Help Makaibari

I've posted this on Twitter and passed on the news to World Tea News (who did a story on it), but I wanted to post here as well. Darjeeling's Makaibari Tea Estate was hit by a cyclone recently, and there was quite a bit of destruction. IMHO, Makaibari is an incredible tea estate with honorable labor and environmental practices, and excellent teas. (Their Silver Green is phenomenal and their Second Flush Muscatel is one of the highest-priced auction teas in the world.) You can donate to help Makaibari through Eco Prima a wholesale tea company, the sole U.S. importer of Makaibari teas, owned by Anupa Mueller, the sister-in-law of Rajah (Makaibari's owner) and a wonderful person in her own right.

Edit -- I originally mistyped and called Anupa Rajah's sister. She is his sister-in-law. Also, I received the following update:

Anupa -- Makaibari was not the only garden to be hit. The entire sub-district got hit pretty bad. Makaibari is situated in the Kurseong Valley in the district of Darjeeling - the entire valley was affected. (I've provided Rajah's description below).

Rajah -- Castleton had heavy damages in their Dhargaon village. There is a huge landslide which has taken away a considerable portion of their tea. The landslide is so devastating that even today a month after the cyclone hit, the slide continues traumatising all in the vicinity with the sound of the slide. More so in the dead of night, as the sliding earth groans horrifically, like a wounded lion as it cascades downhill. The first few nights were sleepless. On top of Singell tea estate, a massive landslide buried a family. all members died. At Longview tea estate, a massive tree which was uprooted, trapped an adolescent girl for over a day, killing her, as none could extricate her. Goethals school, has lost their entire sports campus. Happy Valley lost a great deal of tea as well as a village near the factory, 6 people died on the spot. Goomtee tea estate suffered enormous damages in their villages- mercifully no deaths. Arya tea estate has lost tea and property damage. The list goes on and on. There were about 50 people who died in the cyclone in the district. The loss to property in the Kurseong subdistrict alone is around 6 million dollars and the sub-district is quite small.

Anupa -- This should give you some idea. And now with the monsoons there, rebuilding is a real problem. They will have to wait until after the rains to get permanent structures built. Thank you for all your efforts. Rajah tells me that his people are overwhelmed at the generosity of people thousands of miles away and have hope that they will come through because of it.

In answer to my question regarding why Makaibari is the only estate that seems to have support here in the states, Makaibari got the press because we (Eco Prima) are here devoted to its cause! Other gardens do not have personal representatives here necessarily and we live at Makaibari and have a market presence here in the U.S. I would not even know how to get relief to the other gardens and there is no district-specific effort that I'm aware of. It makes a difference when the owner lives on the estate and is personally aware of all the grief and damage - it brings it to the forefront and you are more motivated to get attention to it - that's the difference.

(Lindsey -- And because I asked World Tea News to cover it. :) No, really, Anupa has been a much bigger supporter than I. She is very devoted to Makaibari.)

Anupa -- BTW, I concur and would add that Rajah is such a dynamic force that all of Makaibari's devoted fans know of him and his unique compassion for the land and the people of Darjeeling, so there is a human connection to the estate, not JUST the great tea.

Tea Tourism in India

Tea tourism in India is getting more and more popular with tourists from around the world. All types of people from around the globe are beginning to think about and appreciate the beauty of what goes into the world's second-most popular drink (after water). Time Magazine is definitely a fan of the trend--they named Makaibari Tea Estate one of the best things about Asia for 2008. From the article:






















"If Darjeeling is the champagne of teas, Makaibari is the Krug or Henri Giraud. At the 677-hectare Makaibari Tea Estate nestled in the eastern Himalayas, you not only taste the finest of its aromatic, amber brews, but experience tea as a way of life.... After a day's induction — with tea-tasting sessions and a guided tour of the factory to see how luscious, freshly plucked leaves are processed into green, white, oolong and black teas — visitors get some hands-on experience.... Not a tea lover? You will be at Makaibari."

Makaibari was listed under the category "Best for the Soul." Having been there, I have to agree. It is a deeply calming and centering place, and I am thrilled to be returning to Makaibari and several other Darjeeling tea estates as a tour guide this October. We're working out all the details now (Tearooms and tea estates and tea factories! Oh, my!) and I will have them posted here within the next two weeks. It should be a fantastic tour and I hope some of my readers, students, and clients out there can join me. For now, I'm off to work on the itinerary some more!

