by Karl Bareis (adapted from The Wooden Post, vol 13, September 2019).
Friday morning at 08:00…a small group of people meeting in a parking lot…who’d have guessed that we could possibly travel 150 miles in a loop around the entire San Francisco Bay in one short day…we all introduced ourselves, and I let them know the itinerary and what to expect. The day ended up being a revelation on the perseverance and persistence of early Japanese craftsmen.
Western States National Bonsai Collection – Lake Merritt Park, Oakland
Our first stop was the Western States Bonsai Collection in Lake Merritt Park. It would be an understatement if we were to say that we were surprised by what we saw. We were met by two people who curate and care for the collection, as well as Jay Van Arsdale. Our knowledgeable hosts led us through the collection by telling us some of the stories of the bonsai specimens in what is a relatively small enclosure.
Our first surprise was to see Hiroshi Sakaguchi’s masterful mon style gate, which greets visitors as they enter the collection. Built in 2001, the gate reflects the perfect proportions of a traditional formal entry gate, as it sits astride a broad stone pathway.
The formality of the gate separates the wide open parkland landscape, and immediately concentrates visitors on the unique contents of the inner courtyard.
Framed by the open gate is a magnificent black pine, as if growing on a windswept cliff high above the Pacific. The sight of the six-foot bonsai giant, takes a moment to recognize that this collection represents the best of the past 150 years of California bonsai culture. Sakaguchi’s gateway was very symbolic to the effort that five generations of immigrants have made to express their deepest spiritual understanding of nature, through ancient trees which communicate its life force and power.
The curator began by describing the Daimyo Oak, a tree gifted to American emissary Anson Burlingame in 1860 by the Emperor of Japan.
That story was just the beginning of a precious hour spent listening to the stories of how the first Japanese immigrants found their new home in California and began working with native trees.
Hearing all the stories of the individual hardships, and ingenuity of the early bonsai masters, brings the collection into a poignant focus. While looking at the individual trees, we also heard how some of the trees began to be cultivated during the Japanese internment period. It’s all so fascinating to see in one place. Jay explained all this as a way to understand his unique system of platforms that he built to highlight the trees. Each red-cedar platform is morticed-and-tenoned in such away to perfectly support these historic specimens. We all left feeling we would be back again, and one member of the group told me they were impressed that such valuable work was part of a public display.
Hakone Garden Lower House Tea Ceremony
As we climbed over the San Mateo Bridge high-span we could see the last wisps of fog on the coastal range. The day was hot and clear as we rolled into Saratoga. The town has the flavor of the old West— its main street only two blocks long before the road winds up into the redwood-covered hills. A short distance from town is Hakone Gardens, a secluded seven-acre stroll garden built one hundred years ago. The Hakone Lower House has two tea ceremony rooms, which are used several times a week for tea classes. Mrs. Tsuji has been teaching there since November 1981, soon after the rooms were constructed for that purpose. Hakone Gardens actually has six places where tea ceremony is practiced, and each October all the various tea ceremony organizations gather there for a “Dai Cha-kai” grand tea gathering. The six spaces are decorated with floral arrangements, set off by incense fragrance, and 16 separate ceremonies are conducted throughout the day.
This historic gathering of tea masters is quite unique—in the tea world individual lineages are usually preserved and isolated from outsiders. Hakone Dai Cha-kai is a chance for students to perform tea for a discerning audience. This day we were able to slip into the large eight-tatami mat room and fold our legs and contemplate the place of the tea ceremony within the Japanese culture.
Seeing these rooms from this aspect is a window on the traditional architecture. While the thick powdered tea was being whisked into bowls we were told about the principle of ichigo ichie—one time, one meeting. This concept attenuates the mind to be aware of the subtleties of the moment.
We spent forty minutes in this small traditional space surrounded by shoji, tatami, the fragrance and the tea world. I was able to describe some of the elements of the tearooms, including the earthen clay plaster and book matched ceiling boards. We had bento lunches within the Garden, and toured the historic 1917 Upper House. Part of my focus within the Garden was to describe how the master carpenter Shintani had to make do with local materials—crafting every building from redwood, the siding boards burnished “yaki-ita” style to cover the Upper House. The group was impressed with the fact that 120,000 people a year tour through the historic architecture and yet it remains intact.
Hakone Gardens has an important Kabuto-mon style gate—this one built in 1931, soon after the Garden changed hands. This gate is magnificent, yet in need of repairs. We stepped back to see that the curved helmet roof had several places completely missing sections of roofing, and the beginnings of water staining already appearing in its coffered ceiling. We discussed the emerging Kezurou-kai USA organization, -with its experts in traditional construction methods, and how we as an organization can lobby public spaces to help them identify areas of architectural concern in the upkeep of their irreplaceable historic structures in the future.
From the lower garden we hiked up the steep hillside, through the tall camellia garden landscape winding high above the koi ponds, and came to the Shogetsuan tea house. This is the location of last year’s major effort to build a tea garden for the small secluded tea room which had been gifted to the garden in 2003. The story of the original 330 year old tea house burned in an American air raid in Osaka in March 1945—the entire town was burned, but the tea master was able to scrape together a team of carpenters in early 1946 to replace the tea room, and begin to practice “ichigo ichie” with those who had nearly lost hope. That tea room became a national symbol of returning from the ashes, and as such was precious beyond its value as a tea room. The daughter of the Osaka tea master eventually offered it to Hakone Gardens, and when the City of Saratoga balked at the prospect of expanding the garden to include yet another tea room, a core of volunteers came together to resurrect and build the three-mat tea house, on their own. As the eleven of us stood atop the hill overlooking Hakone, we could just glimpse the historic koi pond in the distance. All the history and culture we had experienced in being in these spaces really was something we’d like to share with the rest of the organization. As we were leaving, the director Shozo Kagoshima thanked us for coming, saying he relied on our support in the future.
Our original itinerary had included stopping by San Mateo City to visit yet another historic Japanese tea house. Alas, we had run out of time. The towns and cities around the San Francisco Bay are literally filled with historic places. Many need repair. Most don’t have proper up-keep. Few know of our existence.
All could benefit from our attention in the future. The Kezurou-kai movement has a potential to help catalogue and preserve historic buildings.