It came in a round little paper covering, in the shape of a ball - only someone might have stuck their thumb into the center to create a sizable indent. But when it was given to me in a wonderful teahouse in Taipei, on account of drinking three servings of tea in one sitting, between two people, myself and Matthew Bowerman Clark, it was hard and no more thumb sticking would be possible. In fact after I carefully unwrapped it in the safety of my home in Tainan, I found myself stumped: no method to crumble this brick of heavily fermented plant matter came to mind. Eventually I left the couch for the kitchen and carried a knife and the tea to the table where I cut off some slivers, careful to not cut off slivers of my hand which well could have contaminated the tea. This worked, though not well, and I was able to sit down on the couch again.
The first sip - no... Before the first sip I smelled it. I smelled Seattle and the rain and the tree outside my home and Brenton and Matt fresh off the porch coming inside to join me. I smelled the bubbling sound of the teapot and the cold hard feeling of the table put by the window at the suggestion of Matt. And I smelled the tea.
And then I tasted these things in this little white cup that looks really very similar to the little green cups in Seattle on the hard table with the bubbling teapot and the rain, except that it is white.
And for a moment, a fleeting moment that comes more and more frequently these days, I was both in Seattle and in Tainan, or if I was not in both places I could not decide in which one place I was in.
Tuesday, February 17, 2009
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