In those countries where the British were in charge of tea growing, the processing factories are of an imposing size.
The upper floor, or upper floors, like here on the Namring Tea Estate (India), are devoted solely to withering the tea leaves. The rolling, oxidation, drying and sorting of the various grades take place on the ground floor of the building.
Having travelled around the region where Pu Er is grown, I moved further south, to Laos. There, I discovered, halfway between Paksé and Paksong, on the Boloven plateau, a small-scale factory making a very good black tea with aromas of cooked fruits, leather and spices, which will delight fans of Grand Yunnan Imperial.
Curiously, the tea plants here grow in the middle of coffee plantations. In fact, to enable the local rural population, who earn very little, to generate some extra income, the Lao Farmers Association has taught them how to grow tea, and has opened a cooperative whose purpose is to support the community rather than to make a profit.
As I walked for a few hours among the tea plants and luxuriant vegetation, I noticed two things in particular: the bomb craters left by the Vietnam war, and also the incredible number of leeches you must pull off as you walk. Not only do they climb up your shoes and trousers, but the creatures even manage to drop out of the sky, or rather, the trees, and land all over you, even in the palm of your hand.
In many of the countries I travel in, the water is not safe to drink unless it is boiled first. So people always have water on the boil, day and night, at home, at work, in the shops, and even on the road, like here, al fresco.
Just after arriving in Sudianlisuzuxiang in Yunnan, while some of our party went off to pluck the birds and others cut fine sticks of bamboo on which to grill the meat, I lit the fire to make tea. On this high and peaceful plateau, once we had eaten our fill and drunk our Pu Er, we stretched out on the grass for a nap. Except for one, who took a stroll with his water pipe.
Kyoto is undoubtedly a traditional city, but that does not exclude a certain sense of fun. I have chosen these happy Japanese women, who must sometimes wear less classic outfits than these, to be my ambassadresses in wishing you a wonderful year in 2011, a year in which we might allow ourselves to express our “joie de vivre” in front of a passing photographer, a year in which we might take the time to observe such delicate things as the petals of cherry blossom.
In the West, tea is often prepared in a teapot, usually containing between 50cl and 150cl of tea. In Asia, however, where tea is very popular, the use of a teapot of this size, or even of a teapot at all, is not as common as here. In China, for example, where there are probably the most number of tea drinkers on the planet, tea is traditionally drunk from a zhong (a small bowl with a lid) or from tiny cups filled from a tiny teapot. These utensils – some of which you can see in this photo – comprise what is called Gong Fu Cha.
Are the Chinese right to call Pu Erh the “fat-eating tea” because it apparently aids weight loss and lowers cholesterol? I have no idea, and have to say that I am not particularly interested in the health-giving qualities of dark teas, which I enjoy for their flavour. Pu Erhs have an incredible aromatic richness, taking you through wood and undergrowth, with the whiff of stables, leather and damp straw. A pure delight!
In this photo you can see freshly moulded “cakes” of Pu Erh. This is a green (or raw) Pu Erh, as you can see from the colour of its leaves. It has not been covered for the fermentation process. Depending on the conditions in which it is stored, it can continue fermenting year after year, often improving with age.
The sun sets over Darjeeling. If you manage to find a good vantage point from the city centre, this is the view you will get. In this part of the world, the morning skies are often very clear. However, in the evening it can be difficult to spot a patch of sky that is free from cloud, as this is when they like to gather. They come from the Terai plain, or sometimes form right here, in the bottom of the valley. They have nowhere else to go, as they are surrounded by mountains.
This red sky is the old year. Soon it will be night and a new year, 2011, with new roads for us to travel together. New harvests, new delights… I’d be delighted if you’d accompany me.
In eastern China, in Fujian or Zheijiang, for example, tea pluckers ware pointed bamboo hats to keep out of the rain and the sun.
Here, I barely had the time to fix my depth of field that the tea pluckers disappeared to have lunch. They left there their nice hats. So in this tea field, it seems that goblins are playing hide and seek and that only their small hats are sticking out. I like this photo for this funny side. I imagine that the hats are going to raise up and that I’ll see grinning faces.
The end-of-year festivities are often associated with the colours green and red. Green like the needles of the Christmas tree, red like Santa Claus; green and red like the leaves and berries of holly.
So I looked through my photos to see what I had in these shades, to offer you a touch of seasonal cheer, but I found nothing. But then I realised that I give you green throughout the year, with the fields of tea, so I thought a bit of red would serve to illustrate the season.
In a city like Kyoto, with more than a thousand temples, there is not one dedicated to tea. It is not very fitting for a country where so much of it is drunk. Last month, a little disappointed by this observation, I have to say, I decided to call on the Rice God instead, and set off to visit his temple. I am glad I did, because it means I can bring you an image of the wonderful red pillars of the Fushimi Inari-Taisha sanctuary. This Shinto temple has thousands of the beautiful “tori”.
I hope you like this end-of-year celebration in red. Enjoy the festivities!
This is not a particularly attractive photo, but it will interest fans of Pu Erh. It is quite a rare image, in that until recently it wasn’t easy to get inside Pu Erh factories, and it was even more difficult to take pictures of them. The manufacturing of Pu Erh was supposed to be a secret, or at least it was one of those things that are not revealed to outsiders. Why is this? I don’t know, although I suspect it is due to the fact that there is little visual interest in a tea gradually going mouldy.
Pu Erh is the name for fermented tea. As a reminder, black teas are oxidised, and dark teas (Pu Erhs) are fermented. While we are on the subject, the difference between oxidisation and fermentation is that the former is a process that requires exposure to air, whereas the latter takes place in an environment deprived of oxygen. Now you understand better why these leaves have been deliberately damped down and covered: to allow the tea to ferment for around 45 days. A thermometer, which you can see in the foreground, is stuck through the canvas to check the temperature, which can rapidly reach 50 to 60 degrees centigrade.
This is the fast method. Another time I will tell you about the other method used to make Pu Erh, the slow method…
