Arrival in Tokoname!

Wow, this is really something! The entire page is written in Japanese, and my kanji just isn`t that good! I`ve finally made it to Japan and am borrowing Tomoko san`s pc. I arrived yesterday and slept pretty well all day, but today Tomoko san showed me around Tokoname, the famous pottery town where she lives. I`ve decided I could spend my entire life collecting Japanese ceramics! It`s all very beautiful and very in tune with the material. She told me this place has the best clay for making tea in, so there is a lot of expertise here in making teapots and brewing tea. She showed me her favourite kyushu (small teapot) which is absolutely miniscule and very very thin. It has a side handle, and she sat the teapot on the end of it to prove what good balance it had. It gave me kittens thinking it would fall! She said she wanted to take me to meet the maker so he could show me how he works. Very excited! I have no idea how anyone could throw something so delicate and thin. There are also two festivals she wants to take me to, one this weekend to celebrate spring, and one a bit later dedicated to craft, so we`ll have to yoyo between the festival and Tomoko`s gallery so her work can take part. Oh yes, and I just saw the most ginormous soda kiln ever!!! It was used when Tokoname made a lot of clay pipes, and the walls were running with glaze and half disintegrated from all the firings. There was a mould in there that used to be used for the pipes, and it looked just like a Japanese bath. A person could very easily have crouched through the pipe it would have made. Hopefully will post pictures later :)