The (Western) Yixing market

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Bok
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Wed Jan 02, 2019 2:40 am

theredbaron wrote:
Tue Jan 01, 2019 4:21 pm
And in a sense, it is less about money than about the relationships you build with tea people. In Asia it is less about tea shops selling tea than people forming tea circles, where they meet drink tea, talk tea, and whatever other topic that needs taling about. Some people may have lots of money, so they spend more, pay for the expensive teas they then all drink together, etc.
Very true. The best teas I had, where all teas that kind souls have shared with me, not the ones I bought myself...
Most of those I would not be able to afford if I could find them myself. The tea scene in Asia has quite a bit of those tutors/patrons who generously share the good stuff with friends and like-minded people.

Good things are meant to share, drinking by one self is one dimensional sometimes, so much pleasure is achieved by talking about the same teas with a friend over a cup.
swordofmytriumph
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Wed Jan 02, 2019 5:02 am

Bok wrote:
Wed Jan 02, 2019 2:40 am
Good things are meant to share
It's amazing how just sharing a tea with someone else makes it seem to taste better. I've shared some of my good stuff with friends, and I pick up on things in the tea that I hadn't even noticed before, because I'm thinking about it more...critically? Like, telling someone else about my tea is the best way for me to pick up on nuances.
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Brent D
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Thu Jan 03, 2019 12:26 am

This thread took an awesome turn. Great read folks:)
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Bok
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Thu Jan 03, 2019 2:56 am

swordofmytriumph wrote:
Wed Jan 02, 2019 5:02 am
It's amazing how just sharing a tea with someone else makes it seem to taste better. I've shared some of my good stuff with friends, and I pick up on things in the tea that I hadn't even noticed before, because I'm thinking about it more...critically? Like, telling someone else about my tea is the best way for me to pick up on nuances.
One thing I want to add, while generally company at the tea table is nice, it makes it a bit more difficult to get to the essence of a tea. One quote comes to mind:

“In tasting tea, one person can taste tea’s essence; two people can taste tea’s delight; three people can taste tea’s flavor; but six or seven people together can only be called using (drinking) tea” Chen Jiru

I prefer 1-2, max 3 people tea sessions if I am the one brewing. More and too much distracts from the focus on the cup, more goes into concern for everyone's well-being and thirst.
swordofmytriumph
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Thu Jan 03, 2019 3:33 am

That makes sense. To get the essence/flavor, you really do need a bit of focus.
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wave_code
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Thu Jan 03, 2019 6:07 am

Bok wrote:
Tue Jan 01, 2019 2:20 pm
swordofmytriumph wrote:
Tue Jan 01, 2019 1:32 pm

That’s really cool info. So it seems that even if I did live in a place where higher quality was available, it would be a lot of money/effort to even be “allowed” to get the good stuff. Like, a cultural thing? It’s cool that tea is taken so serieously there.
Out of curiosity, for the stuff that isn’t openly on sale, do people who “meet the requirements” for tea excellence just build relationships with shops so the proprietor knows them and will sell to them, or what? I’m imagining someone going into a shop in another city and asking for the secret menu or something. ;)
I had the same experience. I was told after 5 years buying tea, letting me taste their top quality gaoshan, that I can not buy it, that I still need another few years before I am ready :shock:

Basically, asking for it will not help. One can tell by how you drink, or comment on certain teas how much you know, or not. You have to bare in mind that in Asia you taste the tea before you buy. Leaves a lot to observe for the seller. If they care. Some just think foreigners can not appreciate it in any way, so they will never sell to you. Luckily not too many are like this.

Introductions can help as well. And little tokens of appreciations. Well, like any relationship really.
Not to continue going totally off topic, but it does all seem relevant to this discussion.... Interestingly I can see a lot of parallels between tea, particularly the expansion of the western market, and that of (craft) beer, which is where most of my time/drinking was done prior to getting interested in tea. There are plenty of beers which are considered world class or classic benchmarks for particular styles due to their quality and consistency (for example many of the Trappist beers after the monasteries revamped their production processes), some which are excellent but hard to acquire due to smaller scale production for the sake of quality control, and those that are just hard to get and maybe good but not great (or sometimes even bad) but become desirable just out of rarity or because they are a curiosity. Often getting your hands on particular beers was difficult and while you could maybe find certain things by jumping around store to store asking everywhere you could, I always had better lucky by cultivating a relationship with the buyers at a couple smaller stores where I was a regular. They came to know me and my tastes, would sell me things they had ordered in just for themselves or set particular rare things aside for me even without my asking, as well as point me to things I didn't know but would probably appreciate more than other people because they knew my tastes. Occasionally I would pull a small special bottle out of my basement or buy them a drink to show appreciation. Also by building friendships with a few other enthusiasts we would tip each other off, pick up spare bottles for each other or drink them together, swap for other things like rare records, or pull something out of the basement after 8 years. But importantly we knew what the other person liked and usually had similar tastes - it wasn't about getting something just because it supposedly was the best or hardest to get. And similarly, sharing something special in a small select group always seemed the best way to drink said beer.

