Tea Parties

When traveling to the Far East (from New York), there’s often a stop-over at Heathrow in London. I always enjoy getting off the plane after a trans-Atlantic flight and stretching my legs before the next leg. I browse the shops which often display goods that are typical of whatever country I happen to be in. At Heathrow there’s an emphasis on tea service: pots, cups and saucers, world famous (tea) brands, and richly embroidered cozies.

It’s fun to imagine all those refined English ladies taking high tea in their elegant drawing rooms, snacking on cucumber sandwiches, just beyond the treeless wasteland this (or any) airport represents. It’s delicious to think about their fresh, pink-cheeked maids, gingerly picking up porcelain shards off the black and white checkerboard kitchen floors with pale, trembling fingers.

They remain unaware of the big world outside, cleaving to ancient traditions that includes strict punctuality; no thought lent to the mysterious origin of the tea leaves themselves - the terraced gardens of Darjeeling, India, and those of what was once known as Ceylon.

I think of my mother’s hutch in her dining room at home and take note that the tea drinking tradition (or a part of it) has even found its way across the Atlantic to the New World. Only here it serves primarily only decorative purposes. The china remains unused and gathers dust while the coffee urn in the kitchen is stained a deep brown with use.

I remember, not too long ago, a tea room opened in the New Jersey town where I live off and on. It was bright and airy featuring translucent china, tea cozies and such. There were delicacies served on white bread with the crusts cut off. But nobody went - or not enough. The shop closed down after barely a month.

Back on the other side of the globe, in Chennai, India too, there was a shop my wife and I sometimes frequented, featuring the most exquisite teas. It closed as well. Meanwhile, the hole-in-the-wall shops, ten to a block, each prominently advertising ‘3Roses’ (bitter) tea (dust), are thriving.

I heard of an Indian girl sent to Leeds for an education practically dying of homesickness. Ultimately the problem was at least partially solved when she asked her parents (back in India) to send her a packet of ‘3 Roses’ tea.