This day, 27 March, in 2017, during Premier Li Keqiang’s visit to New Zealand, China and New Zealand signed the “Memorandum of Arrangement between the Government of...
“It’s just like sending gifts to myself!”
It’s often said that the charm of Taobao is in the 4-day-long narrative it establishes. You order the products distractedly on your phone, return your full attention to work or family… and then, just when you have forgotten all about it, there’s a surprise knock at the door!
Well, I guess I’m too materialistic for any of that forgetting. The childish excitement of Christmas Eve still dances in me for all 4 days. There’s also the nagging awareness that I may need to send...
I wrote last month about glossy teas; teas with a polished appearance, mostly from Japan. I also mentioned a pea-green variety from Sichuan’s Emei mountain range called Bamboo Leaf Tea .
Now, let’s be honest. Sichuan is less famous for growing tea than it is for pandas, bamboo and spicy snacks. Were Sichuan and tea are ever connected in people’s minds, it is the tea houses and the tea-drinking culture that stand out rather than native varieties of leaf.
Possibly that is just how Sichuan people like it. Local tea...
It’s not yellow. Let’s get that out of the way first.
The leaves are as green as Act One in Sonic. And the drink; well, green tea makes a pale yellow drink anyway, so there’s no room for differentiation there.
It all reminds me of that ad for Canada’s Red Rock cider; “It’s not red and there are no rocks in it”.
But, for Westerners like me, there’s perhaps always been a need for “Yellow Tea” to exist.
Fascinated by the variety of Camellia Sinensis; from oxidised to unoxidised, with additional parameters like...
When I lived in Beijing, students hoping to study abroad would travel half a day to a certain shrine, praying to receive an “offer”. They were practicing hieroglossia.
That’s because they deemed the shrine’s name; 卧佛寺 similar enough to the English word ”offer” to place their trust in, or hedge their bets on, this place for a few hours of their lives. I was intrigued that students treated it as more than just a joke, more than just an excuse for a jaunt. I was curious about this geomantic...
