Diary of My Country Life-April 30th, 2026

The original source of this blog: https://www.lotusandmichael.com/blogs/diary-of-my-country-life

04/30/2026 Thursday 48-62F Cloudy

There are four tea plants growing in my garden. One is big-leaf sinensis, which was injured in last winter because of the long-lasting cold and so far, hasn’t fully recovered; another is small-leaf sinensis—it grew happily until I mistakenly piled up snow on it and broke eighty percent of its branches. Feeling guilty, I purchased another two tea plants this spring. Perhaps because of the climate here, or because they are still too young, they grow painfully slow. The first night after I planted the fourth sinensis, seven deer passed by and nibbled on it. The damage wasn’t severe, but frustrating enough that I had to put a trellis around it to protect it from more deer’s visit. Recently all my tea camellias started to sprout new shoots, the tips of which are perfect for making tea.

Talking about tea, I can’t help thinking of my hometown. It is located in central China, where for centuries was one of the main, and the most northern, tea producing area. The tea produced in my hometown is called “Xinyang Mao Jian”, which belongs to the green tea family—“Mao” here means fuzzy, “Jian” means tips, and “Xinyang” is the city’s name. Put all the words together you will get the features of the tea: Tender tealeaf shoots pointing upright in the glass like little bamboo shoots; though the leaves are fresh olive green color, the tea water is somehow “cloudy” or opaque with a hue of green, like you are trying to see through a foggy green-glassed window since the fuzz of the leaves has been rinsed off by the hot water. 

This is the only tea that the folks in my hometown drink. Whichever household you visit, the host or hostess always gestures you to sit, then a cup of fuzzy, fragrant—the fragrance of the tea smells mellow, with a combined scent of cooked rice and blooming orchid flowers—hot tea is followed. Because of the delicate, infant-like tender shoots, we first fill an empty cup with boiled water at the temperature of 85ish degree Celsius, several seconds later drop in one or two pinches of tea leaves. If the host is generous, you can get a cup of super fuzzy tea and the tea will be replaced after three or four refills; if the host is stingy, the tea you expect from him will be clearer (less leaves) and your cup will be refilled over and over again so at the end the tea tastes like just plain water. It’s not the worst case yet—the worst cases are: Either no tea is served when you enter a household (which means you are not welcome), or your cup isn’t refilled by the host after being drunk up (which indicates that it’s time for you to leave). 

But whatever the case is, one thing is in common: The tea in a cup should never be full, seventy to eighty percent of capacity is the most—in Chinese culture, too full hints “spill soon” so be humble and unassuming.

I left my hometown and went to Beijing, later to Shanghai. So my hometown tea had faded into my memory until years later in my late twenties—I quit my job and changed the routine of my career by working in a tea shop; meanwhile I earned the tea artist certificate. The shop sold Taiwan high mountain tea, a kind of oolong tea. Since the location of the shop was in Xintiandi, where a lot of foreigners, whether travelers or residents, liked to visit, in just three months, I made friends with four westerners—one from Germany, one from England, one was Swiss and one American. They liked me to be their food or shopping guide of Shanghai, and translator of course in some informal occasions. While among all the four foreigners, only one actually bought tea from me—the American one, who later became my husband.

I knew the German and Swiss friends weren’t tea fans, so I forgave them for not buying my tea; but my English friend Martin, who was also the closest to me at that time, drank tea almost every day. Perhaps he knew that everything sold in Xintiandi area was expensive so every time he went to the shop to look for me, he just smiled, never took out his wallet. Then he begged me to take him to a suburban tea market (I mentioned that market to him once and he remembered), where the tea prices were at least seventy percent cheaper if not eighty percent. So he loved tea, and didn’t mind traveling for hours to get tea at a good price. Good for him.

The lines from the movie “Casablanca” always make me feel like they were talking about how my husband and I met—"Of all the gin joints in all the towns in all the world, she walks into mine"-- Of all the “tea shops” in all the towns in all the world, he walks into mine. Had I not changed my normal life routine and been a shopgirl, I would never have met my husband; had that day he not visited Shanghai nor wanted to buy tea, nor taken his friend’s advice to buy good oolong tea from my shop, we would never have met; had he not been surprised by my ample hair and open mind, seeing me write down every unknown English word in our conversation so I could learn it, we wouldn’t have any later stories…

So that’s life. A small thing can lead to a life-changing moment. Tea, teashop, and marriage. Shit (life) happens. Now sitting in my yard, being surrounded by my four tea plants and watching spring pollens drifting around by breezes, I dream about making my own tea one day—when my sinensis grows bigger; when the days are warm and dry; when everything is just right.

I painted two paintings in the last two weeks about the China tea harvesting process: One is called “Tea on their shoulders”, the other one is “Tea in their hands”. These paintings show how tea is picked and carried out of the mountains. I will talk more about them in my next diary.