England Goes Foodie, Tea Prices on the Rise?

England is following and surpassing the American trend of "going foodie." Acoording to a recent article on CNN, they are getting ahead of the American trend towards for organic, fair trade, and local: the British govenrment has even asked retailers to develop "eco-labels" that indicate the environmental impact of each product. The focus is much more on sustainability than on personal health. (It seems to me that most Americans are more interested in their own health than the planet's when it comes to organic food production.) The ethical treatment of animals (still a mojor taboo in the US, despite all of PETA's well-meaning efforts) has also gained some attention in the press on both sides of the issue.

I wonder how the foodie movement in one of the world's biggest tea-drinking nations will impact the tea market. Will more plantations and gardens go organic/biodynamic? Will packaging be altered to be more sustainable and will marketing begin to reflect the (in many cases, newfound) sustainability more? As tastes change in England, will the ubiquitous teabag be replaced more and more by loose leaf tea?

As for the prices, it is already predicted that tea prices will rise in 2008 due to civil unrest in Kenya. Of course, most tea production in Kenya is CTC at present, so it may not impact the prices of loose leaf. Perhaps a price increase in CTC black tea (Kenya's main tea product and England's favorite cuppa) will actually encourage a shift to loose leaf. We shall see!


EDITED TO ADD: A new article on the UK's efforts to make grocery stores more sustainable, ethical, and healthy. Yay!

India Tour

Today is my birthday. I decided to make a special announcement in honor of the occasion. For some time, people have been asking me when I'll start planning tea tours to India. Today, I can safely say "now." Plans are in the works for a trip to Darjeeling this fall. It will be an eco-tour, focusing on organic and fair-trade practices, and a culinary tour, with lots of extraordinary tea. Vee Tea and Silver Tips Tearoom will take a small group to the famed Makaibari Tea Estate and other tea highlights of India this fall. Exciting! More details soon to come.

Goom Tea Estate

Today I visited Goom Tea Estate, which is not in Goom (the town), nor is it near the Goom Monastary. (Confusing?) They have a manager's bungalow that has been converted into an inn. It's absolutely lovely. There's a prim little garden nearby and plants line all the drives. The food is completely vegetarian. (If you want meat, they suggest going to a restaurant in town.) The tea garden looks healthy from afar, but I didn't have the chance to see it up close. (Most of it is conventional, but they do have some organic production as well.) The factory is quite a sight. Almost all of the surfaces are white and it is immaculately clean. You have to wear special shoes, a hairnet, a surgical mask, and an apron to get in. (Strangely, you don't have to wear gloves.) The dryer has lighted windows that allow you to see they conveyor belt moving the tea along as it dries. Cool.

Darjeeling to Kurseong, Plus a Birthday

Today, Nalin joined me (or, rather, I joined him) on the ride from Darjeeling to Kurseong, which is a good thing, because many of the drivers were on strike. He took me to the Tea Research Association (TRA) Clonal Facility, which is really more of a grafting facility, but was fascinationg to see. They have a dozen or so different varieties of tea growing in small sections night next to eachother, which makes it very easy for city-folk like me to see their many differences (color, size, shape, leaf-style, and bud size/shape/downiness). They also have a small greenhouse, in which young grafts are growing, and a miniature tea factory with tiny rollers, dryers, and everything else. We rode by dozens of tea estates, including Singleton and Margaret's Hope. I got to see skiffing (a light, mid-season pruning) and more picking along the way.

Back in Kurseong, I got the priviledge of joining in two 60th birthday celebrations of Rajah Banerjee, the owner of Makaibari Estate. The smaller celebration was pretty much a family affair. It included a traditional Bengali birthday meal of a fried foods, including a fish head, greens, okra, root vegetables, and eggplant, a dessert of rice pudding (which was eerily like the kind my grandmother used to make), the blowing of a conch shell, the application of a red powder to Rajah's forehead, and the lighting of an oil lamp. After the meal, the leftovers from Rajah's plate were buried as an offering to the earth. In the evening, there was a big party, which was very much like an American birthday party in a restaurant. (Drinking, lots of food, boisterous conversation, and a big cake. Well, two big cakes, actually.) I met some great people and laughed a lot. Fun times.

