Steam ships and tea cups

I spent the day with my advisor today, a four foot tall Japanese grandma whose expertise in Japanese history is hard put to be matched by anyone. We were supposed to get together to discuss my research and how things were going. But as usual, she talked about something and something else, and another thing, and we said maybe two sentences about my research. This is fine with me, because 1. her research doesn't exactly match mine, 2. she has so many random interesting facts in her head.

For example, there was a monk name Kisen who lived on a mountain in Uji, and his name became associated with the tea from that area. When the Commador Perry opened the ports of Japan after the period of Isolation, he came on steam ships, called "kisen" in Japanese. There was a phrase, then about "kisenjo" or the "steam rising." And so there became a way of drinking tea that was a metaphor for the ships coming in to the port. Something to do with 4 ships, and 4 cups, and letting the steam rise. Nifty, eh?