Of course, there is tea folklore that reaches much further into history: Nearly 3,000 years before Christ, the Second Emperor Shen Nung (Divine Healer) is thought to have sipped from a bowl of boiled water in which a leaf from the indigenous Camellia sinensis plant had fallen, thereby adding the discovery of tea to an already substantial list of his contributions to society, among them millet, medicinal herbs, and the plough. It is known, for a fact, that tea followed the migration of faith in the East in much the same way that wine did in the West. Like wine, which for centuries remained the dominion of Catholic monks, tea was coaxed and cultivated in Buddhist temples throughout China. Both potations acquired ritual significance and became symbols of status among devotees. However, unlike wine, tea remained ever a sober elixir of wakeful tranquility, and the ritual of preparation and ingestion led to its becoming a spiritual practice in its own right. In 780 A.D., Lu Yu wrote the first comprehensive treatise on tea, and the Way of Tea was firmly established.
Lightweight cakes of tea traveled through Tibet, along the Silk Road into Turkey, India, and finally Russia, where the beverage began to take root in secular communities. Eventually, by way of the Portuguese and then the Dutch, tea arrived in Europe, and the British went mad for it. Initially it was considered a luxury item, with a government-imposed tax of 200 percent, but by the 18th century tea had become the staple of the British working man, replacing even the much-beloved ale as the drink of choice. The first newspaper, and thus modern-day journalism, was the product of a British-style teahouse. One might even say it was the people's love of tea that spawned the American Revolution. Today, tea is second only to water as the most widely imbibed beverage in the world; it crosses boundaries of class, culture, race, and geography, and yet, in a city as diverse as ours, I can count the number of teahouses in San Francisco on one hand.
"Caffeeeeine," sneers Karter Louis, an effervescent homme de cour of tea who left his successful partnership in Chicago to source tea for the newly opened Samovar Tea Lounge in the Castro. "Everybody's so concerned about caffeine these days. The fact is, oolong has half the caffeine of black tea, green tea has half that amount again, and white tea -- even for someone like me who can't drink coffee without shaking and breaking out into a sweat -- it couldn't keep you up if you wanted it to. And we're not even talking about herbal infusions yet, just tea. People in America just don't understand tea."
Louis is not people. As a child growing up in a poor family in Kentucky, his greatest reward was a fresh box of Celestial Seasons tea; his goal was to one day have every kind of tea represented in his tea cabinet. When his successful work in musical theater took him to England as a teenager, a whole new world opened up. Today, he speaks of his tea sources with pointed ambiguity and weighty vagueness, mentioning rare cakes and dwindling caches as if he were part of a band of holy relic hunters. Through him, Samovar lays claim to the last four pounds of a well-known tea brick from 1982 and five of the last 10 cakes of a 1930 pu-erh, a full-bodied Chinese tea that can easily substitute, in richness and vitality, for coffee.
"The 1930 pu-erh is like our Louis XIV top-shelf tea," explains Jesse Jacobs, one of Samovar's three well-traveled proprietors, "but it's still very accessible. It has to be. Anywhere you go in the world, tea is offered to new friends. It engenders greater social intimacy through relaxation and a sort of pulling back and inward, something you can't get with the frenetic energy of coffee. But it must be an affordable luxury."
So, for about $10 you can taste the Chinese revolution in a steaming pot, accompanied, perhaps, by a bergamot pudding or fresh-made tea-infused shortbread.
And that's just the beginning. Under Louis' eye, Samovar has built one of the most impressive multicultural menus in the country, from Yerba Mate, an herbal beverage from Paraguay that is traditionally served in gourds and passed hand to hand around a circle (here, it's served in a gourd-shaped vessel and sipped through a metal straw with a built-in filter) to Tiequanyin oolong, whose rarity and wonder is suggested by the addition of "Monkey-picked" to its title, Iron Goddess of Mercy, to the Wild Rose Silver Needle, a delicate white tea strewn with tiny pink rose buds, to thick, spicy chai made from real tea leaves and served in claylike mugs (don't ask for soy milk because you won't get it). Eventually, Samovar will provide "cultural teas," incorporating all the implements of the corresponding regions, from the ornate service of Russian czars to the simple offerings of Japanese Daoists.
In the meantime, the place is hoping to cross boundaries by sponsoring such events as the Jewish Film Festival, the Arab Film Festival, the Gay Pride Celebration, and the Asian American Film Festival; and by providing a perfect pot of tea in an environment where DJs spin every Saturday night and Louis might sing you a ballad or two, if you get him hopped up on enough Yerba Mate.
At Lovejoy's Tea Room, Mr. and Mrs. Baker always sit at the same lace-festooned window-side table and order the same pot of tea every Sunday. Their conversations, co-owner Muna Nash points out, are always long and seemingly full of meaning, and their attention, even after all these years, remains fixed attentively on one another.
"A lot of people call this a women's club," laughs Nash, "but I'll tell you the men that come here are wonderful gentlemen, and their relationships seem to last a long time."
Nash decided to take over Lovejoy's from some friends after she returned from Ireland, where she ran a youth hostel for three years.
"I lived in a small village outside of Dublin, and on the weekends, everyone would open up their living rooms to the city folk, and they'd come to the country for tea. Tea is such an integral part of their social fabric. They relax, catch up, tell stories, fall in love, all over tea. It's so comfortable and sweet. That's what we try to achieve here."