As interest in craft beer grew I felt like I saw more and more people running around wanting to try every type of "rare" beer they could get their hands on with little to no appreciation for certain subtleties or being totally uneducated and only having been interested in anything other than Bud or drinking to get drunk for maybe a couple months. I don't want to shoot down people just for enjoying themselves, but time and time again I would hear about some amazing beer only to get a chance to try it and find it to actually be incredibly bad by the standards of that style, or even of what makes a beer objectively good in terms of brewing technique. Using techniques like barrel aging to cover up for off-notes in the beer or an inability to get something really good and interesting tasting without it, sort of equivalent I guess to someone masking a poorly produced tea with aroma oils.

I don't want to start trouble by generalizing but I get the feeling perhaps we in the west (and in my experience younger guys in particular) tend to get very enthusiastic about things like this (say a specialist area/field that requires some deep dives to even start to fully understand said thing's diversity and variations and potential quality) and jump in very quickly while often forgetting that the ability to buy up lots of said thing or try lots of said thing in a short period is no substitute for time, experience, and also importantly education by others with more experience. I feel like I have seen on some other tea discussion areas a similar tendency, and that some western shops' businesses seem to thrive on these personality types- watch some youtube, spend a few hundred dollars, buy what a salesman and a bunch of other amateurs tell you is the best, and suddenly you are a tea expert. Enthusiasm can go along way but it is no substitute for an education, and a real education isn't something you can simply purchase. And while it is never fun to be totally written off by someone based on your age, race, or appearance, I can appreciate people who guard and treasure a thing they know and love from such behavior, or at least give someone a skeptical once over and require a bit of proof from someone before sharing certain things to know it will be appreciated.
swordofmytriumph
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Thu Jan 03, 2019 8:00 am

wave_code wrote:
Thu Jan 03, 2019 6:07 am
Not to continue going totally off topic, but it does all seem relevant to this discussion.... Interestingly I can see a lot of parallels between tea, particularly the expansion of the western market, and that of (craft) beer, which is where most of my time/drinking was done prior to getting interested in tea. There are plenty of beers which are considered world class or classic benchmarks for particular styles due to their quality and consistency (for example many of the Trappist beers after the monasteries revamped their production processes), some which are excellent but hard to acquire due to smaller scale production for the sake of quality control, and those that are just hard to get and maybe good but not great (or sometimes even bad) but become desirable just out of rarity or because they are a curiosity. Often getting your hands on particular beers was difficult and while you could maybe find certain things by jumping around store to store asking everywhere you could, I always had better lucky by cultivating a relationship with the buyers at a couple smaller stores where I was a regular. They came to know me and my tastes, would sell me things they had ordered in just for themselves or set particular rare things aside for me even without my asking, as well as point me to things I didn't know but would probably appreciate more than other people because they knew my tastes. Occasionally I would pull a small special bottle out of my basement or buy them a drink to show appreciation. Also by building friendships with a few other enthusiasts we would tip each other off, pick up spare bottles for each other or drink them together, swap for other things like rare records, or pull something out of the basement after 8 years. But importantly we knew what the other person liked and usually had similar tastes - it wasn't about getting something just because it supposedly was the best or hardest to get. And similarly, sharing something special in a small select group always seemed the best way to drink said beer.

As interest in craft beer grew I felt like I saw more and more people running around wanting to try every type of "rare" beer they could get their hands on with little to no appreciation for certain subtleties or being totally uneducated and only having been interested in anything other than Bud or drinking to get drunk for maybe a couple months. I don't want to shoot down people just for enjoying themselves, but time and time again I would hear about some amazing beer only to get a chance to try it and find it to actually be incredibly bad by the standards of that style, or even of what makes a beer objectively good in terms of brewing technique. Using techniques like barrel aging to cover up for off-notes in the beer or an inability to get something really good and interesting tasting without it, sort of equivalent I guess to someone masking a poorly produced tea with aroma oils.

