Sunday, April 14, 2013

Home of the Da-hong-pao (大红袍) Tea

Wuyishan in Fujian is said to be the home of China's cliff oolong tea 红袍 - literally "Big Red Robe". The couple of tea plants shown in the picture below are supposed to be the mothers of all da-hong-pao in the region, which is difficult to believe. Frankly, I don't find dah-hong-pao extraordinary, certainly not the money one has to pay for it.

Wuyishan is beautiful, but also not exceptional. The second picture below is very memorable to me, though. I was told that there was an old temple near this Da-hong-pao garden and one has to walk for roughly a kilometer or so uphill to reach it. It was not a tall order, but very disappointingly, there was nothing old about the temple. The site may be old, but Everything is actually NEW. All the statues are still being covered with plastic sheets! It was a waste of time. But on my way down, I spotted a slightly hunched 85-year-old nun scaling her way up with a walking stick. She told me that she commutes between the temple and the foothill on foot EVERYDAY! Her devotion is simply admirable; I simply had to bow and take my hat off to her.



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