Ahhh...The Tea Fields

Friends,
I forgot to tell you about the tea fields in my last post, so you are going to get two posts today.

Soon after we arrived here, Mr. Skiles graciously took us all out to see the tea fields. There were only about four fields, but they were breath taking. Tea here is grown on bushes in precise little rows. The field that we saw was hedged by a very lovely bush with bright orange flowers and was complemented by a hazy Pacific Ocean backdrop (Yes, I do have pictures of this, but they are for my Mommy to see first because she is the Queen of tea at our house, love you Mom!).

Then we went up into the tea shop. Now, in Taiwan tea is a very big event with much ceremony. We sat in the tea shop drinking tea for at least two hours while the owners made us several kinds of tea in a specific way to tantalize out taste-buds.

First the tea is placed into a cup and boiling hot water is poured over the leaves and left to steam with occasional stirring for a couple of minutes.

Then the tea is poured into little Chinese teacups (For those of you who don't know, Asian teacups hold maybe a quarter cup of liquid and have no handles). We enjoyed several flavors of Oolong tea, some significantly more than others. Once we were done, we simply had to buy some, and here are some example of the beautiful packaging options that they had.

These next packages actually contain tea for China, which is technically a better quality of tea. Apparently the quality of tea varies from country to country, and the better tea is grown higher up.

Another interesting fact that we learned is that all Oolong tea comes from one bush, the only difference (besides the elevation of growth) is how the tea is dried and processed. For example, my favorite tea at this shop was a tea that had been dried and toasted over charcoal, it has almost a coffee flavor but absolutely no caffeine. :) Speaking of caffeine, the owner also told us that even if a tea says that it has caffeine in it, you can brew it in cold water the caffeine is not released.

So take time today to brew a cup of tea, inhale deeply, and pray for the children here and for us.

Coming home tomorrow, see you all soon!
~Annah