Uncertain-TEA

These days, coffee seems to flow from under every rock and textbook on college campuses. As many Jumbos glug down caffeine to power through the incessant slew of exams, extracurriculars, and parties, Tufts is no exception. Yet despite the fame of mochas and cappuccinos, many Tufts students still find tea to be their drink of choice. 

Tufts students left flabbergasted by the plummeting economy may share more with tea than a standing date every bleary-eyed morning. The misfortunes of the economy can also be read as clearly as a tarot card in the dregs of a Chinese specialty tea market suddenly gone dry.

Tea flows deep in Chinese history. According to the company Stash Tea, legend has it that tea was discovered in China over five thousand years ago. Shen Nung, an early emperor, made a wise ruling that all drinking water be boiled for hygienic reasons. One summer day, he and his court stopped to rest on a journey to a region of the Emperor’s realm. As the servants began boiling water to drink, dried leaves from a nearby bush fell into the water and created a brown liquid that the Emperor found to be pleasantly refreshing. Around 800 A.D., Lu Yu wrote the Ch’a Ching, the first definitive book on tea, in which he describes the various methods of the cultivating and preparing of tea in ancient China. Tea houses became often-frequented places for social and philosophical discourse around this time, according to the Far East Summit and Lifegate Institute. With the popularity of tea houses was coined the phrase, “Kai men qi jian shi,” which roughly means, “Open the door (of a house) and you see the seven (essential things).” Tea was considered one of these seven essential things, along with cooking oil and soy sauce. 

Tea remains an important aspect of Chinese culture and society. According to Professor Zhongxin Sun, who teaches in the Chinese Department at Tufts, tea is often drunk at many times of the day in China. “Some people drink tea in the morning, and then they drink tea when they have dinner or lunch, so it’s very often,” she said. “Little kids don’t drink tea. It’s like coffee here.”

“There are all kinds of tea, all kinds of price levels,” said Sun. “It could be really really expensive, [but] some tea is really, really cheap.” 

Sun explained that “most people drink tea from China . . . They have a very long history of tea culture, but you can also find foreign tea.” Though coffee is also becoming more popular according to Sun, there are still more tea drinkers to be found. 

According to the New York Times, as China’s Nouveau Riche searched for a distinctly Chinese way to display their wealth, they turned to investing in Pu’er tea, produced in the mountainous Menghai County. From 1999 to 2007, the price of Pu’er increased tenfold to $150 a pound for the finest tea. Tens of thousands of Chinese farmers, wholesalers, and others poured their fortunes into the tea, which is sold compressed into discs. 

Pu’er became the region’s “liquid gold,” marketed to farmers as a dependable way to get rich. The saying spread that it was “better to save Pu’er than to save money.”  This notion was only reinforced by the fact that, unlike many teas that are best drunk fresh after harvest, Pu’er becomes even more prized with age. Vintage Pu’er from the 19th century could be sold for thousands of dollars a wedge. 

For a while, the tea measured up to the promises of wealth. It brought a prosperity that the farmers in the Menghai County had never before experienced. Villagers built two-story houses, bought cars, and sent their children to school in district capital. With the mystique of a fine wine and a loyal clientele to make the diamond industry turn emerald with envy, the price of Pu’er was only predicted to keep rising.

But when the bubble burst, fortunes shattered like a dropped teapot. 

According to Global Envision, a web site, by mid-2008, the failing economy began to hit wealthy Chinese and the tea traders stopped coming. Now, with the going rate for Pu’er hovering around three dollars a pound, more than a third of the 3,000 manufacturers and merchants, who had built their lives around the tea, have left the trade. The farmers have been hit the hardest, with many now switching to crops such as corn and rice.

The rise and pop of the Pu’er tea bubble shows the deep interconnectedness of cultural and economic, ancient and modern forces. A cultural item running through thousands of years of Chinese history can become the driving force behind a sensational modern market that rises and falls over the span of a decade. 

Tea-lovers might find it interesting to contemplate the long span of history behind the refreshing golden brew. From 5000 A.D. to today’s harsh economic times, comfort and even sympathy might still be found in a cup of tea.