Taiwan: A Wonderland of Tea
It took me more than a year plus three weeks to start my Fulbright program in Taiwan, so I was determined to utilize all the opportunities during my stay there. The pandemic delayed my travel by over a year, and of course I had to go through three weeks of quarantine in Taiwan. My teaching and research are related to tea and culture, and Taiwan turns out to be a tea paradise! While I have studied tea and culture in China’s Tang through Ming dynasties, I came to Taiwan with no experience in tea making, and only rough ideas about Taiwan’s tea tree species, the variety of teas, and the art of tea. Now having completed my program in Taiwan, I feel so enriched in my knowledge and experience of tea. I followed tea masters to make teas three times, which means, in addition to learning about the process of tea making, I stayed up till 4 or 5 am to follow critical tea-processing steps. I have learned so much about varieties of tea plants, kinds of teas, and the art of tea in Taiwan. My trips to Alishan initiated my wandering in the land of tea, learning about and
