Organizing equipment for tea time

Several months have passed since Beelationship wrote The declaration of working on “Tea Time” in July, 2019.

In the article, Beelationship decided to organize equipment for tea time.

What happened after that?

Each member of Beelationship loves pottery and porcelain.

Ito, who was born in 1930s, has several sets of a teapot and teacups for her daily life and for guests.
She likes not only green tea but also tea, coffee and herbal tea so that she has a cup and saucer and a tea pot for that.

Peiji, who was born in 1950s, has some sets of a teapot and teacups and but not as much as Ito.
She likes Chinese tea so that she has a set of Chinese tea tools.
Also she has some sets of dishes for sweets and some cups and saucers.

Hachi, who was born in 1980s, has some mugs which were found on her journey, and has a set of Chinese tea tools as well.

Hachi gradually found that tea time equipment for three generations and dishes might require one more kitchen cupboard.

What does that mean?

Most pieces of tea time equipment and dishes were placed in a kitchen cupboard and a display shelf.

However there are some dishes which are not placed yet because three members of Beelationship collected too many types of Japanese dishes.

For example, tools for special and seasonal occasion like sushi or Nabe, a Japanese stew, requires larger space to be placed.

What should we do….?

The voice was rising in Hachi’s mind.

While she was unpacking and checking tea time equipment and dishes, she remembered that each of them were precious for the three members.

Why?

It is because those were actually used in the past.

“How can we throw our history of eating away? We remember recipes when we see the dishes.”

However she could not figure out how to place all of them.

Her fingers became gradually dried out because of unpacking and packing.

One day in June, 2019, Hachi watched the program of a story of an elderly woman who has been cooking for a long time.

Her name was Tokiko Suzuki who was 94 years old.

Screenshot of the program of NHK “Why is she so charming? The secrets of Tokiko Suzuki(94)”
(The title was translated by Beelationship)
Ms.Tokiko Suzuki

She said that dishes were a part of eating.

Wow….”dishes are a part of eating.”

Why did the three members of Beelationship collected dishes?

It was because they cherished eating and tried to create different atmosphere every time as much as possible to enjoy eating.

However they forgot the feeling and became to use same dishes repeatedly especially when it gets busy.

Maybe now is the time to remember the feeling and find original combinations of dishes and food.

There was another inspiration from the program.

Ms.Tokiko Suzuki showed us a room for kitchen cupboards!

Hachi was surprised by the room where dishes were neatly organized.

Screenshot of the program of NHK “Why is she so charming? The secrets of Tokiko Suzuki(94)”
(The title was translated by Beelationship)
What is waiting for us behind the curtain?

Screenshot of the program of NHK “Why is she so charming? The secrets of Tokiko Suzuki(94)”
(The title was traslated by Beelationship)
The room for dishes…!!

Wow…! It is amazing….!!

Beelationship might have dishes as much as Ms.Tokiko Suzuki if they count the amount of dishes.

If we can use all dishes efficiently, that might lead us to the world of professional cooking.

Hachi wondered a lot to find out how to put all dishes effectively so that she felt as if she caught a glimpse of a possible solution.

At the same time, she was thinking of using more variety of dishes in her daily lives.

Beelationship is not specialized in cooking but cherishes the theme of eating because we experienced that eating was the foundation of life whenever you were an elder or a baby, sad or happy, sick(or hyper active) or healthy, 

We also experienced freshly baked sweets and a cup of drink which you would like to drink at the moment made people happy and get together naturally.

When Peiji and Hachi bought sets of Chinese tea tools, they dreamed of taking time for chatting sitting across a Chinese tea tray watching steam rising from it.

The reason Hachi bought mugs on her journey, she dreamed of taking time to remember the past journey and, if many mugs were collected, she imagined that guests could choose a favorite mug.

Why were they dreaming like that?

It was because of Ito’s habit: when it is 15:00 p.m. or 10:00 a.m., she often brought a teapot, teacups and sweets to take time for tea.

She poured tea with her hand which has done many things.

The scenery became a quiet and happy feeling.

In order to create the moment like that, some pieces of tea time equipment were got together and Hachi practiced baking lately enough to be able to bake and cook anywhere she goes.
(In summer and autumn in 2019, she baked some sweets and bread. Maybe the story is another time.)

Some day Beelationship would have an actual place, the function for tea time would be added to the place for people because Hachi was lead to the theme of tea time again while she was solving a complicated issue.

Organizing tea time equipment and dishes will take more time.

She and Beelationship will not forget to take time for tea while they work on it.

Do you take time for tea?