I don't want to start trouble by generalizing but I get the feeling perhaps we in the west (and in my experience younger guys in particular) tend to get very enthusiastic about things like this (say a specialist area/field that requires some deep dives to even start to fully understand said thing's diversity and variations and potential quality) and jump in very quickly while often forgetting that the ability to buy up lots of said thing or try lots of said thing in a short period is no substitute for time, experience, and also importantly education by others with more experience. I feel like I have seen on some other tea discussion areas a similar tendency, and that some western shops' businesses seem to thrive on these personality types- watch some youtube, spend a few hundred dollars, buy what a salesman and a bunch of other amateurs tell you is the best, and suddenly you are a tea expert. Enthusiasm can go along way but it is no substitute for an education, and a real education isn't something you can simply purchase. And while it is never fun to be totally written off by someone based on your age, race, or appearance, I can appreciate people who guard and treasure a thing they know and love from such behavior, or at least give someone a skeptical once over and require a bit of proof from someone before sharing certain things to know it will be appreciated.
+1

If I were a shop owner, or tea maker, and I had the good stuff, I wouldn't want to share it with someone who couldn't appreciate it either. I'd want to make sure it "went to a good home".

I feel like it's much harder here (Seattle) to learn about tea first hand, not like Bok and Octo were talking about anyway. I wonder if there are any good books about tea to read? I should go look into that. You know it's funny I've learned more from joining this forum two weeks ago than I have in the last 5 YEARS of drinking tea by myself. All y'all rock!
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Elise
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Thu Jan 03, 2019 9:27 am

There is one really good AND recent book I would recommend if you read French:

Rougeventre Karin, « L’Empire du Thé. Le guide des thés de Chine. »

Comprehensive, precise, full of historical, process-related and cultural information.
Teachronicles
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Thu Jan 03, 2019 11:08 am

swordofmytriumph wrote:
Thu Jan 03, 2019 8:00 am
wave_code wrote:
Thu Jan 03, 2019 6:07 am
Not to continue going totally off topic, but it does all seem relevant to this discussion.... Interestingly I can see a lot of parallels between tea, particularly the expansion of the western market, and that of (craft) beer, which is where most of my time/drinking was done prior to getting interested in tea. There are plenty of beers which are considered world class or classic benchmarks for particular styles due to their quality and consistency (for example many of the Trappist beers after the monasteries revamped their production processes), some which are excellent but hard to acquire due to smaller scale production for the sake of quality control, and those that are just hard to get and maybe good but not great (or sometimes even bad) but become desirable just out of rarity or because they are a curiosity. Often getting your hands on particular beers was difficult and while you could maybe find certain things by jumping around store to store asking everywhere you could, I always had better lucky by cultivating a relationship with the buyers at a couple smaller stores where I was a regular. They came to know me and my tastes, would sell me things they had ordered in just for themselves or set particular rare things aside for me even without my asking, as well as point me to things I didn't know but would probably appreciate more than other people because they knew my tastes. Occasionally I would pull a small special bottle out of my basement or buy them a drink to show appreciation. Also by building friendships with a few other enthusiasts we would tip each other off, pick up spare bottles for each other or drink them together, swap for other things like rare records, or pull something out of the basement after 8 years. But importantly we knew what the other person liked and usually had similar tastes - it wasn't about getting something just because it supposedly was the best or hardest to get. And similarly, sharing something special in a small select group always seemed the best way to drink said beer.

As interest in craft beer grew I felt like I saw more and more people running around wanting to try every type of "rare" beer they could get their hands on with little to no appreciation for certain subtleties or being totally uneducated and only having been interested in anything other than Bud or drinking to get drunk for maybe a couple months. I don't want to shoot down people just for enjoying themselves, but time and time again I would hear about some amazing beer only to get a chance to try it and find it to actually be incredibly bad by the standards of that style, or even of what makes a beer objectively good in terms of brewing technique. Using techniques like barrel aging to cover up for off-notes in the beer or an inability to get something really good and interesting tasting without it, sort of equivalent I guess to someone masking a poorly produced tea with aroma oils.