An Extra Day in Darjeeling

I was going to return to Kurseong today, but decided to see some more sights in Darjeeling. Nalin took me around the area to see some gorgeous views of tea estates (including Tukduh, Pandam, and Glenburn), an organic farm, waterfalls, flowers, and all kinds of fruit trees. (Many of the fruits ripen in winter. It's enough to make me want to stay in India year-round!) We talked about tea tourism in India (which was obviously a topic of interest to me, as I am a tea tour guide) and about the tea industry in general. He showed me several estates he used to manage, all of which were lovely (tree-lined roads, healthy plants). Nalin shared all kinds of tea secrets along the way. Unfortunately, I was too carsick to enjoy about half the trip. Next time, I'll take a motion-sickness pill first. After the expedition, I ran some errands in town and worked on a gift for a friend (which I will share with you all later). Tomorrow: Back down the mountain to Kurseong, via about 15 tea estates and the Tea Research Association (not to be confused with the DTRC).

Darjeeling

Today I visited Happy Valley Tea Estate and The Mayfair Hotel, and I learned a lot about tea politics.

After a breakfast of momos, I walked down the mountain a bit to Happy Valley Tea Estate. Happy Valley is not particularly known for its tea, but the estate itself is in most of the India guidebooks because it is so convenient to Darjeeling proper and because (until recently) it offered tours of the field and factory. I navigated winding roads, narrow paths between houses and sharp drops, slippery stone stairs, and a rocky trail through the estate grounds to find a group of men milling about outside the factory. I asked them if I could take a tour and (after some discussion amongst them in Nepali) a young man stepped forward, eyes darting about. Halfway through the "tour," I discovered that the tours had been discontinued and that I wasn't supposed to be there without permission from the manager. "May I see the manager and ask him?" "No. He has seen you with me already. He'll be angry." So, I didn't get to see the factory and the information on the fields was limited. However, I did learn Lesson One: Always ask who is in charge.

After the "tour," I stopped by the "cafe," which is actually a tiny house with a snack stand operating out of the kitchen and a "tearoom" in the bedroom. I drank Happy Valley tea, which is "the world's best tea" ... or so I'm told by the woman selling it. Her reasoning? "It brews in only five seconds." I know what you're thinking, right? "No way." Well, let me tell you this: It DID brew in only five seconds. Maybe even less. And it tasted pretty good. How is that possible? She used about 1/2 cup of FTGFOP1S (Special Finest Tippy Golden Flowery Orange Pekoe Top Grade) tealeaves per cup of water. ... Yes, really. The other tourists in the room with me were eating it up. Lesson Two: Don't believe everything you're told, especially if you're a tourist.

Over the course of my visit to Happy Valley, I spoke with several employees. Each one told me, in no uncertain terms, that Happy Valley is, well, not so happy these days. They USED to be, but a recent change in management has caused a lot of strife. Complaints ranged from bureaucracy and hipocracy to cuts in sick days (from 14 days per year to 3 days per year if I remember correctly). Lesson Three: "Our names are labels, plainly printed on the bottled essence of our PAST behavior." (Empahsis added.) I hope things get better soon.

After the trek to (Un)Happy Valley, I walked back up the big hill to The Mayfair Hotel for afternoon tea. Just as I was starting to feel very cynical about tea in Darjeeling, by luck, I was recognized and caught by Nalin Modha, a tea professional who was the youngest estate manager in the entire Indian tea industry. Over tea (with freshly baked butter cookies and cucumber sandwiches) and (later on) dinner (which was delicious and enormous), I learned Lessons Four through Four-Hundred from Nalin. We talked about tea education, workers' health, the tea market, the ecosystem, and numerous other things related to tea and (generally) to politics. He's very knowledgable and I am glad to have run into him here. Tomorrow, I'll be meeting him to see some of the surrounding area. Exciting!

Castleton Tea Estate

Natalia and Pat left for a tour of the Golden Triangle today. I miss them already! However, I had an exciting distraction. I got to visit Castleton Tea Estate!

