Apologies for the lack of updates! RENKEI Kyoto has been packed full or workshops and activities so far, and we are trying to make the most of our free time by exploring Kyoto.
All four groups produced exciting presentations on Tuesday; it was really interesting to see how each group's ideas had developed over the break. The audience consisted of our RENKEI colleagues and local Japanese businessmen, and in the afternoon each group was given the opportunity to receive feedback from each business representative, which was immensely useful, as their experience led to us receiving some fantastic advice.
On Wednesday we received a tour of Kyoto University and a lecture on its history, which lead to very interesting debates on student movements and the effectiveness of university education in both Japan and the UK. In the afternoon we received a lecture on Japanese traditional literature, particularly certain forms of poetry, which really helped to give some background on Japanese traditions and culture. This was further strengthened on Thursday, with lectures and demonstrations on Japanese dance and traditional flower arranging. It was really interesting to discovered the shared importance of certain details between different cultural activities, such as the role of the seasons in Japan.
Friday's program involved discovering more about the traditional Japanese town house, or machiya. The importance of preservation of existing machiya was discussed, and after a lecture briefing us on the basic design, we got to visit a preserved machiya in Kyoto. This led to some interesting questions regarding how to integrate traditional aesthetics with a modern life.
In the afternoon, we took part in a social discovery program called 100ninMap. This involved participants breaking into groups and then setting out to record our own experiences of Kyoto using smartphones. We then reflected on our observations,and seen how technology can help to discover and collate individual feelings and experiences.
The weekend was full of sightseeing, shopping, and maybe a little rest before commencement on RENKEI week 2! Also, each team was busy preparing a second presentation on both our team projects and our general RENKEI experiences.
On Monday we gave our presentations to representatives from each participating university. This gave us the opportunity to try and demonstrate the positive effects of RENKEI not only in developing collaboration between cultures and universities, but also for personal skills and development. I think every team done really well, and I hope the university representatives got a good feel of the program.
In the evening we went to a beautiful restaurant in the center of Kyoto, with an innovative method of staff rotation and customer satisfaction. We had the opportunity to further discuss the RENKEI program with the university representatives over an amazing traditional Japanese dinner.
Today we took part in a second world cafe to create new projects regarding urban sustainability and resilience, especially concerning Japanese issues. Additionally, in the evening we got to experience wearing Japanese traditional dress, or kimono! However I have already written a lot for this post, so I will leave further explanation of today for the next post.
