Tea Production and Dilemmas on China’s Southwest Frontier

Abstract

“Pu’er tea¹ is complicated … Compared to the terrace tea (taidi cha), ancient tree tea (gushu cha) has much stronger chaqi (qi of tea) going through tasters’ bodies, from tongues to fingers, to toes,” (see Figure 1.1 for terrace tea gardens and Figure 1.2 for an ancient tea forest) said Zhongyao,² a certificated tea taster. I sat with Zhongyao at a big wooden table arranged for tea tasting in his house. From time to time, this nationally recognized Pu’er tea taster pushed me to feel with almost every pore in my skin the power of chaqi released from the ancient tree teas. He explained that the ancient tea trees could obtain much stronger chaqi because their roots grow deep into the land, where human disturbance was still rare. According to Zhongyao, Yunnan, a province on China’s southwest frontier, had the greatest quantity of ancient tea trees and forests in the world. “Unfortunately,” Zhongyao continued, “people don’t realize the value of ancient tree tea until they have already chopped down so many ancient tea trees to plant the modern tea (xiandai cha).³