Wednesday, January 13, 2010

Welcome drink at ryokan, Suimeikan

Hi, everyone! This is a year of Tiger in Japan. There was a tiger statue at a ryokan, Japanese-style hotel we stayed in Gero hot spring resort. The ryokan that we stayed there for a night was Suimeikan. In Japan, people enjoy hot spring bath and meals featuring local specialties at ryokan. Most ryokan have the casual cotton kimono known as youkata for guests (what we ware in the picture). Japanese bathing culture is a little different from western. There is washing space outside of the bathtub, and tub is just a place for soaking in hot water. I think, for many Japanese, “Taking bath” implies relaxing in hot water, rather than simply washing your body. So, some people soak in bath several times in a day, after all that’s the main reason for a trip to hot spring.


Suimeikan is a nice hotel. They served matcha as welcome drink at our room. I think typical ryokan serve sencha. I was happy with the matcha, and it made me relaxed. The taste of matcha was not as good as what we have at tea lessons, but wasn’t too bad. The matcha and little sweet relieved my weariness of the long drive.

Have a nice day!

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