Leah Sorkin: Pacorn Tennis Circle

For my CIP, I joined Pacorn community tennis circle in Saiin, a neighborhood in southwest Kyoto. I decided to join the tennis circle because I wanted to find a CIP where I could be active but also meet people. When I first joined the tennis circle, I found it very difficult to figure out how practices were structured. It was obvious that there was an implicit hierarchy and that there was a certain order of drills within the practices, but no one verbally communicated any of this to me, so I was very confused for a couple of weeks while I figured everything out. It was also cold! Playing tennis outside in January is not the most comfortable, although aside from a few mutterings of “samui!”, no one ever complained. Throughout my time at the tennis circle though, the weather has warmed, and both the organizer, Ageta-san, the people I came to understand to be chosen by him as informal leaders and instructors, and everyone else were exceedingly welcoming. They tolerated my rusty tennis skills throughout the drills, and pulled me aside to help me learn or fix certain strokes one-on-one.

On the more social side of things, I never managed to break past small talk with anyone, but the circle provided me with the opportunity to meet many young Japanese professionals, an opportunity I probably would not have had otherwise. While most of the members of Pacorn are men in their 20s and 30s, who are often difficult to engage in conversation, especially, I think, from my standpoint as a young American woman, a few of them have reached out to me, especially more recently, and the few women in the circle have engaged me in interesting, if shallow, conversations. One very vivacious man introduced me to a great number of people a few weeks ago, and while I could not possibly remember all of them, his introductions helped with some of the hesitation around speaking to me, especially around whether I could speak Japanese.

All in all, I am glad that I dragged myself all the way across Kyoto to Saiin a few times this semester to get to play some tennis and interact some of Kyoto’s young professionals. I would recommend joining Pacorn to future KCJS students, especially if you live close by!

4 thoughts on “Leah Sorkin: Pacorn Tennis Circle

  1. This sounds like such a cool experience! It definitely seems like you got to meet a lot of people that you wouldn’t have run into otherwise.

    In terms of unspoken hierarchies, that was definitely something that I dealt with at the ballet half of my CIP. I’m curious- was the hierarchy primarily based on skill, or do you think it was also related to other factors, such as age or time spent with the group? For my CIP, it was a very strange mix of all three, so when unfamiliar dancers came to class, it was sometimes difficult to know where to stand or who to dance with.

    • Hi Elizabeth,
      Thanks for your comment! I actually thought of what you had said about your CIP at our initial CIP meeting when I started to notice the hierarchies at the tennis circle. The tennis circle was interesting in that people would sort into groups based on skill level and then within that there was further division. As I was usually on the least skilled court (I am a very on-again, off-again tennis player and inconsistent), there were usually particular people who were designated in sort of an instructor role. I think age is definitely a major factor, as many of the people who function as “instructors” did not appear to be particular excellent players. Not all of it was age-based though; I think time spent with the group was definitely a major factor. There were a few guys who I came to understand usually filled these roles, and then others who would fill in if they weren’t around. If none of his favorites were around, the organizer would just choose a couple of the guys who could hit consistently to lead drills (it was always men, but the group is mostly men). It could definitely be confusing, though, and, while everyone else seemed to just know what was going on, the organizer had to coerce me into going to the right court and the right place on the court many times. I hope this answers your question!

  2. That sounds amazing! I’m glad you got to meet more people and make friends at your activity.

    I’m very interested in the unspoken hierarchies – did they form spontaneous? Were they reliant on a senpai-kohai relation? Were they arranged by age, profession, skill level? Moreover, as it must have been very confusing, how did you eventually figure these hierarchies out?

    • Hi Yupei,
      Thanks for your comment!

      In response to your first few questions, I am copying from my response to Elizabeth above:
      The tennis circle was interesting in that people would sort into groups based on skill level and then within that there was further division. As I was usually on the least skilled court (I am a very on-again, off-again tennis player and inconsistent), there were usually particular people who were designated in sort of an instructor role. I think age is definitely a major factor, as many of the people who function as “instructors” did not appear to be particular excellent players. Not all of it was age-based though; I think time spent with the group was definitely a major factor. There were a few guys who I came to understand usually filled these roles, and then others who would fill in if they weren’t around. If none of his favorites were around, the organizer would just choose a couple of the guys who could hit consistently to lead drills (it was always men, but the group is mostly men). It could definitely be confusing, though, and, while everyone else seemed to just know what was going on, the organizer had to coerce me into going to the right court and the right place on the court many times.

      In terms of how I figured it out: pattern recognition. It took a lot of energy sometimes.

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