō and sadō. People would put a scroll on the wall, written in calligraphy by a priest. In front they would have a flower arrangement, and they would drink tea.

The traditional Japanese room for sadō was originally a very large room, for example, in a war lord’s castle. Sadō was practiced only by the wealthy. They would burn incense on the tokanoma, a special raised platform with a seasonal scroll and ikebana. Then four hundred years ago, Sen no Rikyu (1522-1591) said you did not need luxurious things. Rikyu made everything simple in sadō. He had a strong reverence for each simple object. In that way, he taught people to know the real value of things. He trained at Daitoku-ji, a Zen Buddhist temple, and was given the name Rikyu, which comes from a Buddhist saying, “One does not need fame or profit.” Sen no Rikyu was very open minded because he grew up in a commercial area, Sakai, famous for trading many different kinds of foreign goods. He made tea ceremony frugal, characterized by wabi cha, simple tea. He distinguished the tea ceremony as sadō, flower arranging became kadō, calligraphy, shodō, and burning incense, kodō. Rikyu wrote a famous poem: “Though many people drink tea, if you do not know the Way of Tea, tea will drink you up.”

Even if you are in a very small room, you can feel at one with the universe. When you enter a small room with a low door, you have to bow down. You enter with humility through a small opening into a small space. Depending on the emotional attitude, that small space will be become a big universe. You do not need all the luxurious equipment. It can be very simple and you can create a vast universe in a tiny room. That is the heart of sadō. When you drink the tea you become calm and you experience harmony.

The four principles of sadō are: wa (harmony), kei (respect), sei (purity), and jaku (tranquility or enlightenment). When you are in that calm environment, you can reach enlightenment. Some people who practice tea today just want to show off their expensive bowls and rich kimono. They are missing the point. The true spirit along with the prescribed form of etiquette of sadō can help people in everyday life. Offering hospitality and giving respect to others, behaving in a natural and polite manner, being frugal, simple, clean, careful and orderly, attending to details and discovering beauty in commonplace things, all of these fundamentals are cultivated through the practice of sadō.

Wabi sabi is also the basis of poetry. For many years I have been writing poetry, both haiku and waka. Haiku season ( from haiku no ku, literally “not serious verse”) is a form of poetry with 17 syllables in three unrhymed lines of five, seven and five syllables, often describing nature or a season. Waka (from wa “circle” + ka “song”), now called tanka, (from tan “short” + ka “song”) is a form of poetry with 31 syllables in five lines, the first and third lines having five syllables each and the other lines having seven syllables each.

Poetry is like Zen. It is from the heart. The meaning is really deep. In the old days people used to write more about nature. Four of the main themes were flowers, birds, the wind and the moon. These days people write about anything. Perhaps shinjinrui, the new breed of people, need more stimulation. I think they do not appreciate the subtleties of nature the way kyujinrui, the old breed of people, used to. The old style of using nature for poetic inspiration does not seem to suit young people. The emperor still reads poetry once a year to the public. He retains that old dignified style, drawing from nature. That is one of the few instances you will find traditional poetry in modern times. Now people speak more directly. There used to be a more beautiful way of saying things. Traditional haiku looked like nothing but had such a deep meaning. Now you read poetry and you quickly understand. It seems that people today do not know how to think deeply, so they have to write in a more obvious way. I feel the modern way is not interesting.

Like the poet Bashō, I wrote a number of poems on my walk from Kyōto to Tōkyō, included in my Diary of the White Bush Clover. In telling my memoirs, we translated these poems into English, with my added commentary. It was very hard to do this because it is difficult to convey the meaning of a poem in another language. One expression in Japanese, such as momijiba no aki, might take eight words to explain in English: “beautiful changing color of maple leaves in autumn.” Many words are used only in poetry, especially words that refer to the season, such as aki, which literally means autumn, but has the connotation of a sentimental season. Japanese people understand the allusions underlying these words but it is not so apparent to someone else. Also, some of the words I used are so old they are not even found in modern Japanese dictionaries. It often took us half a day to translate just one three-line poem. Every word required a lot of thought. For instance, referring to one ripe persimmon still hanging on the tree, we finally settled on translating akashi as “deep orange.”

Chapter 7 Teachers

Teachers (sensei)

Both you and me,

our lifetimes are as momentary as the dew.

Recognize that life is precious.

Do not waste it.

We talked this way until sunrise.

