NY Times article about beautiful tea

[iGo]

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/06/styl ... -ios-share

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[Bok]

Exactly my kind of people...

[Chadrinkincat]

Join the fun!

https://www.facebook.com/groups/gongfuc ... 44?sfns=mo

[faj]

The participants are described as being...

• A former model, actress and dancer
• British shamanic healer and movement teacher
• A yoga teacher, musician and former supermodel

They are in the bush, far from civilization.

I think this is not an actual article. It is the first 10 minutes of the scenario for a horror or porn movie.

[debunix]

Left-coast beautiful people doing very silly things that proper Manhattanites wouldn't waste time on.....a very traditional NYT poke at Los Angeles

[Victoria]

Left-coast beautiful people doing very silly things that proper Manhattanites wouldn't waste time on.....a very traditional NYT poke at Los Angeles

Haha pretty true. Although, her teacher Wu De (Global Tea Hut/Tea Sage Hut) comes to Pu’erh Brooklyn almost every year. I meet Aaron Fisher/Wu De during one of those LA trips she met him at. While, I’m not into the ceremonial aspects, he did have very good oolong. Last time I heard about this group they were setting up tents in Playa del Rey in the wetlands with Wu De. I find it curious how certain Global Tea Hut followers manage to travel the world getting paid to serve tea,

makes her living serving tea worldwide and “holding ceremonial space” for women

This line was particularly funny about tea in LA,

“a benevolent virus” spread across their L.A. communities.

[faj]

I find it curious how certain Global Tea Hut followers manage to travel the world getting paid to serve tea

Well, if you want to attract a rich and attractive clientele willing to pay stratospheric prices to sustain a cult-like movement, being featured in a NY Times article would seem like a very good step to me. The tea itself might be very good for all I know, but tea is but a pretext in the business model.

Also, it is pretty striking how many gallons of gas and kerosene have to be burnt for people to reach the locations where they can finally connect with nature. Nobody destroys nature like a nature lover.

[rdl]

"All the world's a stage,
And all the men and women merely players;
They have their exits and their entrances,
And one man in his time plays many parts..."
William Shakespeare
We can disagree, debate, but let's not denigrate.

[Victoria]

Yes, on board with you @rdl, it’s so interesting to be open to different points of view and places in life, world experience and nuances, without judgement. In that context, the NYT article comments section is pretty interesting to read .

[rdl]

Victoria,
I just took your suggestion and read some of the comments.
The hoi polloi (of which I belong) have spoken
If I can digress, Naga Munchetty on BBC Breakfast interviewed Boris Johnson a few weeks ago. Of all the important things to discuss, and I don't know the backstory, she chastised him for leaving his teabag soaking in his mug and not removing it. Boris Johnson was like a schoolboy caught in the act and was completely flummoxed trying to defend the practice. Politician taken down a notch 0 - teabag 1!

[Ethan Kurland]

Well, if you want to attract a rich and attractive clientele willing to pay stratospheric prices to sustain a cult-like movement, being featured in a NY Times article would seem like a very good step to me. The tea itself might be very good for all I know, but tea is but a pretext in the business model.

Also, it is pretty striking how many gallons of gas and kerosene have to be burnt for people to reach the locations where they can finally connect with nature. Nobody destroys nature like a nature lover.

I think that "tea session" deserves to be mocked. Denigration seems in order to me.
Selfish acts are too often celebrated by media. An example: Serena Williams talked about how it was difficult for her as the mother of an infant to tear herself away from her daughter to go play tennis; then, the next week she & her husband fly on a private jet from the USA to Venice to eat some good pasta. Instead of the ? being asked, "Did you abandon your daughter for a meal; or, take an infant on long flights which usually bother infants?" reporters wrote about how much the rich husband loved pleasing his wife. Nor was any mention made of the use of so much jet fuel to have a supper that really could not be fully enjoyed because flying dries out one's mouth hurting appreciation of food for a day or so.
To me, appreciation of tea can lead us to making less of a carbon footprint. A small amount of an agricultural product mitigates lust for greater amounts of other things that tax the environment more. Price per gram of some teas may be high, but the cost of tea can be low in many ways (but not by traveling hours & hours to drink a cup as part of ....). I won't pontificate.... my feelings about humility & modesty are tied to my not taking photos & having a humble life.
In congested, noisy, crowded Bangkok, John B. & I found a pagoda in a park to have a lovely tea session a couple of years ago. Coming off crowded skytrains & by bus, our relatively quiet spot seemed like a bit of paradise.

[Victoria]

An interesting take on the NYT article, written by P. Kerim Friedman, associate professor in the Department of Ethnic Relations and Cultures at National Dong Hwa University in Taiwan;
https://anthrodendum.org/2019/12/08/inv ... in-taiwan/

[Bok]

An interesting take on the NYT article, written by P. Kerim Friedman, associate professor in the Department of Ethnic Relations and Cultures at National Dong Hwa University in Taiwan;
https://anthrodendum.org/2019/12/08/inv ... in-taiwan/

Good one, thanks for posting! Much more to my liking.

[joelbct]

An interesting take on the NYT article, written by P. Kerim Friedman, associate professor in the Department of Ethnic Relations and Cultures at National Dong Hwa University in Taiwan;
https://anthrodendum.org/2019/12/08/inv ... in-taiwan/

What an amusing and enlightening follow-up article! This whole thread was hilarious.

Left-coast beautiful people doing very silly things that proper Manhattanites wouldn't waste time on.....a very traditional NYT poke at Los Angeles

And Debunix, I agree with your take, to a point anyway (this article must have been in the Sunday Styles section).

The reporter was probably tasked with writing a "real" article, but about this somewhat absurd though benign topic, and she and the editors probably couldn't resist having some fun. The deadpan observations speak for themselves

"predominantly white wellness circles," "after what she calls an 'amazing chain of serendipitous events'" (including a deadly natural disaster), "'The Way of Tea,'” written by an American man named Aaron Fisher, who lived in Taiwan and had taken the name Wu De, etc.

But, whatever! All traditions have to be started from something, I guess, maybe even weird, semi-plausible, possibly-innappropriately-appropriative syncretisms.

And maybe in 400 years these strange, manufactured methods of selling marked up tea to wealthy westerners will have become as sacred as the Japanese Matcha Ceremony Whatever floats your boat.

[StoneLadle]

I'm speechless

There are so many ways to approach this

I think the best way would be to send the article to Ricky Gervais for comment... He's quite responsive over on Twitter...