On October 27th, the Center for International Relations (CIR) held its fifth Global Campus Event "NAIST Tea Time #5" with more than 70 students, faculty and staff attending. In accordance with the "NAIST Globalization Strategic Plan 2011" and accompanying "Action Plan", Global Campus Events are aimed at strengthening NAIST's on-campus community and fostering increased mutual understanding and familiarity among NAIST's diverse population of students, faculty and staff.

After a brief welcome from CIR Director Steven Nishida, members of the NAIST Tea Ceremony Club introduced the history of green tea and the culture that surrounds it, including the importance of rich communication between tea ceremony hosts and their guests while delicious sweets and tea are being served. The Tea Ceremony Club members demonstrated the proper way of preparing matcha, Japanese fine powder green tea.

After the demonstration, sencha green tea and higashi, dry confectionery made of arrow roots from Yoshino, Nara, were served to all attendees. The attendees enjoyed the beauty and elegance of the tea ceremony and the spirit of Japanese tea culture.

In the second half of the event, PechaKucha presentations were delivered by the following three participants:
·Lidwina Ayu Andarini (Indonesia), Student (M1), Information Science
Theme: My road to NAIST
·Christopher Yap (USA), Student (D1), Information Science
Theme: Becoming a game researcher
·Aftab Ahmad Chattha (Pakistan), Post-doc, Biological Sciences
Theme: Scientific networking

*PechaKucha is a short, lively presentation format (20 seconds/slide x 20 slides=6 minutes and 40 seconds) that was invented in Tokyo in 2003 and is now popular all over the world. Here is a link to learn more about PechaKucha: http://www.pechakucha.org/