Castleton is very well-known throughout the world. It is run by a company that is 70% British-owned. They own several other estates in Darjeeling, including the equally well-known Margaret's Hope. I met with Suman Das, the field manager, who has worked in the tea industry for some time and who cares very much about spreading knowledge and love for Darjeeling teas around the world. Today we he took me on a tour through the factory. Next week, he'll take me to the fields.

We began the tour with the withering room. It was pretty similar to the one at Makaibari. Not much to say about that.

Then, we went to the rolling room. There were two types of rollers, the regular, single-action kind I had seen at Makaibari, and a second kind that uses a more intense double rolling action to bruise the leaves for oxidation. We discussed the variations in pressure that are necessary to properly bruise the leaves, and then stopped by the "fermentation" (oxidation) tables and talked about the first and second nose (the two peaks of flavor that black teas go through as they oxidize).

From there, we went to the drying room and talked about the input and output temperature variance, the mechanized spreader (which keeps the tea input volume consistent), and the conveyor belt mechanism for transport of the tea to the sorting room.

In the sorting room, I saw several machines which were not present in Makaibari. They sorted the teas to varying degrees. Often, the tealeaves were run through the same machine multiple times for a more refined sorting. At Makaibari, this work is done by hand. I'm sure the machine method is much more efficient, but I have to admit that the hand sorters at Makaibari looked much happier than the workers who ran the sorting machines at Castleton. Either way it's done, at the end of the sorting, the leaves are divided into grades, the most basic of which are dust, fannings, broken leaf, and whole leaf.

(A side note: There are two main types of tea harvesting. One is done by machines. It's called CTC or Cut, Tear, Curl. It cannot produce whole-leaf teas. The other is called Orthodox production, and it is done by hand. It is more time and labor intensive, but it is the only way to get whole-leaf teas. Castleton is not organic, but it is Orthodox. This is part of why it has such a good reputation.)

The last stop in the factory was a multi-purpose room where the tea is run through an electromagnetic machine that removes any residual trash/foreign matter, piles of tea and a shovel (for blending), and crates and stencils (for packaging).

After the factory tour, we sat down for tea and talked shop for a while. We talked about the American market and tea education, and arranged for a field visit next week. I'm looking forward to it already!

Outside of the Castleton visit, today's highlights include:

Orange Blossom tea (Darjeeling with marmalade and orange peel)
The reading of Rajah's book, "The Wonder of Darjeeling"
Progress on the craft education thing I mentioned yesterday
Dinner and tea with Rajah (who has become a good friend over this visit)

Makiabari: Day Two

Today I awoke with a cold and plans for a tea tasting. Talk about a bad combination! It was fine, though. Natalia and I slurped and spit our way through about 20 unsorted teas and six of Makaibari's premium teas. Amazing. The pinnacle was the last one--Imperial Silver Tips, the highest-priced tea in the world.

Afterward, I switched gears and went to the biofuel plant, where three cows (named Red, Black, and Angry) are housed and their waste is composted for methane cooking gas and slurry for composting into mulch for the tea garden. There's a great program in place that encourages the locals to use the plant for their fuel instead of gathering firewood to burn. Talk about a commitment to sustainability!

Later, Natalia and I headed down the mountain to meet her boyfriend (and my friend and webdesigner) Pat. He had just flown in from Kolkata and we arrived at the airport to surprize him. Rajah arrived a little later and we all waited for some of Rajah's business associates while talking about politics, mangoes in Dubai, and plastic surgeons over a very large beer that was brewed with Himalayan spring water and mixed into shanties with Sprite from a bottle. Normally I don't drink beer during the day or Sprite, well, ever, but this was a pleasant exception to those rules. The associates, a couple from Hyderabad, arrived and we left for Makaibari again. The view of the mountains was the best I've seen so far. I guess Pat got lucky.

When we got back, we chatted more over tea and met with the leading staff of Makaibari. They seemed to be humble and proud of their work at the same time. It was such a contrast to so many Americans who are egomaniacs with no pride in their work. Natalia and Pat left for some alone time and I headed down to the shaman's house for some old-fashioned cold remedies. He had me taste a variety of bitter and sour roots from around Makaibari, each for a different purpose. Then, he have me a tuft of grasses and told me to dampen them, wrap them in cloth, and sniff the fumes to alleviate my cold. Afterward, I went on a walk and enjoyed the night view, and then read "The One-Straw Revolution" by Fukuoku (a loan from Rajah). I don't know if it was something the shaman gave me, the altitude, or just being at Makaibari, but by the time I got back to the hotel, I was on cloud nine. And that was BEFORE the tea-smoked mushrooms and African curry. I love this place.

