Beppu Zen Retreat

At 6:50 each morning, guests gather in the kitchen of a traditional wood-and-tatami house in the mountainside neighbourhood of Toyoka, in the town of Hiji, and walk together to the temple, about thirty seconds away. At seven, zazen begins: forty minutes of sitting, followed by tea.

The temple is GyaTeiJi, first established in 1346 and held by the Kono family for three generations. Yodo Kono, a Rinzai Zen monk, was a high school physics teacher before he inherited it, and has been a monk for the past ten years. His wife Keiko is a calligraphy master who has studied the art since childhood and is highly skilled in formal tea ceremony. Yodo's mother has taught tea ceremony for 45 years. GyaTeiJi is also a busy community centre, so guests see how a working Zen temple operates and meet the temple community.

The day has a plain rhythm. After zazen comes a simple monastic breakfast of rice porridge, then samu, light temple work such as gardening or cleaning, or a special activity. Lunch and dinner are prepared together with the hosts, and weekdays double as Japanese cooking lessons. Afternoons are left open for calligraphy, tea ceremony, kimono dressing, hiking, or a free bicycle ride. Beppu, ten minutes away by train, has the highest concentration of onsen in Japan, and the hosts know which ones welcome guests with tattoos.

Guests sleep in sparsely decorated private tatami rooms on futon bedding. The retreat keeps its numbers small, takes single travellers, offers meditation suited to beginners, and has vegetarian options. It is open year-round with a minimum stay of five nights.