Half the joy of a hobby is finding community. No matter what kind of hobby you pick up, there’s always going to be a group of folks that’s just as excited about it as you are. It could be something as popular and group-oriented as playing Magic: The Gathering or as solitary as coin collecting–…
I’ve always found winter to be a miserable season. The cold, sunless skies and the frigid temperatures don’t agree with me, forcing me to wear robes, slippers, and blankets around my shoulders even as I sit next to the heating vents in my home. Nothing I do is enough to warm me through. I’ve only…
It’s nearing midday, though it’s hard to tell. Any time you look up through the trees to the gray skies above, you’re greeted with a face full of the fine mist that’s been falling all morning. You’re telling time not through the sun or your half-dead phone with no signal but with the rumble of…
As I mentioned in my post Reflecting On a Year of Tea, I’ve been learning Japanese for about a year. My accent is awful, and my handwriting is atrocious, but I make the effort regardless. Still, there’s one area I can’t practice in my day-to-day life: listening. So when a friend asked if I’d like…
One dollar. I’d like you to think of the last time you bought something for a dollar. It might be hard to do. As you wrack your brain, you might think of the last time you went to a vending machine. No dice. A bag of chips, the weight of which is half air, costs…
I started learning Japanese this year on a whim. I’d been thinking about matcha, looking up chawans on the internet, and decided, heck, why not? I’d love to visit Japan one day. So I dove in, downloading Duolingo, signing up for WaniKani, and practicing my hiragana and katakana on Tofugu. That’s how I normally decide…
It’s 1973. You’re on a red-eye flight to Boston from LA, and the flight’s been delayed for half an hour. Something on the tarmac. Something with an engine check. You try to rest your eyes, but the in-cabin lighting stays on until liftoff. The buzz of the lights tickles your ears, the backs of your…
If you were born and raised in a country proliferated by tea bags, your introduction to gongfu brewing might have looked similar to mine. There I was, scrolling Instagram tea blogs and looking at pretty tea cups when, suddenly, I’d see a disembodied hand pouring tea out of strange vessels with unsecured lids. After seeing…
Chinese teas make up the bulk of my tea shelves. As the top tea-producing country in the world, that isn’t much of a surprise. Our shelves mirror the market, and we become familiar with the most accessible teas we can buy. Sure I have some teas from Taiwan, a couple from India, and the other…
When I started my tea journey, I read everything I could on tea tasting. Eager to expand my range of tastes and flavors, I scoured reviews, reading descriptions like “round umami flavor” or “notes of caramel”. I’d order the teas, brew them up, and take that first anticipated sip only to be disappointed. The flavors…
Tea Reads 