Ittoen

You will be living and working in a community called Ittoen, which was founded in 1904 as a community of people seeking a life of few possessions and service. It hopes to achieve the fulfilment and enlightenment of its members through a Spartan lifestyle.

Your Project

Ittoen is not a religion but it has loosely Buddhist principles. It worships what it defines as Light, which could be God or Buddha or even nature. There are morning and evening services to give thanks.

In the community there are a variety of businesses and services, including schools from kindergarten up to college level. The schools are for children in the community, although most of the students actually come from outside Ittoen. Meals are taken communally, sitting on the floor in the traditional Japanese style, and are simple and nutritiously balanced.

Every person living in Ittoen does daily communal work called ‘samu’, which translates as ‘work as service’. You will be fully accepted as part of Ittoen and you will join in on that too. Therefore, your work will be split between communal activities and teaching English at the school. The communal work is manual and includes such tasks as grounds maintenance, cutting wood for the fires, helping in the kitchens, and generally working within the community. The teaching work is to various ages in the community school, as well as adult evening class. There is also a kindergarten where volunteers spend some time being human climbing frames! You will work long days and Volunteers need to be adaptable and resilient – your impact will be immediately apparent.

Ittoen is right on the outskirts of Kyoto, a beautiful and very ancient city. The buildings in Ittoen are very traditional and the grounds well landscaped and attractive. It is a one stop train ride into the centre of Japan’s cultural capital, Kyoto, and Volunteers can get out and about in Kyoto as they wish.

Accommodation

Volunteers live in an apartment within the grounds of the community. You will have a bedroom each, a living room and a small kitchen, although all meals are provided in the communal dining hall. Bathing is done in the communal bathhouse in keeping with the age-old Japanese tradition.