瓜子 (guazi) or “Melon Seed” is the name of an online used-car selling platform. It’s an example of how brand conventions have evolved in China beyond fruits (Apple, Blackberry) to the names of dried food commodities (Xiaomi, Sesame, etc.) It’s also an example of a shift from branded physical products to services. Actually, the subject of this month’s Strainer is not a tech startup or a financial service. It’s not even the humble melon seed itself (a fine Autumn snack); it’s a variety of green tea that is also named 瓜片...

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...

The English language wouldn’t be as careless as this. Sure, 汤 (tang) is “soup” but this character also gets used for fruit juices, as in 酸梅汤 (suan mei tang); sour plum juice.  There’s also 茶 (cha); tea, which means “processed-Camellia-Sinensis-leaves” and “drinks-infused-with-those-leaves”, right?  Well, not quite, because there are other roles for this character, too.  There are those Chinese drinks using the leaves (and flowers) of other plants. In Beijing’s impromptu Temple Fairs, I have drunk a 茶汤 (cha tang); tea soup, which is a glutinous, sugary, sesame-flavoured thing much better than it...

Let me state that The Nanjinger has not paid for me to be here. Nanjing is far too far away and the expenses for such a glamorous patch could easily spiral beyond control. I write from Juan Les Pines on the French Riviera. You can almost skip a stone to Cannes in the west and Monaco to the East. Every town along here has significance to the grand tour, the lost generation or the jet set, but also to a contented local populace. This is still more French than...