A teapot and tea, ready for a ceremony
Harmony in a cup
According to legend, it was Emperor Shennong who first discovered tea during a search for medicinal plants in Southwest China some 4,700 years ago. The leaves were initially chewed rather than used for a drink but this gradually changed over the centuries. A fascinating tea etiquette arose in China specifying, for example, that tea drinkers had to be in harmony with their surroundings. This is why teahouses are established in gardens with beautiful ornaments, water and rocks. Numerous poems, stories and paintings refer to the art of tea drinking and today there appear to be countless types of tea. All Chinese tea can be divided into 6 kinds, however, including green, black, white and oolong. You can learn all about this at the Museum of Tea Ware which contains the world's oldest tea set and many other fascinating things to see. The museum also shows several interesting documentaries. After visiting the exhibition, go to the teahouse under the museum to try out the many different teas to your heart’s content.
‘Love at first sight’ tea at LockCha
Flower tea in the city park
Although every Chinese restaurant in town serves tea, preparing it properly is not easy. Have a look inside the teahouses of Hong Kong. At the LockCha Tea House in Hong Kong Park, for instance, where the ponds and trees conform to the etiquette, the masters prepare more than one hundred kinds of tea with the utmost dedication and precision. The menu is packed with the common green, white and Pu-erh varieties, as well as unusual flower teas. Take ‘Love at first sight’ ─ this tea goes in the glass in the form of a ball and unfolds in the water into a bouquet of jasmine flowers. Magical!
