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Seth G

@nowenluan

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Translator. Musician. Tea Bandit.
翻譯 | 音樂愛好者 | 茶賊王
獨在異鄉為異客

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Summer time in Hue and learn more tea experience by making Fresh Lotus tea.

Camera: @nowenluan
#hueimperialcity #lotustea #vietnam #traditionaltea

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Practicing Chuyên Trà with Annam tea from our tea research
#chuyêntrà #vietnamtea #vietnam #teaculture #saigon

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Finally made it back to harvest in the tea gardens… in the Western North Carolina mountains 👀 (!?)

Tony and Amelia @redsunasheville have been cultivating cold hardy varieties of Camellia sinensis for the last 15 years on an acre of south facing slope in USDA growing zone 7A at 2200 feet (680 meters).

Tea Camellia is a subtropical shrub that doesn’t do well in colder climates. They’ve taken varietals already developed in southern Russia, Japan, and Korea and let nature select the most cold-hardy specimens, breeding in resilience dialed to their micro region.

If that wasn’t badass enough, they’ve integrated the tea gardens with regularly pollarded shade trees like poplar, mulberry, pawpaw, honey locust, and Chinese chestnut as well as gotten chickens and rabbits into the mix with grazing and fertilizing.

Seth @nowenluan was in town so we took a trip out to lend a hand with their first flush harvest.

Tony’s gotten well studied up on technique and is producing some fine tea. Get in touch with him on ig if you want some of the best North American grown red tea around.

It was a trip to be working with tea leaves again but so far away from Asia / close to home 🌏🍃🌎

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Chuyên trà experience in Saigon :)
#chuyêntrà #vietnam #vietnametea #saigon

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Cha Gongfu 108席在 - the first time Chuyên trà was performed officially overseas with the Gongfu tea community.#chuyêntrà #vietnam #專茶 #vietnametea #saigon

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Roasted & Smoked
Saigon Kissed
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#chuyêntrà #專茶

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the birthplace of zen

The experience at Senkoji in Hirado was unforgettable. The personal story of the temple’s head priest Tanaka-san (田中住職さん) left me in awe. As far as I recall and, his journey began with 7th grade black belt judo and the career of a police officer in Kyoto. Feeling like something is missing, he kept discovering that there is more to the body, and studied acupuncture and physiotherapy. Later, as Tanaka-san was seeking even more depth about his spiritual journey through the body, mind and soul, he tapped into Zen Buddhism and meditation. Eventually, he walked the 88 temple pilgrimage in Shikoku and trained to become a monk in several Rinzai zen temples, Sogenji in Okayama if my notes are truthful. They also write “the dragon came here to him, dragon light mountain / our heart is so wide, it can be heaven and hell / Yudan Taiteki 油断大敵 – Don’t Be Careless - idiom referring to martial arts” and I have to be very honest that I do not recall what those are referring to exactly, nevertheless, it fits and makes sense somehow.

Wholly in line with zen practice, as soon as we arrived we were each given a broom and were asked to sweep the mowed grass off the foundation of the first transcendental meditation centre in Japan, Hushun Hermitage. Right next to it, there was a big stone, on which Eisai used to meditate on, the monk who brought Buddhism and tea to Japan from China.

After getting the work done, we were generously shown around, ate sōmen together and drank matcha. We got to see the replica of Drinking Tea and Prolonging Life (喫茶養生記, Kissa yōjōki), which Eisai wrote in 1211, Japan’s first treatise on tea. This was followed by two sessions of zazen meditation, including the keisaku (警策) strikes. Finally, he gifted us some wooden Buddha statues, which were carved by his teacher and are believed to bring good health. Since it was a very special day, I did bring my goshuinchō (御朱印帳) also, in which pilgrims and travellers collect seals from temples and shrines. And this seal definitely stands out thanks to the very special memory.

Adventure companions: @_me.mar_ , @ikedokitea, @nowenluan , and @matsumotoyasuharu ⭐️

Japan archive, October 2023

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Japan in 6 months - autumn 2022 and summer/autumn 2023 🇯🇵

Swimming in nostalgia and baking up some more extravagant dreams for 2024, as always 🍃

P.S. My recent interview with Matsu-san about the future of Japanese tea got printed in the latest Coffee & Tea @coffeeteacacao_net issue 🍃 The next one will feature the interview with @_me.mar_ about her tea travels and @ikedokitea life in Higashi Sonogi 🍵⭐️

🔗 Link in bio

またねー♪

#japan #japantrip #japanlife #nagasaki #kyoto #wazuka #fukushima #izu #shizuoka #tokyo #tokoname #aso #asokujunationalpark #hikeinjapan #uji #higashisonogi #kumamoto #osaka #aichi #riceharvesting #teafarm #obubu #buddhism #hirado #zen #japaneseculture #japanesecountrysidelife #matcha #alternativetravel #nomad

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Mona Lisa and rolling our hand-picked tea leaves for a wakoucha (Yabukita 藪北 + Qing Xin 青心) with Mar (@_me.mar_ , @ikedokitea), Tozaka-san (@tozaka.chaen), Nishida-san (@imat_etsat), Matsu-san (@matsumotoyasuharu), and Seth (@nowenluan). 🍃

Good times 🌞

Mukit (@mukhkha) - these are the behind the scenes of the tea that we have drank together at the BRAC University’ residential campus! ✨🇧🇩

#tea #wakoucha #japanesetea #yabukita #blacktea #monalisa #handmadetea #artisan #japan #sonogi #higashisonogi #nagasaki #qingxin #japan #日本茶　#そのぎ茶 #和紅茶 #紅茶 #長崎 #茶園 #いいね #いい思い出

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The first tea garden in Japan and the beginnings of Zen.

In 1191 (Kenkyū 2), monk Eisai returned from Song Dynasty China, where he studied Buddhism and tea. He landed in Hirado Island, as Nagasaki Prefecture used to be the main trading port area. Eisai founded Fushun-an hermitage (later more about the first Rinzai Zen meditation centre; now the temple is called Senkoji), and planted the first tea seeds in Fushun-en, marking the birth of the first Japanese tea garden. Only later the tea seeds ventured to Kyoto as Eisai gave seeds to the monk Myōe, who planted them in Kōzan-ji temple, as well as Toganoo ad Uji.

While the original hermitage is gone, the tea garden remains, though the tea bushes now are the descendants of the original ones planted by Eisai.

The Matsura family's Chinshin-ryu samurai tea ceremony also has ties to this garden. 🍵

When Crown Prince of Japan and Mrs. Akishino visited in September 2011, they were served a sencha blend of leaves of Fushun-en and leaves from Kyoto.

More about our kind Zen monk host, sweeping the remaining patch of first meditation centre of Japan where Eisai meditated on a stone, our zazen practice in Sensoji, Hirado city and more. It definitely was one of the most unforgettable days spent in Japan. 🍵🧹

#japan #rinzaizen #zen #zazen #hirado #japanesetea #teahistory #eisai #monk #buddhism #tealife #storyoftea #meditation #teagarden #teafarm #zairai #fushunan #fushunen #senkoji #temple #songdynasty #china #chan #matsura #chinshinryu #samurai #nagasaki #ikedoki

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