Chai: That Cup of Tea

Photo by David Mao on Unsplash

 

On a long drive back from the cool and pristine hills of Ooty, drunk on its tea plantations and towering Eucalyptus trees and presently, caught in the heavy traffic of Bengaluru, we were tired, my husband and I, and would turn the radio on from time to time to drown the monotony of inching forward.

On one such occasion, the RJ announced that it was International Tea Day; 21st of May! She went on and on about one thing after another while I was thinking about this was one drink, apart from the elixir of life, of course, that made many a day worth living. It has given me, that much needed boost to make it through, on days when I did not believe I could or that comforting relief from a blistering headache when water, bananas and analgesics failed to work their magic. As I thought about the beverage, which was nothing fancy, but a must have for so many of us from all walks of life and all cultures, the world over, I decided it actually did need a day earmarked for it.

Just as I was navigating through my thoughts, my husband voiced his, aloud, asking me to write a blog on it. I smiled. Yes, that would be a small but befitting tribute to my second-best drink! Chaaya!

Chaaya is what we call it in Kerala. My ears ring with childhood memories on the train with vendors selling “chaaya, chaaya, chaaya, chaaya, chaaayaaa!” I used to find it so funny. I would also watch the house helps drink tea with such happiness as they would dunk their bread in it which I was fascinated by. And so, I took a liking to tea rather early in life especially because it was forbidden. Children must drink milk and not tea! In the early eighties when I was growing up, in India at least, no one talked about lactose intolerance or for that matter dyslexia or autism that the current generation uses rather freely. The symptoms described by these conditions were usually driven away with one tight slap or punishment of some kind.

So, my dislike for milk fell on deaf ears. The fact that my tongue felt funny and sour after milk and that I felt nauseous made no difference to anybody. Yet, my poor mother, with so much to handle gave into my stubborn tantrums, occasionally. In this manner, I got my first taste of sweet tea and did I take to it! To this day, unlike most South Indians who are connoisseurs of coffee, I am more of a tea drinker.

You would think I down many cups of tea a day. I don’t. Just one cup in the morning after breakfast and one when I wake up after my afternoon siesta. I am finicky about my morning tea, the Indian style tea which is made when you bring the milk and water mix (a quarter or less cup of milk and the rest water) to a boil and then add 2 heaped teaspoons of tea leaves for a cup (I like a mix of Lipton’s Darjeeling long leaf tea and Brooke bonds Red Label powder tea for perfect colour, aroma and taste and no, I am not promoting the brands just telling you how rigid I am in this one area of my life) after which you bring it to a boil and then simmer for 30sec and turn it off. Let it sit for 10 seconds and pour out the ambrosia into a cup! I used to have two heaped teaspoons of sugar till my early thirties. I gag at the idea now. Never listened to my dad when he said it back then but whole-heartedly agree now, that you taste tea best when there is no sugar.

The credit of the transition from two teaspoons of sugar in my tea to drinking tea without it, goes to my mum-in-law. She weaned me off the sugar gently over a period of ten days. It was an effort to make me shed a few kilos. That didn’t happen but I got the taste of tea, unadulterated. You’d say there is milk in it! True, but this one act also got me to try black tea and green tea with no milk or sugar, with great relish! In fact, my evening tea can be green or black tea or a premix, we discovered recently (unfortunately, with sugar) and that is okay. This flexibility came in the last four years or so, when we got lazier to make a long-drawn cup of tea!

I learnt how to make tea when I was in grade 7. My mother taught me with emphasis on proportion because she is a bigger fusspot than I am which is also the reason why she is an amazing cook because even if we wolf down anything that isn’t made to perfection, she wouldn’t be able to. The same for tea.

Anyway, she praised my efforts to high heaven and the eager-for-validation me, lapped it up. In time, it became a duty despite the fact, that the praise wasn’t as enthusiastic and I had had enough of it. I guess it carried on, on most days, till I left home. And my husband would pay the price!

I stopped tea during college years, as I stayed in the hostel and then I joined the IAF for training. Those 18 months and about six months after commissioning, so about two years, I drank the worst specimens of tea and even the hybrid “choffee” which we coined after the debate on whether it was chai or coffee. How I did it is yet another example of how incredible our mind is!

Another singular exception was when Cupid’s arrow struck, as I was woken up from sleep early morning, on a train, with a cup of tea by someone who turned out to be my first love. Did the tea have anything to do with it, I wonder, because I do not remember the taste. It was the act, the surprise and the smile that came with it! I was smitten. Subsequently, on another occasion, I was offered tea but declined. Magic cannot always happen. I could never impress anybody if I smelt a cup of tea I didn’t like. I just have no control over my expressions.

Then, I got married not to that love but luckily to another very magnanimous one. Two times lucky! In the first year we stayed together three months! We always had outstation commitments so on those rare occasions we were together and not working, my husband would offer to make tea for me and I would panic. He is a North Indian. As a rule, they love milk and put extra milk into anything they can. At least, his mother did and I saw the tea he drank at his home – a tall and broad glass of milk with a mild spray of tea!! He, however, promised he would follow my instructions to a T and also ensure there was no trace of any parachute (a coin we use now courtesy my son, who at four would sit over his milk waiting for us to take off the cream that settles on hot milk and if you picked it from the centre with your fingers it looked like a parachute).

 Well, on one such day I let him and voila! The best tea ever! The one great thing about a man’s brain is that once they master something, they are consistent as long as egos don’t spoil things. And so, he was consistent, making the same tea, despite mood changes (another quality that men have is that their moods seldom affect the task at hand- their brains are made up of compartments) and just like my mother did I slowly made evening tea his duty and I made tea in the morning. My husband’s love language is acts of service and so, when he saw me asleep on a Sunday morning, he surprised me with tea! I was so ecstatic, that he would do it more often and slowly and steadily as time went by, it was totally on him and I would make it occasionally!! I know, I know. We all have a dark side.

Unlike my mother however, I would praise my Leo husband and genuinely so, for the lovely tea he made and mastered which he smiled at till we started having friends over, who wanted tea made by him. If it got to him, he was gracious enough not to show it.

Now, so many years later, 26 years and over, it has come back to me, for over three years, come to think of it. I tried my best to teach the kids. They learnt but refused to take on the job! They do not drink it either. I keep trying to coax them into drinking it- they are missing out! Nah, no luck there.

 Chai, Chai tea (tea-tea?), chaaya, cha and whatever else it is called, comes in so many flavours and varieties and is available to every single human being. The warmth it provides to everyone; from the poorest of poor, to the have-it-alls and everyone in between, this humble drink is a great leveler, don’t you think?

If only we could be like tea, where our essence, our presence, could be so beautiful and nurturing, humble and flexible, that we are welcomed by most and our arrival brings a smile on faces and not invisible walls. If only we could create safe spaces for people to just be, instead of judging them, what wonderful world we would leave behind us! At long last, this blog is done and I am going to make myself a strong cup of the MAGIC BREW!