ブックタイトルa-history-of-international-exchanges00

概要

a-history-of-international-exchanges00

- 149 -then, the classes were given in the seminar room of the music department witha set of tea ceremony utensils. At the beginning, there were many studentsfrom Malaysia and Indonesia, but later more exchange students from Americaand New Zealand and students from China and South Korea took this course.The students taught each other their national characters in every class.When I asked one student ‘What is the cawing of a crow? In Japan it caws“ka~,ka~”,’ an American student interrupted and soon said, ‘The teachershould not ask such a question. It sounds as it is heard.’ An Indonesian studentanswered sympathetically, ‘A crow caws somehow like “a~ku, a~ku”.’ I feltashamed to ask such a question. That was a happy opportunity for me to learndifferent cultures.I sometimes had a chance to serve tea to the members of an inspection teamor to the students of a short-term program. It was heartwarming to see theguests sit erect on their knees patiently. How many students did I teach tea ceremony in 20 and more years. Lookingback some photos taken occasionally, the surprise and the excited cry in thefirst class came back to me. I wonder if they remember the classes of teaceremony and me? There was one Indonesian student of the Faculty ofTechnology, Heru Dwi Wahjono, in the first tea ceremony course whoexceptionally took a half-term extra course to learn more. He got ‘Theadmission permission of Procedure of Bonryaku.’ He, who still sometimesgives me telephone calls, is surely one of the good memories. He told that itwas an Indonesian custom for a person older than 18 to treat people whom heor she owes. In one class on his birthday, he treated me and his tea companionwith deliscious green curry and rice. It was Heru who taught me how to usea PC (Lc 630) and after he went back to Indonesia, we enoyed ‘chatting’ inalphabets.