Tea in public

In the third and second to last entry covering my exploration of tea, I shall discuss the consumption of tea in the public arena, outside the home and workplace. Given the status of tea in both these other realms, I find the breakdown of tea consumption in public quite intriguing and have my theories as to why this is.

As mentioned in the previous posts, tea is quite a popular beverage at home and at work. While people drink coffee, it's certainly not what all the commotion is about. Step outside these places, however, and it suddenly becomes difficult to find a cup. Much like in the US, the streets here are lined with coffee shops, in addition to Starbucks, Cafe Nero and another place of which I am currently blanking on the name are quite prevalent. While all of these places of course serve tea, they are now clearly secondary to the consumption of coffee-based beverages and baked goods. I have not come across any chains, such as Peet's, where tea is placed on anything resembling an equal priority to coffee.

Much like in America, a number of finer establishments offer the concept of high tea. Apparently you haven't lived until you've gone for high tea at the Savoy. Or maybe it was the Ritz. Or maybe one of those other really fancy hotels. Anyways, as can be supposed, these situations involve the handing over of vast sums of money to sit and drink tea with a vast array of tiny sandwiches and biscuits and such spread out before you. In my mind you are also wearing a pastel suit but I don't think that's necessary. Pinkies however, should never touch anything but air (again, I'm just assuming). Despite knowing that these things exist, I don't know of anyone who has been to one.

The third option for tea consumption in public is the one I have actually partaken in, that being what I see to be a rural/small town sort of phenomenon as the quaint little tea shop. Having visited such a place while in quaint little Beaulieu, frequently this sort of establishment involves a little pot of tea, some what the English call scones, what we call buttermilk biscuits, clotted cream, and jam (as illustrated in the above photo from last April). They should have more of these places in London. It's a nice little change of pace.

So why doesn't tea take centre stage when out and about? Why doesn't everyone suddenly disappear off Oxford Street at 4pm for tea? I don't know but it sounds like an awesome idea and I'm going to pursue it. I could have a scone with jam everyday. Anyways, my real point here is that in a busy city people often do not have the time or inclination to stop and savor a cup of tea as they might in the home or in the countryside. Tea is a relaxing, destressing beverage at home and well, I'm assuming a staying awake beverage at work. While both of these would be handy while shopping and running errands, it would also somehow cheapen and depersonalize the tea-drinking experience. Or perhaps there is just a lack of options for tea drinking in these parts. If I opened 'Anglo Mango's Urban Tea Oasis' and had little mugs and saucers with flowers on them would I be tapping into a hugely under served market?

Tomorrow in my final tea entry, I shall discuss the amazing power of tea as discussed in literature and popular culture throughout the centuries. No really, I will.

Tea in the home

In the second of my tea series, I explore the presence and power of tea in the private realm of the home. Again, having only had limited exposure to these sorts of things, I'm putting in a disclaimer that some of the following may be somewhat inaccurate.

I must admit that despite not being a tea drinker, and the roomie not really being a tea drinker, I have tea in my home. Not only do I have tea, but alongside my cute little strawberry canisters labeled 'coffee' and 'sugar' there is one called 'tea'. Needless to say, it is the one never used, but still it is filled with tea. Apparently you get deported if you don't have tea on hand in case of emergencies. Now, I must admit I don't know what kind of tea fills up the little canister. It used to be Asda brand, but that apparently has been replaced by something fresher, I just don't know what.

So I suppose before delving into the serving of tea at home, I'll discuss the buying of the tea. Much like we have an aisle devoted to salad dressing, the English grocery store has a tea section. While the US grocery store would also have such a section, it seems primarily to be of this size to fit on a maximum number of obscurely flavored teas. While there are still plenty of varieties on offer here, the size of the area seems to be to allow bigger and bigger boxes of tea. The bottom shelf is often of double height and stacked with boxes containing 100 tea bags. It's one of the few products at the grocery store that you can genuinely buy in bulk.

