Tea People

As butterflies dance around each other, so too do people get to know tea. Sometimes they are dancing around tea, but they haven't yet been made the connection. The greatness of tea is still outside of their awareness. There is a special kind of tea person: the tea person who is a tea person before they even know they are a tea person. We can call them a latent tea person. A person who loves tea, but does not yet know they love the tea. This is mostly because they have either not had the right kind of tea, a good tea, or they have not had tea presented in a way that makes them fall in love with the tea. But once they experience the right tea in the right setting, that is just what happens, they fall... and fall hard, deep into the world of tea. They are different than the average person who gets into tea, because when they do, it's as if they have just met a long lost friend. There is no doubt for them that tea fits into their life. They know they will be enjoying high quality tea from that moment when they first experience it until they are no longer with us, here on this earth.

It's funny, after being in the tea business for a while, I can practically smell a tea person, even a tea person who does not yet know they are a tea person. I can almost tell by looking at them, and observing the way that they hold themselves. But then after talking with them for a bit, I can be 90 percent sure if they are a tea person or not. What are some common characteristics of a tea person? They like to travel to distant lands and learn about cultures that are very different from their own. They might be a food person, or a wine person. They are generally into expansive thinking and view the world through a positive framework. They are very often intellectual and exploratory in their thinking, meaning that they want to learn how to view the world and their place in the world in a positive light. Sometimes people are into tea for their own reasons. I once had a customer tell me that he drinks tea because he doesn't eat vegetables. Thus, a tea drinker is a tea drinker, but they might not be a tea person.