Archive for category Misc
The Water for Tea
Posted by daniel in Misc, tea culture&tea stories on September 6, 2009
The water for tea drinking
Venus her myrtle, Phoebus has her bays;
Tea both excels, which she vouchsafes to praise.
The best of Queens, and best of herbs, we owe
To that bold nation, which the way did show
To the fair region where the sun doth rise,
Whose rich productions we so justly prize.
The Muse’s friend, tea does our fancy aid,
Repress those vapors which the head invade,
And keep the palace of the soul serene,
Fit on her birthday to salute the Queen.
——-On Tea @ Edmund Waller
running tiger spring
“Water, fire and teaware”, they are three keys for tea brewing, and “water is the mother of tea”, good tea will present you the unique flavor, taste through the water. In the long history of tea there are lots of man did research on what tea is better for tea and resulted a lot of famous books, the most three famous books are Jian Cha Shui Ji by Zhang Youxin in Tang dynasty, Zhu Quan Xiao Pin by Tian Yiheng in Ming dynasty and Quan Pu by Tang Duxian in Qing dynasty. They reserve us many good secrets that are still useful nowadays.
Mainly there are 2 kinds of theories about how to choosing the water for tea drinking. One is according to the source, see it’s come from rain, snow, dew, river, well or Spring, and Spring is the best choice. Another theory is according to its weight, light water will be better, Emperor QianLong even wrote a book on it.
running tigers dream spring
Historically there are some discussions about who is the best water in the world. The saint Lu Yu and many many litterateurs all talked about this subject, most of them had ever been to lots of famous mountains and tasted it, but time changed, different time will have different saying, Hupao Spring(running-tiger Spring) in HangZhou which is the most famous water today in China just sit the fifth place as LuYu’s Choice, he said Spring on the mountain is the best, then river water and last is the Well water. Specially the spring comes from the rock and flows slowly is more better, it’s a live water and full of CO2. And the rain, snow or dew is also a good choice, before people called it ‘Heaven Water’, though because of the air pollution it’s not a good choice any more. People think the Autumn rain is good because there is less dust in the air and oppositely there is more dust in the Summer because there is so much thunder and gale.
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The Emperor QianLong even make a special silver measure set for water to weigh it light or weight, he had been to every famous water and measured it, at last he reported that the lightest so as the best water is Jade Spring located in the captain of the empire. So the Jade Spring is protected wholly to supply to the palace only.
But as everybody know there is no possible to obtain the special water for every day’s brewing, if you live distantly. For the rich they can get the famous water sometimes but normal man will have no way. Really? In ancient days people though out some interesting ways to make good water at home. The main work is to filtrate impurity and absorb the wish from heaven.
bamboo spring
Now time changed, we’ve tap water, purified water and mineral water, are they better than the above we talked? Not exactly. The best water for tea is still the Spring comes from the rock. We know water can be classified to soft water and hard water, and should take care of the PH, dont’ let it higher than 7.
as the tap water, take care of the ferrous ion, specially for the rusty tap. It can have a chemical reaction with tea poly-phenols, it can get the tea water darker even been to brown. So for tap water, you can silent it for a day and night to get the Chlorine out and let the dust sink to the bottom or install a filter. Now most of people will choose mineral water for good tea, and just take care of the PH. For purified water, I don’t want to suggest you this water, it’s plain,nothing good, nothing bad inside too.
But one man told me “hometown water is the best”, I agree with him, no matter where you ‘re, your hometown is the best specially you’re distant away from your home. Take care.
Memories from Childhood – drinking tea
Posted by nefreez in Misc, tea culture&tea stories on September 4, 2009
Memories from Childhood – drinking tea
the stars
One of good things I remember from my childhood – tea drinking. I’m from Estonia, but my grand-grand mother and g.-g. father
lived in a village in Ukraine, it’s 2000 kilometres away from Estonia. But we all are russians anyway, at least partially. Each
summer me and my parents were visiting them for about one month.
It’s usually quite hot outside in Ukraine, in the summer, even in the night time. In the evening, after a day of hard work in the
field or a day of having fun and adventures with friends, we all were getting to one table in the front yard. A part of a big
family and friends, usually about 10 people or more.
