For the sharing of Festive Tea (fuku-cha) and the first Tea-occasion of the New Year, to use in the tokonoma a green bamboo receptacle freshly cut by oneself, the host and household-head, is a family custom dating from my father's time.

One chooses the bamboo with in mind the balance between the receptacle and the hanging scroll that one is planning to use; this particular piece of bamboo is especially large in girth, and rather handsome. The yellowish hue of the lower part is due to lack of access to sunlight, through originally being submerged in soil, just above the roots. In order to balance the girth of the receptacle, I have chosen a spray of Kamo Hon'ami camellia from our own garden, as this flowering bush produces both buds and leaves that are unusually large for a camellia, and have used just one bud and three leaves.

To this I have added a long shooter from a mature red-flowering Japanese apricot tree, also in our garden, intending to express with this the happiness of welcoming a new spring, and the vigorous vitality of the coming season. I should be delighted if you would imagine for yourself the pleasure I felt, at the moment at which just one bud near the tip happened suddenly to open.

The Amur adonis that I have placed in the upper compartment was, in the time of the Founder, Lord Enshu, known as the 'flower that brings felicity' (fuku-tsugu-gusa) , and is thus, in its former name too, well suited to the auspiciousness of the New Year season.