It all started one crisp October morning in 2003, when I discovered that a cup of coffee was not what pleased me anymore. So, it was off to a friend’s coffee and tea store where I purchased my first four ounces of Assam loose leaf. Of course, I had to add a tea ball infuser. [...]

The Company’s returning China fleet laden with eight milion pounds’ worth of tea, silk and porcelain found an imposing French squadron laying in wait at the mouth of the Strait of Malacca (where fifteen years later Sir Stamford Raffles was to found Singapore for the Company). Commodore Nathaniel Dance had the Indiamen calmly form a [...]

It was 6:00 A.M. on July 5. I was on my knees on the ground between a large RV (mine) and about eleven ceramic garden figurines. Including, but not limited to: a puppy; a voluptuous frog in a bathing suit; a spotted cow in need of milking; a rabbit in a sailor suit; a Dutch [...]

Here are the entries received from the tea haiku contest. The first comment on that post was just the incentive needed!
mado no soto
ha ga uzumakare
ocha wo nomu
outside my window
the leaves are swirling around
as i drink my tea
I took a little liberty in translation with the second line, the original meaning is ‘the [...]

I just finished the wonderful Matt Gross piece on Darjeeling in Sunday’s NY Times (Oct. 14, 2007). What a fine piece of writing! In it, Matt Gross repeatedly mentions Rajah Banerjee’s out-sized ego, but this is too facile and too easily misrepresents the man himself. People with less “patrician” self-assurance are simply incapable of pioneering [...]