The Tea Girl of Hummingbird Lane(114)
In 6-week RCT with black tea, 76 males divided into two groups. Half receive caffeinated beverage made from tea; half receive caffeinated placebo. Both groups presented with challenging tasks, with cortisol, blood pressure, blood platelet, and self-rated stress levels measured pre-and post-. 50 minutes after completion of tasks, cortisol levels drop 47% in tea group compared to 27% given placebo.
Suddenly, I felt on much firmer ground. They showed slides with chemical percentages, dosages, and study methodology for different age-groups, sexes, and countries in studies that covered glucose tolerance, cardiovascular disease, bone density, cognitive function, neurodegenerative disease, and, of course, various types of cancer. Outcomes ranged from “compelling” to “equivocal at best.” Not exactly ringing endorsements, but I was intrigued and I sure couldn’t blame it on the second sample of Sen-cha Flip I’d drunk earlier. At the end of the presentation, I asked for cards from all the participants, one of whom was Dr. Barry, who later agreed to let me work on her study.
Feeling a bit giddy, I walked down the aisles of the show and it was much like any expo, with a whole range of vendors—from the English tea-cozy ladies to Kenyan tea-plantation promoters, from Japanese women in kimonos doing a formal tea ceremony to Portland hipsters with flower-based products. I stopped for a moment to watch a man—Chinese, handsome, and five or so years older than I am—pouring tea for a group of people, letting the liquid slosh over the rims of the cups. It was truly messy and completely unlike the elegance in the Japanese booth. The man caught me observing him and called, “Join us.” When I hesitated, he beckoned me with what had to be a Chinese proverb. “Every passing moment is the passing of life; every moment of life is life itself.” Who says that to a random stranger? It certainly wasn’t a line I’d heard before, so I entered the booth and sat down. He introduced himself as Sean Wong.
“Here,” he said, pouring tea from a glass pitcher into a white porcelain cup, “I want you to sample my Pu’er.” The first sip of liquid blossomed in my mouth—bitterness bubbled away by sweetness. He watched my reaction, smiled more to himself than to me, and then proceeded to brew several more vintages of Pu’er, each one better than the last. One tea had such strong huigan—what he described as the overwhelming effect that this tea has on breath and opening the chest—that for a moment the world went dizzy. “That’s because you’re drinking history,” he explained.
His laugh made my heart race. And honestly, I could barely take my eyes off him. His cheekbones were sharp, his eyes seemed wary, his hair shone like lacquer. He was friendly and obviously some type of tea connoisseur. The careless way he poured the valuable teas, letting them overflow their little cups to show abundance, was oddly entrancing. Why he’d set up a stall at the expo wasn’t and still isn’t clear, but I’d gone to high school with plenty of girls like him and now I was surrounded by his ilk—guys and girls—at Stanford, who are part of the People’s Republic of China’s wealthy and international jet-setting elite.
I don’t know what made me do it, but I mentioned my tea cake. Bragging, I guess. Or wanting to prolong my time with him. He was immediately intrigued.
“They say that the most valuable tea will be found right here in Southern California,” he said. “It would have come with a sojourner a hundred years ago, been given as a gift, or received as payment for something.”
“How valuable?” I asked.
“Last year a cake of Pu’er, weighing three hundred and ninety grams—a little under a pound—sold at auction for one point two million Hong Kong dollars. That’s about one hundred and fifty thousand U.S.”
“My tea cake can’t be worth anything like that,” I said.
“How do you know?”
The next day, I brought my tea cake to see if he or someone else could tell me about it. People offered exorbitant sums to buy it, but Sean had the most tempting offer: “Just as a person is searching for tea, the tea is searching for the person. Come with me to China for a week. We’ll make a pilgrimage to your tea cake’s place of origin. Put yourself in my hands. I’ll take care of everything.”
A pilgrimage to the place of origin . . .
“I’ll be going anyway,” he added. “You may as well take advantage of me. My expertise, I mean.”
Okay, so I wasn’t completely forthright with Professor Ho, my parents, or even myself. Sure, I’m totally into the project I got Professor Ho to advise me on. I’ve also got the Tufts project on my laptop, and I’ve looked at plenty of tea samples for Dr. Barry in the lab, which will help create a baseline for my research. When I’m in China, I’ll meet farmers and collect my own tea samples. I’m going to win that Stanford award! But there was—is—something about Sean, besides having an on-the-ground guide who speaks the language, that made me say yes to his offer.
I went back to Stanford, and we communicated by e-mail. We met at his house once when I was home for winter break to go over plans for the trip. I’d figured he was rich, so I wasn’t surprised by the address in Pasadena practically around the corner from Hummingbird Lane. It turned out to be a little more than a “house,” however. It was a grand old mansion built back in the day by some mucky-muck. I figured it must have cost $15 million, give or take, which means that Sean isn’t just rich, he’s superrich. The grounds and the house looked beautiful and well maintained from the outside; inside, it had been gutted down to the studs. We wended our way through the construction to the old housekeeping quarters. The rooms were cozy and warm. One thing could have led to another, but he was all business, and so was I. And we need to keep it that way. We have separate rooms booked for every stop. I have the e-mails to prove it. Besides, nothing can happen if he isn’t on this plane . . .