To be honest, I don't know what flavor the generic English tea is. I don't know if it's what we call English breakfast, Earl Grey, Lady Grey or any of that stuff. It's just called tea. And aside from PG tips, which I can easily believe to be England's most popular tea because it's everywhere (I sit next to the filing area, on top of the cabinets one of the storage boxes is a disused PG tips box, it once contained '2 x 1150 one pyramid catering tea bags', whatever that means), you often see a lot of grocery store branded tea bags (hence my old Asda ones). Again, the boxes just say it's tea, so I guess you just sort of roll with it. And it is also very cheap. Although it must be if the people are drinking it like water.

One of my primary failings as a hostess in this land (at least in my mind) is that I have never offered anyone any tea. I offer water, beer, wine, lemonade and all that racket, but never any tea. One time I did manage to have a bit of an epiphany and offered Mark a cup of tea, but it went wrong when I realized I not only didn't really know what I was doing but the tea had apparently passed it's ideal freshness date. After that the Asda tea was retired. So to date, as that cup was not fully consumed, I believe only one glass of tea has been consumed in my house, and that was by Mark's mom. Excuse me, his 'mum'. And having heard of our tea shortcomings, she bought the tea beforehand.

As a guest in the homes of others, I have been offered tea on numerous occasions and occasionally accepted. Again, I never really know what goes on in the making of this tea, but it always comes out tasting and looking the same. It's got the same subtle flavor, and is of what I consider to by an orange-tinted milky brown color. It is the orange tint that makes it recognizable as not being coffee. Again it has sugar in it, but nobody seems to have sugar cubes around (nor are there any in my office), it's just the regular loose variety. I've heard rumors of people who drink tea constantly while at home, where the roommate circle assures that someone is always making some and offering it up to the others. It's something.

The one last component of the home tea experience that I find rather bizarre is the electric kettle. Much like here at work, people don't seem to heat their water up with a regular kettle on the stove. The electric kettle is a standard issue appliance, and it somehow manages to heat your water up much quicker. This can be key when drinking tea like the gallon, but you can then also use it when heating up water for cooking purposes. There is one on my counter right now. And sometimes, I use. But then sometimes I just like to heat up my noodle water the old-fashioned way.

Tea in the office

It just wouldn't be England if tea weren't consumed by the truckload. Today I will begin what may become a multi-part series on the culture surrounding the consumption of tea by those around me. Since I've been tending to write blog when I get into the office a bit early (as is the case today), I shall start by discussing the role that tea plays within these walls everyday.

To give a little background, in the little kitchenette, there is a coffeemaker that may have originated in the 1980s and an electric kettle. For use with the kettle, in the cupboard there is instant coffee, hot chocolate mix, and boxes and boxes of tea bags. There is also sugar in the cupboard and strange little boxes of milk in the mini-fridge. In a separate cupboard, there is a bevy of mugs, many of them generic company mugs for general use.

So while I obviously can't speak for the whole of the land, I can relay what I observe in my immediate surroundings. Within my group of six desks (myself included) there are two regular tea drinkers, and one sort of unknown. My connections in other areas also rely heavily on the power of tea. I don't know of anyone who drinks the coffee. Then again I can't blame anyone, as having tried it before I can assure you it's not good.

What is missing from my immediate surroundings, that I have heard of happening quite frequently in other arenas, is the concept of people sort of getting rounds of tea as people take turns getting everyone's drinks in a pub. No one ever offers to get me a cup of tea! And quite frankly it's in everyone's best interest that I don't make any as I really don't know how (how much sugar? how much milk? how long do you leave the tea bag in??). I sort of get the impression this group tea making is a way of group bonding in some circles, much like drinking in the pub. For all I know people get coffee for each other in the US, but the DOT didn't have free beverages at the ready so such culture didn't exist there.

There is also this concept of tea discussion. Yesterday someone walking by yelled out to someone else walking by 'Where's my tea!?', to which they received the response 'In the kettle!' This morning one of the group tea drinkers interrupted a casual conversation with the statement 'Not before I have my cup of tea.'