My grandmother was my first sensei. O-bā-san, as I called her, taught me from my earliest days the proper way for a young lady to behave. When I was a toddler, if I sat with my legs sticking straight out, Grandmother would remind me to sit with my legs folded under. I could not sit this way for long so she corrected me gently but frequently. She loved sewing and made many kimono for me. She also made little rice-filled balls stitched together from petal shapes cut from her own baby clothes. I always remember her sewing. She used to like taking me along with her when she went to Senso-ji, the Kannon temple in Asakusa, or visiting her friends. She did everything tadashiku, very properly. For example, she always put on new underwear when she went out “in case something happened,” that is, in case she was hospitalized. She was a very caring person. She loved looking after others and helped many people, such as the students at Teikoku University in Tōkyō. Many of them rose to high positions in society. Later they turned around and invited her for meals and asked for her advice.

O-bā-san advised me to study traditional aspects of culture, not to become a teacher but as pastimes. It was the thing to do in those days. In addition to shamisen, ikebana and shodō, I also studied buyo, traditional dance. I did not study long because the war started and we were not allowed to do those things, to play around, since there was a war on, no money, no food, people dying.

Oishi Takako was my first calligraphy teacher. She taught me from the time I entered secondary school until I married, two years after graduation. After that came the war and then I was looking after my children. Ten years passed. Then I began studying with the same teacher for another ten years. Finally, I received my shodō license. Now I have been teaching shodō myself for over fifty years.

Oishi-san’s teacher, Onoue Saishu, was good friends with my grandfather’s brothers. Because of this connection, I came to meet my teacher. Oishi-san studied traditional-style hiragana, Heiangana, which is about 1,300 years old, with her sensei. I studied Heiangana with Oishi-san and now I am teaching this traditional style to my students. It is also called sōsho, “grass hand,” a cursive style of calligraphy which abbreviates and links the characters to create a flowing, graceful effect.

Oishi-san was very strict. She taught me how to properly care for the calligraphy tools: fude, brush, sumi, ink, and washi, paper. She had an extremely busy teaching schedule. As soon as she finished one class, she had to move on to another. She taught in a cultural school as well as giving private lessons. Her private lessons were rather expensive but very good. She had a waiting room outside the classroom where people would line up for their lessons. It must have been hard for her teaching so many people individually. She also taught private group lessons. I attended individual lessons because I wanted to become good at calligraphy. We had a long connection, over seventy years. She died about three years ago, in 2002.

Hirayama-sensei, my tea ceremony teacher, lived in Ōsaka when I was living in Nara. She taught me the essential techniques of sadō. I was in my forties when I began studying the way of tea with this sensei, who was in her seventies, so there was a difference of thirty years between us. Now I myself am an old lady. Her legs were bad, like mine now, and sometimes she could not kneel in seiza position. She often took me to tea ceremonies in Kyōto.

Matsumoto Jitsudo was the chōrō, head priest, at both Saidai-ji and Hozan-ji in Nara. He had a very gentle face and spoke very calmly and quietly. He was dedicated to renovating dilapidated temples in the Nara area and was well known for this work. His motto was, “Be strict on yourself but be kind to others.” Another saying was, “Humans cannot live alone, they need other people, so we must give thanks to everyone around us.” Those were some of the guiding principles he taught me. I went on in my life to try to live up to his teachings.

I first met Matsumoto-san after I moved from Tōkyō to Nara. One day I went to pray at Hozan-ji. At that time there was a tea ceremony room in the temple where you could go to drink some tea after praying. A man was setting up the room for a tea ceremony. Ito-san was not a sensei but he knew about the equipment. I said I was coming to Hozan-ji for the first time to pray, having recently moved to Nara from Tōkyō. Ito-san offered to introduce me to Matsumoto-san. It was not usually easy to meet the chōrō. I do not know why Ito-san offered to do this. Perhaps it was because I had come all the way from Tōkyō or perhaps he thought I was a true believer. It must have been my destiny on the Buddhist path. My first impression of Matsumoto-san was that he was really kind-hearted. Sometimes he would perform the tea ceremony after prayers. We would talk and I learned the real heart of sadō from him.

          Matsumoto-san was also very good at shodō. He wrote a single kanji (from kan “Chinese” + ji “letter, character”) for me, wa (peace), which is still one of my greatest treasures. I met with this chōrō when I would go to pray at these two temples. I felt he gradually came to understand my Buddhist beliefs and we became friends. He came three times to see my shodō exhibitions when they were held in Tōkyō. Each year, in order to help my Cultural Academy, he donated three kakijiku, shodō scrolls, to be sold. I was very grateful because not only I but also my students could benefit from his art and wisdom. Everything he talked about was so wonderful.

