Biz Trip Taipei - Jiufen Tea House

One of the thing you must do when you go to Jiufen is to have tea at one of the tea houses there. They can be found easily enough, but which to go to is a challenge. Most cost around SGD20 for tea and some snacks. The above one, found in the centre of the old street seems to be the biggest one and looks the most expensive. So I went inside to have a look around.

It was heaven inside! Just look at the photos here! Any tea drinker's dream come true. I love tea. Not the wester English time of yellowish brown stuff (no offence), but the light yellow scented white tea, or beautifully brown pu er, oolong or iron buddha, and even lightly green matcha tea, germaicha, or my current favourite is houjicha. I love eastern tea. And this was tea heaven to me. 

I love the ritual of drinking tea. I love the comradeship, the chess playing and calligraphy and poetry that comes with tea drinking. I guess deep down inside, I was pretty much Chinese. And I was all ready to spend some money here. But sadly, the customer here was surprisingly cold. Maybe it's because they are so famous that they don't really need to entertain a hooligan dressed tourist like myself. Although I showed interest in the tea set and tea, nobody ever came to entertain me. And when I walked nearer to the actual tea house, a lady promptly came over to tell me that I can't enter as it was for customer only. Probably the place was too expensive for me. But it was a beautiful shop, so instead of being offended, I suck it in and act poor inside, asking if it was ok for me to look around and take photos because it was so beautiful. Surprisingly she said yes, and even told me I could make my way downstairs for more things to see! So I went downstairs....

What greeted me was even more amazing! A line of pottery cat teapot sat there sunbathing as I walk down the wooden stairs to the floor below. The above photo is one of my favourite. At first I thought they were just pottery cat. But when I looked closer, they are actually teapot! Aren't they just adorable?

And downstairs, a beautiful tea living room greeted me, with koi pond and miniture waterfall etc. If I'm ever so rich, I would love to have a living room just like the one shown in the photo below. It was so calming. I could have sat there the whole afternoon sipping tea. It was amazingly beautiful that it seemed strange that nobody was there but me. Was these meant for special occasion only? I would never know.

And when the sunlight hits the stone ,or wooden structure, or water, everything just glitter like magic.  I was so in love.