January Salon features Japanese tea ceremony

As part of its ongoing program featuring Japanese customs and culture, The Friends of the Arts, in cooperation with volunteers from the Japanese Society on Saipan, will be hosting a traditional Japanese tea ceremony as its January 14 Sunday Salon program.

Audience participation will be encouraged but only the first 20 will get to try the Japanese green tea. Special cookies will be served with the tea.

This program, which has gone on since October, so far has featured Japanese fairy tale reading, the art of kimono wearing, and a demonstration of the material art Aikido.

Still coming in February will be a recital of Japanese classical music performed by volunteers from Shiga Prefecture in Japan performed on the shamisen (3 stringed guitar) and the taiso-koto followed by a vocal piece called a Shi-gi-n (a poem read to a certain rhythm.

This will be followed by an origami demonstration in March specializing in the making of small purses which will available at a small charge.

This program is in conjunction with the ongoing exhibit at the Commonwealth Museum which features the civilian Japanese period in the Marianas.

The Sunday salons take place every second Sunday of the month at the Museum (the former Japanese hospital across the street from the Garapan Central Park) and featured the variety of local talent in music, poetry and other arts.