Afternoon tea, my thoughts and me

The title sounds vaguely familiar to that popular restaurant in Mangal Bazar “Coffee,Tea and me”, does it not? I would be lying if I said I wasn’t inspired from it. But the title just suits really well, so let’s just go with it, okay?

Here I am, sipping on my tea. Afternoon tea, such a simple yet sophisticated term. I wonder if it were the British who came up with it; you know, because of the afternoon tea tradition of theirs. The little cakes and sandwiches that go well with afternoon tea? That must be it. Forgive me, I can get distracted easily. Whatever the initiation of the afternoon tea, even if there were none, I am more than happy to enjoy my cup on this afternoon.

Shris had said, post her trip to Ilam, that we had been making tea the wrong way, the whole time. When she visited a tea house in Ilam, for her RES during MBA course, they were showed the proper technique of making tea, the technique which would assure that maximum flavor would be enriched out of the tea. Maybe the tea I am drinking was also grown somewhere in Ilam. It is fascinating how a tea bag infuses so well with a dip in hot water making a cup of tea.

A cup of tea: it’s uncanny how a cup of tea can have so many variations and how people like their differently. You might like yours black, or maybe with milk? Perhaps with a spoon of sugar or maybe two? Or you like yours flavored. Or perhaps with cardamom? There are so many variations I could go on and on. And maybe, just maybe, that was how they were inspired to use that popular phrase “it’s not my cup of tea” something is not your cup of tea because you like to take yours differently.

Yeah, that is definitely how the phrase took its inspiration. Everything cannot be your cup of tea and you cannot be everyone’s cup of tea. And you know what? That is okay, because everyone likes their tea differently.

Comments

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