Tea Museum

For GaoYan’s birthday we visited the Tea Museum. We were without our children so I was taking my time carefully reading each sign. Tea drinking originated in Yunnan province southwest China where people steeped the big leaves of tall wild trees. Later tea culture really developed in the Tang dynasty around 700 AD. Also some emperor visited Hangzhou to pick tea leaves from eighteen tea plants still growing today in the Dragon Well village.
GaoYan was pulling on my arm “Come on” when a nice museum lady walked up and offered for us to sample some tea. “Perfect, drinking tea in the tea museum, but how much is this going to cost?” We sat down to a well used tea set. There were ten or more canisters of different types of tea.
The museum lady asked, “What kind of tea do you want to try first?”
Hangzhou is Dragon Well green tea country, so we tried that first. I took a sip and remembered I drink green tea because people are forever setting it down in front of me. What else you got? “Do you have the big leaf tea from the tall wild Yunnan trees?” I doubted.
“This tea hits bitter at first with a sweet after taste,” said the museum lady.
“Oh wow! That is interesting.” GaoYan and I smiled at one another.
“Try this oolong with ginseng. It has a sweet taste deep in the throat when breathing through the mouth.”
The museum lady would also drink the tea with GaoYan and me. She didn’t pressure us to buy anything. Sip after sip and cup after cup she would look confidently in our eyes. The museum lady smiled a tiny smile that said, “You guys had no idea tea could taste this good.”
We felt refreshed after drinking tea and the sweet taste lingered deep in our throats.