I don't want to start trouble by generalizing but I get the feeling perhaps we in the west (and in my experience younger guys in particular) tend to get very enthusiastic about things like this (say a specialist area/field that requires some deep dives to even start to fully understand said thing's diversity and variations and potential quality) and jump in very quickly while often forgetting that the ability to buy up lots of said thing or try lots of said thing in a short period is no substitute for time, experience, and also importantly education by others with more experience. I feel like I have seen on some other tea discussion areas a similar tendency, and that some western shops' businesses seem to thrive on these personality types- watch some youtube, spend a few hundred dollars, buy what a salesman and a bunch of other amateurs tell you is the best, and suddenly you are a tea expert. Enthusiasm can go along way but it is no substitute for an education, and a real education isn't something you can simply purchase. And while it is never fun to be totally written off by someone based on your age, race, or appearance, I can appreciate people who guard and treasure a thing they know and love from such behavior, or at least give someone a skeptical once over and require a bit of proof from someone before sharing certain things to know it will be appreciated.
+1

If I were a shop owner, or tea maker, and I had the good stuff, I wouldn't want to share it with someone who couldn't appreciate it either. I'd want to make sure it "went to a good home".

I feel like it's much harder here (Seattle) to learn about tea first hand, not like Bok and Octo were talking about anyway. I wonder if there are any good books about tea to read? I should go look into that. You know it's funny I've learned more from joining this forum two weeks ago than I have in the last 5 YEARS of drinking tea by myself. All y'all rock!
Floating leaves tea sometimes has tastings you can go to, mostly Taiwanese oolongs, and shuiwen (the owner) is pretty knowledgeable about TW oolongs, might be something to look into.
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Victoria
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Thu Jan 03, 2019 1:09 pm

+1 if I lived in Seattle I’d be over at Floating Leaves every week, Shuiwen is a fountain of knowledge and has great teas.
Teachronicles
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Thu Jan 03, 2019 1:22 pm

I know Phoenix Tea hosts crimson lotus every so often too, they do puer, might also be worth looking into.
swordofmytriumph
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Thu Jan 03, 2019 2:19 pm

Thanks for the recommendation guys! I guess I’ll have to head over to floating leaves. I didn’t know they did that!

I did some looking online and decided to read For All the Tea in China: How England Stole the World’s Favorite Drink and Changed History. It’s REALLY good so far. I’ll post a review later when I’m done, in case anyone is interested.
theredbaron
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Thu Jan 03, 2019 8:05 pm

swordofmytriumph wrote:
Thu Jan 03, 2019 2:19 pm
Thanks for the recommendation guys! I guess I’ll have to head over to floating leaves. I didn’t know they did that!

I did some looking online and decided to read For All the Tea in China: How England Stole the World’s Favorite Drink and Changed History. It’s REALLY good so far. I’ll post a review later when I’m done, in case anyone is interested.
A book that i would suggest reading is Blofeld's "Chinese Art of Tea". It gives you a good introduction also into the spirit of tea, written by a legend who lived through some of the most tumultous times in Asia.
theredbaron
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Thu Jan 03, 2019 8:08 pm

wave_code wrote:
Thu Jan 03, 2019 6:07 am

I don't want to start trouble by generalizing but I get the feeling perhaps we in the west (and in my experience younger guys in particular) tend to get very enthusiastic about things like this (say a specialist area/field that requires some deep dives to even start to fully understand said thing's diversity and variations and potential quality) and jump in very quickly while often forgetting that the ability to buy up lots of said thing or try lots of said thing in a short period is no substitute for time, experience, and also importantly education by others with more experience.

Not just in the west...
In particular in China incredibly expensive teas and teaware are part of te bragging rights for many of the newly rich, but who do often not take the time to learn and appreciate tea and teaware beyond showing off their wealth. That's life...
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Victoria
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Thu Jan 03, 2019 9:17 pm

swordofmytriumph wrote:
Thu Jan 03, 2019 2:19 pm
Victoria wrote:
Thu Jan 03, 2019 1:09 pm
+1 if I lived in Seattle I’d be over at Floating Leaves every week, Shuiwen is a fountain of knowledge and has great teas.
Thanks for the recommendation guys! I guess I’ll have to head over to floating leaves. I didn’t know they did that.
If you are into Taiwan oolong, Floating Leaves just got their winter shipment, it’s very fresh 🍃. The best goes fast too.
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