bodhisattva of tea

How is the trip going? Great. Spending time with tea master Mr. Yan at his farm late at night, we tasted through various grades of Tikuanyin, Yellow Gold, and Ben Shan Oolong. Nuances were compared and discussed. Darius, I am proud to say, impressed the heck out of the farmers by not only knowing how to steep their tea well, he was adept at using chopsticks to pick up slippery noodles at dinner with ease. He even tried his hand at sorting tea, which the women laughed at. The one to beat was an adorable eight year old girl from next door; as her hands were a blur. I mention this on purpose. Is this child labour? Should this child be learning how to produce tea at such a young age? First of all, it’s family business, all hands are needed at peak production time. Secondly, according to Mr. Yan, 8 to 9 years old is when they are first trained from everything from tea picking to tea sorting. It takes that long to be good. By the time they are 18, they can apprentice with the tea master and learn to taste and judge tea. I thought to myself, since Olympic fever is in full swing, how many 4 to 5 year olds have begun their grueling practice at gymnastics, or how many 11 year olds are already competing at swim meets, training full time. How is this different? The art and craft of making tea must begin at a young age. Americans who worry that our tea are from a sweatshop exploiting child labour probably should rest in peace. Or like organic, fair trade, and many other issues, look at the situation with a full set of information before judging it from 10,000 miles away.
Anxi is where it's from. Tie= Iron, Guanyin=Bodhisattva of Compassion, the Oolong tea as beautiful as Guanyin and heavy as iron in one’s hand. The leaves are fleshier and darker green than other oolongs, with a slick, plump surface. The edges are sharp and jagged, with an elegant spine. If we had a rainy day, the leaves can not be plucked; but the leaves will get too mature by the time it stops raining. If they are too wet and the surface doesn’t dry fast enough, once the oolongs are curled and shaped, the moisture isn’t properly pumped out and the tea gets moldy. A hot day means the surface gets too dry and the moisture fails to travel out of the veins of the leaves, ensuring disaster. A rainy day followed by an unbearably hot day, or vice versa, produces the worst tea possible.
I asked Mr. Yan, following this explanation, how unfair is this for the farmers? For no one can control the weather, especially global warming, so their livelihood is after all, hanging on a nail and completely at the mercy of weather. Yes, said Mr. Yan the tea master. We always have been at the mercy of nature.
A particular melodious Tikuanyin note is after all, why we are here, deep in the Anxi mountains. This morning, the farm hands brought in last night’s processed leaves. Mr. Yan judges and grades them, view their successful accomplishment as a Mao Cha (primary finished tea), determines pricing according to grade, and negotiates with each farmer. This is also in the context of the entire season’s tea and what that quality range was. After all, the weather, more than the tea master or farmer, will determine the ultimate quality from leaf size to ability to respond to human crafting. You can not make diamonds out of cement? But Tikuanyin is the diamond of oolongs, and if we ended up with a particular good batch, we then parsed over the particular differences between firing by charcoal vs. wood fire vs. electric oven baking. Drinking good Tikuanyin enlarges the throat when it travels down, where good oolongs will merely go down straight, and the bad and ugly? It constricts the throat as if someone is choking you with both hands.
The Anxi Tea Market is the largest of its kind in the country with 3 separate and major structures. It is also the only spot meet where the farmers can haul last night’s processing to the market by the next morning and wholesale buyers can come make their purchase. On a normal busy day, 5000 people congregate there buying and selling tea. I call it the NYSE of tea. Tea is big business, it is also pervasive. Whole cities are devoted to the tea
industry sometimes. Anxi, Fuding, and cities like this have an inseparable identity with their tea.
Suzanne, Yoon Hee, and Darius might be learning just a little first hand information here at the farm at Anxi. At least, they see how meticulous, hardworking, and dedicated these tea crafters are. The teas grow here on 70 degree mountainous terrains like no other agricultural product, and require the optimal conditions of fog cover, bright mid day sun, gentle breeze, sprinkles of rain fall, and a cool, mild comfortable temperature. If it’s good enough for the tea, it’s good enough for us! On a side note, I am sitting here writing with a mosquito incense burning, bug spray handy for re-spray every hour, and tiger balm for the enormous welts that have cropped up any exposed surface. I have the topography of Anxi Mountain on my arms and legs. No wonder, because when the mosquitoes attacked Darius, they dropped dead instantly.

Taken from http://teapersonality.blogspot.com/