When he was around ninety, he fell sick and retired as chōrō of Saidai-ji and Hozan-ji. He moved to a smaller temple where he was cared for by a family living at the temple. I went to visit him. When I saw him I felt as if he had given up being an elite priest and just seemed like a nice old man. I thought that was a good thing, because when you are chōrō you have to shoulder a lot of responsibilities and you are very busy but now he had none of those concerns. There was a little child near him in the room calling out, “O-jī-chan, O-jī-chan!” He seemed so happy now, a grandfather enjoying the comforts of a simple life. Three months later he died.

When I was about thirty-five, I met Komatsu Chiko, who was niso, head nun,

 of Jakko-in in Kyōto. When we met the first time, I felt a strong connection. I felt that something inside me, my inner feeling, could be understood by her. I felt that this woman could sense my belief in the one truth just in one meeting. It was miraculous.

Chiko-san was very busy. She wrote Waga Omou: Budda to Heiwa e no Michi, a big book, which was translated into English as The Way to Peace: The Life and Teachings of the Buddha. It contains the prayer to Kannon-sama, which I write out every day in shodō, as a spiritual practice. She also went to Sri Lanka and founded a school there. Even though she was so busy, she would invite me to come visit her at Jakko-in in Kyōto. We would spend time talking and take lunch together. Even during the mealtime some interesting Buddhist teaching would appear. For instance, one time a butterfly landed while we were eating and Chiko-san said, “The butterfly is also a deity, because who made the butterfly? So let us pray to the butterfly.”

Jakko-in is a very peaceful place. The garden is very beautiful. I went every year to be with my religious teacher. Tragically, the temple burned to the ground a few years ago, apparently an act of arson. No one knows why. Chiko-san was deeply shocked by this incident. After that she did not invite me to come and soon after she died, in 2002.

I learned so much from these visits. One time Chiko-san opened the shojō and saw the maple leaves changing color in autumn. She said, “What beautiful momiji they are. But when those leaves first appear, they are all green, all the same color. Depending on how they get hit by the rays of the sun or the wind and rain, they get changed and that makes them beautiful. When they fall from the tree, they are all different. Humans are the same. Now when I go to hospital and see the babies in the newborn ward, I think, they are all like young momiji.”

You have to feel this way inside. My religious teacher always felt like that but it was not so easy for me. Chiko-san was so much greater because she could feel that way all the time. I have to try harder to feel the connection with the universe. It seemed so easy for her. These conversations with her were like that, so good.

Chapter 3 Nothing Special

Nothing Special (hei hei bon bon)

Walking all the way from Kyōto,

crossing the old border station at Fuwa,

now completely quiet.

kyo yori no

tabiji haruka ni

ayumi kite

ima seki koyuru

fuwa no yamazato

Before the Pacific War was a very peaceful time for me. Hei hei bon bon, nothing special happened. My life was just normal.

I went to a private all girls’ school, which taught a way of life for girls. There were 30 girls in my class. In the home economics class, I learned how to grow vegetables and cook them. I learned how to raise tomatoes and make tomato puree. I learned the basics of sewing. I also learned typing. These skills have been useful in my life, even now, and I still enjoy cooking and sewing.

In addition, I learned about shinto and bukkyō (Buddhism), a mixture of both, not extreme on either side. Japanese religions are not exclusive. For example, marriage is performed before a Shinto kami, whereas a funeral is a Buddhist ritual. In most homes there are two altars, a Shinto kamidana and a Buddhist butsudan. Because of my upbringing, I am interested in religion. Especially I love Buddhism. Because of that I had good kone, personal connections, at a famous temple in Kyōto and Nara. I believe it was the will of nature.

I went all the way through six years of primary school and five years of secondary school. Most people started working after primary school or became apprentices. The first two years of secondary school were the same for everyone. After that you had to choose a specialization. Girls could specialize in home economics, office work or preparing for the entrance examination to university. Only one or two students in each class of primary school went on to secondary school, as primary school was usually the end of one’s education. Of those who finished secondary school, only teachers or professional workers would go to university. Not many did that and more boys than girls continued on.

I started secondary school in 1936, at a time when rumors of war were starting. Just before the war, in 1938, the Japanese government introduced education against the United States, especially in the boys’ school, where military training was important. In the girls’ school, we had a special budō class to learn naginata, long sword, as well as archery. The purpose was not to make women fight but to develop their fighting spirit. Naginata is the name of the weapon and also the name of the martial art. It is a long oak pole with a sword at the end, originally a Chinese weapon for cavalry, which was taught to women so they could defend themselves if the castle was stormed. During practice we would use all wood poles or poles with bamboo at the end.

