The custom of drinking tea has endured for thousands of years. Calming, warming, and in many places throughout the world, part of the daily routine, tea can be as simple as a cup of Lipton in the morning with a splash of milk and a spoonful of sugar, or as elaborate as the Japanese Tea Ceremony. The Japanese Tea Ceremony ("Cha-no-yu" or "the hot water for tea") was described by the Irish-Greek journalist-historian Lafcadio Hearn, one of the few foreigners ever to be granted Japanese citizenship during this era. He wrote from personal observation, "The Tea ceremony requires years of training and practice to graduate in art...yet the whole of this art, as to its detail, signifies no more than the making and serving of a cup of tea. The supremely important matter is that the act be performed in the most perfect, most polite, most graceful, most charming manner possible." Sipping a cup of tea is quieting and peaceful--A custom that deserves to be carried on in the new millennium. A great site recounting the history of tea and information about buying, brewing, and growing tea can be found at www.stashtea.com/facts.htm.   | Home | Cultural | Environmental | Musical | Ordinary | | Contact Us | About the Authors | © Copyright 2007 fiftythings