Personally I don't understand with this requirement of having tea. While it's caffeinated, it's not really that caffeinated. I just sort of get the impression that there is this deep cultural bond to this generic milky tea that seems to be consumed in considerable proportions. Speaking of which, perhaps tomorrow I will discuss the role of tea in socializing in the home (not that I really know what I'm talking about, but I can speculate....).

Allot Grdns

It took me a long time to figure out why so many open spaces in these parts are called Allot Grdns (as represented in maps). It's short for allotment gardens, and it's what they call community gardens. And having determined what they are, I feel like I am therefore qualified to give an opinion on their presence. First of all, these allotment gardens are plentiful and large and so you come across them somewhat regularly. My first face to face exposure was my first day of exploration last summer when I moved to London and decided to go check out Bishop's Park by my house. A large area (let's say around 2 football fields) within the park was fenced off and full of small rectangular raised planter beds. There was some scattered greenery, but the general impression was that of inaccessible decay and isolation, a place not frequented by human beings. I assumed at the time that it was something connected to the neighboring school.

Since this time I have seen 'Allot Grdns' appear on many maps, including one of Bishop's Park, and have thus been able to make the connection to what they actually are. While it seems like a good idea, people living in cities having a little plot of earth to call their own and grow plants and vegetables and such, they just don't come across as being of much use in reality. Perhaps it's just been the time of year, but they all just look sad and lonely to me. I've never seen anyone actually tending to their little plot. I can't help but think it might be a bit more conducive to community development if they were just left as open fields that everyone could actually walk through. I don't know, perhaps come April they'll be packed every Saturday with little families teaching their small children to grow tomatoes and I'll be eating my words. But they could at least take down the high fencing or have visiting hours or something. And I am in no way considering getting myself an allotment. I would have to spend my Saturdays weeding. When I could be sitting around watching tv.

In a scattering of other news, it's really winding out and I'm slightly fearful that the building is going to collapse. We found out yesterday that ours is the only flat in the building that has the extra room extended onto the back of the building. For some reason my gym has decided that their current locking system of putting in a £1 coin to release the key (you get it back when you put the key back in) is too conducive to people leaving their stuff in lockers when they're not there, so have decided to switch over to old-fashioned padlocks. Because having to carry a padlock around with you all the time does not tempt you to just leave it on a locker all the time. So now I have to go find a padlock at lunch today or spend £5 to get the one they are selling at the gym (I want to get my own, otherwise I would never be able to figure out which one was mine when I was done with the work out). I haven't used a padlock since high school. Oh, and all the people have returned to work and I'm stuck with unnaturally overcrowded trains while trying to get to work. I shall be a sardine for the foreseeable future.

Rugby!

Today capped off the Christmas season. As part of the festive melee, Mark and I went to a rugby game somewhere in the quasi-suburbs of southwest London. It was part of his Christmas gift, you see.

Anyways, the stadium is near the national rugby stadium at Twickenham. The Harlequins were playing Leicester. I asked what city the Harlequins actually represented and was answered by a puzzling glaze. But that's not the important part. Key here is that it was my first real-live rugby 'match'.

The stadium was relatively small, with a sell-out crowd barely topping 10,000. It was a nice sunny day, and when the sun was out it was not too cold, which I thought was key! As the stadium was small, we were relatively low down and close to the action. While I had a bit of trouble following the ball at times, that was probably mainly because of my novice viewer level. The game started out well enough, with the quins getting a couple, um, uhhhh, let's just say field goals and they went up 6-0. There were some scrums and some occasions of throwing people up in the air, both of which I found quite exciting. The other fans for the most part seemed relatively normal, and aside from being in the considerable female minority and American, I didn't feel particularly out of place. There weren't any songs like at the Southampton game, just occasional chants of 'Harlequins'. There were two mascots, both bears, one called Harley the other called Charley. Within my notice, one stole someone's beer and the other one managed to get some guy to pick him up and twirl him in the air. It was cute.

Things sort of went downhill in the second half. And quickly. Leicester was up 42-6 before the quins finally managed to score a, um, oh wait I know this one, a try, and the final score was 42-13. So much more respectable to lose by less than 30 points. Anyways, overall it was an enjoyable experience. The game wasn't too long, there was plenty of action, and a lot of short shorts.