I especially remember kangeiko, cold practice, early in the morning in the coldest part of the year. I had to take the first train out to commute to school. There were no heaters in the gym, so first we warmed ourselves on a bonfire outside made with scraps of wood. I wore a cotton practice uniform, kimono style, very thin, and we practiced for two hours. After practice we would eat breakfast and go to academic classes. Every year there was one naginata competition in the school, competing against our classmates.

For archery there was another class. There is a way to set up your shot, very precise. The target was 30 meters away. It was made of paper over straw and when the arrow hit correctly in the middle, it made a nice sound. It felt good when it made that sound, zook! It did not make a pleasant sound when it hit the dirt bank.

I practiced budō for five years. Budō is like Zen. There is nothing. If you aim at the target and think, target, target, you will miss it. You have to be one with the target. Once, a long time after I had graduated from school, I was walking down a street, carrying a shopping bag in each hand, when a bad-looking man came toward me. Without thinking, I shifted the two bags to one hand, preparing to defend myself. I gave the man a hard look and he turned and ran away. It happened automatically, because of my training in budō.

Traditional Japanese arts were not taught at school. Those were activities after school. At twelve I started learning shodō, the “way of writing” with fude, brush, and sumi, ink. I also studied ikebana, the art of flower arranging, and shamisen, a lute-like instrument. I did not start learning sadō, the way of tea (also know as chanoyu), until I was eighteen, after graduation from high school.

There was a school in Tōkyō, the Julliard of Japan, famous for both western and Japanese music. It was called Tōkyō Music School, which later became Tōkyō National University of Fine Arts and Music. My uncle taught the vocal music course at this school. I learned to play shamisen as an extracurricular activity from a lady who graduated from Tōkyō Music School. Shamisen is a long, three-stringed instrument which is plucked, and is accompanied by singing. In the old days shamisen was taught one to one, but when I learned it had changed and there were several students in my class. The style I learned was nagauta, one of the most popular styles. Usually when people hear nagauta, they do not understand because it is very stylized, but when you read the lyrics it is very poetic. Nagauta is designed to pass down the old songs written by famous poets and musicians a long time ago. I like the lyrics even when they are not accompanied by music. They are very traditional.

The origin of ikebana is a form of offering flowers to Buddha. The purpose is to show that humans are in between heaven and earth in this life. It was only practiced in the temple at first. Then it went to the warlords in the castles. Common people did not do it. The style I learned was very traditional. The tallest plant is called ten (heaven), the ones in the middle, jin (humans) and the bottom, chi (earth). You are making your own cosmos. That is the meaning behind ikebana. You could use one plant and have all three levels. I think nowadays people put a big bunch of fancy flowers together any way, as long as it looks nice, but you cannot see where heaven and earth and humans are. With true ikebana the three elements are clearly displayed and that is the most pleasing view. My teacher was from a temple. She taught me that each plant has its own history and it is alive, with its own spirit. You have to understand that when you cut the flower. Every time you do ikebana you put yourself into it. You make your own personal microcosm, so that is why every arrangement is different.

After graduation, I went to summer school, held by Tōkyō City Government (now Tōkyō Metropolitan Government), to get a license for teaching shodō for three years. During and after the war I was busy with my family and did not study. Later I took up the practice again and became a shodō teacher. I still continue to teach to this day.

I learned all these things from my teachers. When I was thirty-three, I started teaching shodō but I did not start teaching sadō until I was fifty, because when you are young you do not understand what all these things mean. Feeling is emphasized over technique. When you stir the tea, you have to put all other thought out of your mind and focus on stirring the tea, just like when you put the brush to paper. You cannot understand wabi sabi, simplicity and silence, when you are young. Also the cups are very fragile and valuable. I started learning shodō earlier, so I understood it better, and I also started teaching shodō earlier because you do not need so much equipment, just paper and brushes. To get the license for sadō used to be quite difficult. You had to take a test and also get permission from the master teacher. Now you can become a teacher just with money and the test is administered by the Culture and Education Ministry.

Many years ago I had twenty sadō students but now I am retired. As I get older I do not want to teach, I just want to enjoy the way of tea myself. Also, my knees do not like to sit folded under for long! Once you get to a certain age, most people stop teaching, although I still enjoy teaching shodō. I can sit at a table to make practice exercises and correct students’ work. Some of my students have been with me for twenty-five years. Teaching shodō is a blessing. I am able to pass on the old traditions, which I feel are very valuable as a spiritual practice, especially in these fast-paced times. And through the money I receive from teaching, I am able to support the humanitarian activities that are dear to my heart.