can i get some more flowers down here?

I got twelve mosquito bites moving furniture from the old teacher`s apartment to my new apartment today. The story is that I visited the old place and it was really messy and dirty, pretty disgusting really(sorry P, but wasn`t it?). The old teacher(Paul ;) ) said it was drafty, had bugs, and that two surrounding houses got robbed recently. So, I asked the teachers at the new high school, who are in charge of my housing, if could switch to a different place. They showed me the place next door and said I could move there if I liked. That place has shiny new tatami mats and sparkles from floor to ceiling. I liked it much better right away; it`s clean and free from years of old sponges and jars of kimchee from English teachers past. As far as safety, well, it *seems* safe enough. I told them I`d take it.
It`s got three rooms, so I`m pleased to say once again, there`s plenty of room, please come visit!

Watching tea ceremony the other day was really nice. First, Etsuko taught the woman Sa Sensei and her husband To an English lesson. Then, we went into her tea room and sat seiza while she prepared tea for us. She offered us some tasty treats from Tokyo that she called 'Tokyo Eggs.' They looked like eggs but they were sugar-coated sesame paste cakes--tasty! We watched as she performed the ceremony. It was easy to watch. She lifted this, poured that, turned this, moved that--gracefully and in a relaxed manner. I was scarcely aware that she was doing something so precise and choreographed. She simply looked as if she was enjoying herself, and she explained what she was doing from time to time.
Then she served the tea. She showed me how to view the tea bowl, and how to drink the tea, turning the bowl clockwise twice gently in my hand and then sipping. The tea was soft, fluffy and only slightly bitter. It was grassy green, something like the color of wheatgrass juice. The bowl had little blue cherry blossoms on the front.
I had had the idea that tea ceremony was something a little boring and maybe even stuffy. Sa Sensei has been practicing tea ceremony for over 40 years, but it seemed a fresh and lively experience for her.
Beforehand, we meditated a bit on the month's theme, written on a scroll in the corner of the house reserved for such things. The story on the scroll read,
"A great old wizard decided to visit inside a flower vase. He sat in the vase for what he thought to be one week, but after emerging, he realized he'd been in the vase for a thousand years."
She explained the meaning. Even if something seems huge for us, it is only a tiny thing in the scheme of the universe. Don't worry about tiny things in daily life.

I don`t know if I want to study tea ceremony, but it was a very positive experience for me, and especially nice to be around such a jovial woman.