Kleenex

Having had a cold that crossed the Atlantic with me this past month, I couldn't help but notice the differences in the Kleenex found in each land. Despite all intuition indicating it would be the opposite, I am generally much more impressed with the UK Kleenex. It's both considerably thicker and softer. It's not just that the stuff I have here is the premium either, my desk/home boxes are the cheapest grade of Kleenex available. Yet they are still triple ply. When you have a cold and are going through a lot of Kleenex, these little things can make a huge difference. Like my nose is a little happier over here. When comparing my slightly more luxurious travel Kleenex to the US stuff it's even more remarkable. It's like the Bellagio versus, umm, Circus Circus or something. Or maybe the parents just stock really, really horrible tissue. Unlikely.

In other news, I'll be shoving my application for a new visa in the mail today. I had been intending to do this on Wednesday but I didn't have everything I need, and then yesterday I had collected the things I had forgotten but removed something else. But today it's all hitting the streets. This is a worrying thing on many levels. First there is the obvious concern that I will be turned down for the visa and therefore be deported, then there is my general well-founded lack of faith in the Royal Mail to get my passports back to me when they are done with them.

Along the lines of completely unrelated paragraphs, I might also add that I am so glad to have purchased a box of my dearly beloved granola bars while at Target last weekend. Not only were they nice snacks to have on the return journey, but they've been fabulous snacks since then as well. Why, why, why does the UK not have Quaker peanut butter chocolate chip granola bars?? Do they not know what a glaring hole this is in society's ability to snack in a reasonable manner? You want a granola bar here you end up with some obscure thing generally lacking taste and only coming in one flavor - chocolate chip. Mind you, Nature Valley is around but I don't really find these comparable given the fact that they have two in every package, making them a much more considerable snack than the single bar. Plus you just get crumbs everywhere with the Nature Valley. Anyways, I could go on and on about granola bars all day. But I won't. I'm going to clean my desk instead. At least a little bit.

Happy New Year!

After my brief sojourn in the US, I'm back at work in Notting Hill, my Christmas tree has disappeared and for some reason it's a new year despite the fact that I was on a plane at midnight (everyone knows red-eye flights don't really count as 'nights').

So I arrived at Heathrow yesterday morning at around 6:30, having gotten about 2 hours of sleep on the plane. They certainly don't make it easy on you. You get on the plane at 12:30, and then around 3:30 west coast time they decide it's 'night' and they turn all the lights off and you're like, um, I'm not sleepy. And then when it finally gets to 9:00 west coast time they turn all the lights on and serve you breakfast. It's just wrong. Anyways, I made it through customs with considerable ease and grabbed my bags. Sadly because it was pre-8 am on a holiday, trains were not running that frequently, so I had to wait about 20 minutes for a Piccadilly line train into town. And as did everyone else at the airport, so it was packed with giant suitcases. There were loads of empty seats, you just couldn't get to them because of bag barricades. At Earl's Court there was another 15 minute for a Wimbledon train to come, but I finally made it through my front door around 9:15. After using the facilities, watering Basil and Thymey Tim, I took a 3-hour nap. I figured all the New Years revelers were sleeping until noon, so it wouldn't be too horrible if I did as well.

So, after my nap the Turners arrived with about 8 carloads of items and then were off like the night. I spent the rest of the day doing some unpacking, vacuuming up pine needles, putting up my new shower curtain and chatting with someone wearing an Oregon State sweatshirt. It's like I just can't escape those darn Beavers!

The combo of jet lag, time change, and the thought of returning to work make it extremely difficult to get out of bed this morning. After three snoozes and an additional ten-minute period of semi-conciousness, I finally managed to get up. It was not great. And now I'm back at work. There was no one on the trains this morning and there aren't many people around here. It makes me think I could have slept in a bit later this morning. And the email servers seem to be down so I can't check my emails. It's going to be a long day! I'm looking forward to going back to bed already!