Tag Archives: Xishuangbanna
Tea Horse Road Chronicles – The Pluck
Napu went up the tea tree amid a forest of tea trees, shimmying along a support branch, until she could access the buds and leaves two metres off of the ground. I shimmied up along side her to watch her … Continue reading
Umami Flows West to Puerh and its Bite
A flow westward out of one of the most precision oriented cultures of the leaf to a tiny corner (and an old home of mine) in southwestern China, where the leaf is still at times an imprecise thing of random … Continue reading
Puerh’s Ancient Cylinder – 竹面 – Zhú tǒng
The round cylinder of compressed Puerh, was formed using a bamboo husk and provided one of the most effective means of transporting tea along the Tea Horse Road. Continue reading
South Tea Sips 3: Moustaches and Matè Unleashed
Those who enjoy tea’s ability to “lay the hammer down softly” have always held Jing Mai teas in regard. These words were used once by a Guangdong friend of mine whose abilities to discern teas – despite a ferocious … Continue reading
My latest article for UNESCO on tea
Goes without say that the article (titled “Ancient Green Wisdom“) is best read with a cup of tea and perhaps a good deal more than simply “a” cup
Jingmai Pu’erh – Menghai Part V – Last Sips
Few things bring people to concur like trees do. We need more of them everywhere and of every kind, and when the trees happen to be tea trees, there is the added bonus of the ‘sips’ and stimulant-wonder that they … Continue reading
A Time of Talk … of Tea – Xishuangbanna lll
There is always a kind of inevitability of events in China. With the rush, the masses, the intensity of purpose, things just MOVE!! There is the sense at times that the speed and lack of warning of when something … Continue reading
An Arrival – Xishuangbanna/Sipsongbanna
Heat, Green, Some Characters…and more Green There are moments when the senses tell the rest of the body that one has arrived; moments when the body knows something before the mind does. Stepping out of a plane’s hatch, hot air … Continue reading
A Tea for Departures – Lau Banzhang
Embarking for the south of Yunnan on the tea sourcing mission tomorrow, it seems a perfect time to indulge in a little ‘tea’ farewell from home here in Shangrila. Above, on the wooden slats of my Tibetan home’s roof, ice … Continue reading
A Tea fit for a Trek
When selecting a tea for a mountain journey – and for every mountain journey there must be a tea – there is always a moment, a question: “which tea(s) for this particular trip?” The final selection signals not only a … Continue reading