Chapter I · The Origin: Making — Tea is a fine and noble tree of the South…
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The passage
“Tea is a fine and noble tree of the South. It may stand one or two feet tall, or reach many dozens of feet. In the mountain gorges of Bashan, there are trees so thick that two men can barely encircle them; one must cut the boughs and pick the leaves from below.”
Making
Tea is made, not merely picked. The timing of the harvest and the precision of each step decide how much of the mountain survives in the cup.
Fixation, rolling, oxidation, and drying all push the leaf in different directions. A fine raw material can be lost by a careless hand.
Read the old processing sequence as a chain of decisions, not a list of museum objects.
Reading note
Read the passage once for the image, once for the judgment, and once for the practice it implies.
Practice
- Name one thing the passage asks you to notice.
- Compare it with a tea you know.
- Keep the question open.