Women were preparing food for supper, men were firing up the ovens (ovens there are using firewood) for heating russian sauna,
called BANYA. Also they were putting special thing near the table, used for preparing the tea – it’s name is SAMOVAR. Here is the
link about it form Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samovar. They have similar things in Turkey and Iran. The SAMOVAR has a
medium size metal container for water, it has a small platform for firewood in the bottom, so when you fire the wood up, the water
in container starts boiling, so you can make tea. Black tea is usual for those places. People, who lived most of their lives in the
USSR are used to black tea, ’cause it was very popular there. Though I prefer green tea now, memories are still alive and I take a
cup of oldtime black tea sometimes to refresh those sweet pictures of a childhood.
happy family with Samovar
Now, imagine such picture
In Ukraine, it’s getting dark very fast, at about 9 o’clock. After going to sauna and having a supper, there we were, at the
table in the yard, in the darkness, having one small lamp as a source of light.
And darkness around.
And an adorable sweet smell of flowers on the trees and relaxing smell of a burning wood in samovar and oven nearby.
And crickets singing\making noise in the bushes.
And the brightest stars in the sky, like it the desert. And the moon sometimes. If fire in the samovar is still burning, it is
giving a small light, which is very romantic. All people are relaxed and having a good mood, because they are a bit tired, they
have full stomaches, they went to sauna and now have a slow, sleepy talk to eachother. And they are drinking tea.
In such atmosphere you can understand other people better. It melts people’s souls and minds and puts them into one. It’s a real
unity. And even if there is someone new at the table, you feel like you know him for a hundreds of years.
It’s almost like being in nirvana, I think.
I hope to see it all some time later, again.
Oh My Computer Dream
Oh, my computer dream
computer dream
I cannot code or decode, but I can help people around me fix computer problems.
In young, my dream used to be a solider, a scientist, a hero, then a millionaire, I think I just dream to be a programmer for a
while. In the 90th, there is few computers, the big three for a family is air conditioner, icebox and washer when you get married,
no computer. The first time I know about it and touch it is when I was in high school, the OS is DOS (I figure it out years later)
, black terminal, we can just learn how to use the simple command like dir. It’s amazing but ugly I think. I don’t like it much
because we don’t have much chance to go into the computer room.
After joined the colorful univercity, I world is enlarged, I knew netbar and heard about QQ(a popular instant messenger), but still
few students own computer, no matter big desktop or laptop. But we began to learn the Fortran and I began to now about Windos98, I
love it, but it break down frequently, I hate to reload it. Unfortunately we just have computer class for one term, if you want go
to the computer room you got to pay, about 3RMB per hour. At that time I registered my first QQ account and still mine till now.
At 2001, our neighbor room classmate bought a computer, 6 men owned it together. Every night their room comes to be the most
popular room, we play cartoon, movies and some special videos you know boys always want that. We date, play basketball, play
computer and at that time I began to love computer, I borrowed a lot of computer books.
I’m a Linux fans, you know, now I’m typing on a Debian OS. Since 2006 I bought my second computer and I’ve tried RedHat,
Mandrivia, Ubuntu, ArchLinux, Gentoo, I love Open Source and the freedom. I hate virus because I’ve to use WindowsXP in Office and
get attacked by virus several times, that always disgust me, something like you’ve to aware of someone behind you. I feel free and
safe on my T42+Debian.
I am always glad to help people get out from computer problems. and I enjoy computer and thanks God I don’t have to live by it, it
just my hobby.
It’s sunshine today, enjoy our vacation.
My computer dream
Childhood Memories
Memories about Childhood
nice memory
Two days ago (22-07) here occured Full Solar Eclipse, it’s interesting to have day-dark experience. all man went out, no matter young or old, all watching at the sky.
It said it’s lucky to have this experience, someone will not have it through all his life.
But Moon Eclipse is not a luck sign, when I was a Child, we used to sleep under the sky, people will not want go into the room especially in the Summer. The Summer moon is so round and bright, the whole nigh is covered by the silver light. People said there is a beautiful woman lived on the moon, her name is Chang Er. There is a sad story about her. Don’t mind.
Fathers or Mathers will stop you straight your forefinger to the moon, they said the moon will cut your ears. We all got afraid of that. It’s interesting to listen ghost story under the moon, if you’re afraid, the speaker will get more excited. Sometimes it will make you unable to get sleep and dream a lot of curious things.
Before people are all very kind, no one will close they door when they go out. no door is closed. They will welcome you anytime. But adult man always need to have a sweet sleep at noon, you’d better don’t disturb them, or you will get ass beating.
I have some good brother friends. but now are all fighting for life. We can only have a meet one time a year.