Nash and her schooldays friend Gillian Briley seem to recreate the warmth and comfort of an Irish sitting room without trying. But they rise early every morning to attend the farmer's market, and they bustle about the kitchen like mother hens. Cluttered with mismatched antiques, china culled from Nash's collection -- which began before she even knew what she'd do with it all -- and tea cozies made by customers over the years, the main floor is overflowing with the trills of laughter and the faint strains of Irish folk music. The waitresses, who usually stay in Lovejoy's employ for a very long time, recognize most of their customers by sight and preference, even though weekend reservations at the tearoom are usually filled three days in advance, and the linen cabinet is always in constant need of refurbishing.
While Nash and Briley do not claim to be tea experts, they offer a very fine assortment of traditional favorites and the occasional rare bird, like the hand-rolled jasmine ball, which unfolds to reveal a fuchsia-colored flower at its heart. The food is good enough to make you feel like a spoiled little princess: crustless tea sandwiches -- from the traditional roast beef and horseradish to pear and Stilton -- fresh clotted cream, warm crumpets, miniature champagne grapes, and Shepherd's Pie made by the hands of a real, live Irishman. And no matter how busy Lovejoy's gets, there are always two large tables set aside for community seating.
"Americans still get nervous about sitting with strangers," says Nash, "but tea is about taking the time to get to know the person sitting across from you. There's more to it than what you're drinking."
A Daoist priest with an easy sense of humor, Roy Fong says tea was the last thing on his mind as a business when he, then a young teenager, and his family came to San Francisco from Hong Kong. Still, it seems that tea was never far from his thoughts, and eventually his proclivity and passion for it led him to set aside his import company and consider the value of tea leaves.
The Imperial Tea Court, located on the edge of Chinatown, is the only Chinese tearoom of its kind in the United States. It is rich in earth tones and strung with songbird cages; on Saturdays, the elder statesmen of the Chinese community come from as far as San Jose to partake in the tradition of "songbird tea" -- which involves gossip, news, and ostentatious display of their priceless pets. The Imperial Tea Court is a proper destination because of its proprietor. Fong has, in the grandest tradition of tea merchants, given his life and heart to tea. He oversees the production, manufacturing, shipping, and service of each leaf. Every aspect of the journey, from the ground in China to the cup in your hand, is infused by centuries of tradition. Even the teahouse itself is not as far from the source as it seems.
"We brought everything from China -- the marble, the wood, the bamboo, the nails, even the glue. It took a full year just to get it open," Fong says, laughing at his seeming foolhardiness. But when it comes to tea, he is a man driven by unseen forces.
"With tea, I never feel like I am doing enough, you know?" he says, spinning a broad jade ring, meant to engender personal power and denote his exclusion from menial labor, on his finger. "But I'm not like that with anything else."
The comfortable and constant presence of his youngest daughter and wife suggest other focuses of attention, but there is no doubt that there is more to tea than refreshment for Fong. "Tea is a living thing to me," he says, pouring hot water over a small pot and three tiny teacups sitting in a bowl called a tea boat. "As with a person, you must take time to get to know the tea. Brewing tea is like a conversation."
Fong flushes water from the teacups into a second bowl and uses a small bamboo paddle to layer a strong oolong called Old Bush into the brewing pot.
"The five elements find harmony in tea. Wood is the plant; water grows the plant and makes the tea; fire heats the water and dries the tea leaves; earth makes the pot and grows the tea; and metal, which is the opposite of wood, is hidden in the clay, which helps the plant to grow."
Fong runs the bottom of the pot along the rim of the tea boat in a circular motion. In practical terms, this action releases pockets of water locked between leaves; in philosophical terms, it emphasizes the circle that is at the center of every tea ritual.
"The first steep, we do not drink," says Fong, pouring tea, which he allows us to smell but not to sip, into the water bowl (a vessel for undrunk tea). "First, we cleanse our minds. Now we start to feel our hearts. The tea is starting to release its aromatics, telling us the story of its life. There's a lot going on. There's a lot to discover in its smell."
The second steep is poured from the "fairness pot," a secondary vessel that ensures no one's tea steeps even a second longer than another's. We are invited to drink, slurping to aerate our palates.
"Now the tea is talking to you."
The drink is robust, notes of peach cut by a bitterness that touches lightly on every part of the tongue, with a floral undertone as complex as any wine. "Nowadays, people measure success by how fast they amass a fortune," says Fong, preparing a third brew. "But there is much more to life."
This second cup has fewer floral notes but is smoother, almost buttery. The finish is not as sharp, but lasts longer.
"When you brew tea you are bringing it back to life. There is a dialogue between you and the tea," explains Fong as we swirl and slurp our third cup. "You are learning about it, from it. This helps you enjoy the people with whom you are sharing tea. Sometimes the success of a tea ceremony can be measured by how little you talk -- if you can achieve a oneness with your guest and begin to understand each other without words."
As our third cup settles, our conversation relaxes, turning to the Fongs' new enterprise at the Ferry Building and his daughter's boyfriend. Shotguns are mentioned, laughter is shared, and I begin to feel as if I've known Fong for a lifetime.
