Kitchens in Japan

Southland Times, Issue 20618, 17 October 1928, Page 13

Kitchens in Japan

Under the caption, ‘‘Disarming Beelzebub in a Japanese Kitchen,” the Rev. Percy A. Smith, for 16 years a missionary in the district of Kyoto, Japan, tells in the Spirit of Missions how he is trying to show in a practical way that beauty and reasonable comfort have a direct relation to wholesome spiritual living. He says that the parlors of Japanese homes are exquisite in their artistic and delightful simplicity but that the back of the house is often another place. He asks us to stand for a moment at a kitchen door until our eyes become accustomed to the semi-darkness of the place, and then to enter, with him, a room about 12 by 18 feet, with a platform about 9 feet square raised in one corner about one foot above the level of the floor. This part is covered with straw mats like those in the parlor but much more worn and ragged from hard use. The rest of the floor is covered with more or less flat stones set two inches or so apart, in cement, the level of the cement being about one inch lower than the stones, an arrangement exceedingly difficult to walk on. At the end opposite the raised floor there is usually- a small window and beside it is the brick cook stove, smoky and black. On the raised floor is a small cupboard, a very small one, and not far from it is a small wooden sink, about one and one-half feet above the lower floor and therefore six inches above the higher one. The pump is seven or eight feet or more from the sink. There is no table. Sometimes the housewife uses the sink for a table, sometimes she stands on the lower floor and uses the higher one for a table (one foot highl, or sometimes she sits on the higher floor. One Japanese woman said that her kitchen was very much improved since they had put a window in as it was pretty hard to see before, especially when it was too cold to have the door open. Some of the kitchens have dirt floors. Since improvements have been begun great difficulty has been experienced with some carpenters. Sometimes they have refused to put in a floor over the whole kitchen because “no one ever had such a thing

in a kitchen before.” Again it was the sink—the order had been to put in laundry tubs and connect the sink and tubs with the drain that went to the sewer. The carpenter considered such connections entirely unnecessary, saying "The ground slopes toward the drain and the water will find its way there without any pipes or tile, besides it is under the floor and no one will ever see it anyhow.” In some kitchens the worker has had to wear wooden clogs when about her work as she was constantly standing in

water. Again she has had to do most of her work out under the eaves as the room was so dark she could not see across it. The Japanese housewives caught the idea and at the time when Dr. Smith wrote, nine kitchens had been done over. One such kitchen is the show place of the city in which it is located and has been written up in the papers. Another has been the model for several other houses, and so the plan is spreading and we may expect before many years to know that Japanese

5 If you use individual salt and pepper ; shakers, place them above each cover. j If soup is served in cups, the handles - of the cups should be parallel to the edge r of the table. Arrange all serving dishes required at the s table to the left of the one who serves, 6 and all serving utensils to the right. When r chocolate, coffee, or tea is required at a sitr down meal, arrange the service at the right t of the person serving. The handles of the i cups, and the handles of the cream jug,

sugar bowl, and coffee, chocolate, or teapot, must go the same way. T , . e , . , , . If . ls n " w ,h / c fash!on '° set a ! er ™® P late before each person. The food (except the sweet), if it is cold, is serv ed on second plates, separated from the ser ' lce plate by means of a small d oyley. Place cold first courses on the table beore guests are seated. Grape fruit, a lobster> fruit cocktail, or glace melon are some °f *he delicacies that come under this