Tea ceremonies in Ukraine: how and why it looks not like in China
24 years old, sound producer
He does a tea ceremony.
«I try to show Chinese culture every minute of my life. On parties I come with tea set. Usually you may find some people there who want to join. I rarely see people who is neutral to it. There are people there interested in this. Of course there are people that don’t have any interest — but I’ve rarely seen attitude like this.»
How did you started to do tea ceremony?
I’ve been learning Eastern culture since i was a teenager. How did I started to do this? Once I’ve been offered a cup of pu`er tea. I’ve heard it can get me going
Is that true?
No, and that’swhy I started to comprehend the tea ceremony. I wantedto understand how it works.
Well, what did you find in tea?
You know that feeling — when you’d learn a new skills and this knowledge is getting under your skin? You don’t know how to live without it. Do you understand, yeah? I’ve always felt the same way with tea. I have zen training: in the half-light I put on special music and do a tea ceremony. That’s how I feel — peace, totally zen, I call this «tea zen».
What is your favourite type of tea?
I don’t have such one. I want to try something new all time. Pu’er is the most common one. I like «Raw Pu`er» and «Biluochun».
Who is usually comes to your tea ceremony?
People who want to see performance. Such kind of events are full of special music, low relaxing light and peaceful talks about tea. For me a tea ceremony is a training your zen. I want to transfer my psychological condition to my guests.
About a tea ceremony in China
In CIC countries people think tea ceremony is mysticism, reading Taoist treatises and ephemeral state. Chinese people take it easy. They don’t put too much stock in this. There peoples smoke, drink tea and talk about business at the same time.
What do you think about tea-bags?
People who drink that may don’t know much about tea. The main criterios to make it quality are soil, light cycle, humidity, temperature, harvest, storage. Tea-bags has nothing to do with real tea. Do you want to know what you’re buying? There is a classification of tea: white, green, yellow, red, oolong and black. All teas come from the same plant. In order to create different types of tea, the process of oxidation must be also different. Oxidation is when you dry, roll and heat the plant. Usually fermentation stops manually. But in previously mentioned «Raw Pu`er» tea process of fermentation never stops. Imagine you’ve bought a green tea and after 2 years it has become a black tea.
About temperature of boiling
Each type of tee should be filled with water of different temperature but never higher than 78°C because tea can loose it’s flavor and antioxidants but never higher than 90°C.
How will tea culture develop in Ukraine?
There will always be lovers of wine, coffee and tea. Now, we have so much information and if you really want to know something — you find that. What about Ukraine? I guess, ukrainian society is really good «rewrite», I mean it’s looks unique but we can see where it leads. We have American, European and Asian influence. Everything here is somebody else’s, but came from abroad. So I can only watch.
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