Makaibari Tea Estate

Today, I got my first taste of Makaibari Tea Estate. It was astounding, but first things first... Breakfast: Darjeeling tea (of course) and toast with ginger-plum jam and local honey. Yum. After breakfast, Natalia and I walked down the mountain a bit, making our way through the quiet, secretive mists and searching for glimpses of the surrounding landscape. Suddenly, we saw it: "MAKAIBARI TEA ESTATE." The mist had parted to reveal the estate's name written across the entire roof of the factory (this kind of sign is common, as it allows you to identify the estate from afar), the offices, some of the neighboring houses, and (a small) part of the (very large) garden.

Upon arrival, we met The Man himself, Rajah Banerjee, otherwise known (much to his chagrin) as "The Lord of Darjeeling." Over tea (Makaibari's second flush muscatel--excellent), we talked with Rajah and with Katie (a volunteer from outside London who is at Makaibari to teach the local children about health and hygene).

After tea, we were wisked away to the factory to see the withering room (where the tealeaves are partially dried), the 120- and 140-year-old rolling machines (which bruise the tealeaves and begin the oxidation process required for black and oolong teas), the oxidizing shelves (where the teas are tested by their "nose" (aroma) to ensure that they reach their peak flavor), the drying machine (which looks a bit like something out of the original "Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory"), the sorting and grading room (where we got to join some of the ladies in sorting tealeaves by size and quality), and the packing area (where wooden boxes are labeled with stencils and filled with some of the worlds' best teas). Very illuminating.

After the factory tour, we met Rajah for salutations to Ganesha, stopped off at the stables to feed carrots to Rajah's ex-racehorse Storm Centre, and began a trek through the gardens. Rajah stopped every minute or so to show us a medicinal plant, unusual butterfly, or other point of interest. We learned about Makaibari's six stages of permaculture (most permaculture only has three stages), which include legume trees (which deposit nitrogen into the soil), fruit trees (mango, cherry, guava, pear, etc.), marijuana plants (with a high THC content to repel pests), tea bushes (of course), small neem trees (a staple in India), and clover (for mulching). The soil itself was the richest, most fragrant soil I've ever seen. It may sound silly, but it was ALIVE. There were worms and ants and microorganisms crawling all throughout it and it was absolutely beautiful.

I won't bore you with the details of the rest of the day, because it was almost all talking and eating. I will say that we had a phenomenal white tea (Makaibari was the first Indian tea estate to produce white tea, this one was light and floral, yet strangely earthy), some incredible food (notable dishes: a gingery version of saurkraut and a dessert of fresh mangoes with double cream), more tea with more volunteers (Mike and Dana from Pennsylvania, who teach at the local school and are building a library for the locals), and great conversation with everyone we met. It was lovely.

First impressions of Makaibari: I can tell there's something very special (magical?) about this place. Everything is so green, the people look so happy, and there's a particular energy radiating about everywhere you look. It's simple in its complexity and vice versa. It's alive and full of life (which are two different things). It's dynamic, connected, sustainable... I have the feeling I should have visited other estates first to avoid disappointment!

Up to Darjeeling!

Ah, Darjeeling! Glad to be here.

We awoke early and took a car to the airport. We talked with the driver about current events and Bollywood films. At the airport, we checked in (amazed by the casual approach to security), met a woman who lectures on/researches human trafficing and whose son lives in NYC, were mistaken for a movie star (me) and attendant (Natalia, who everyone keeps thinking is Nepalese), and boarded the plane.

On the plane, I got the impression that Indian national airlines are probably very much like American airlines were in the '60s. The flight attendants were very well put together and (genuinely) friendly. (I couldn't help but notice that they always said "namaskar" instead of "namaste." "Namaskar" is more polite and formal than "namaste.") The music was far less banal than what you'd expect of an airline. The food was actually decent. A selection of newspapers were offered to every client. Cool.

After we landed, we hopped a cab to Siliguri, a nearby military town. From Siliguri, we made the mistake of taking a shared jeep to Darjeeling. I say mistake not because we went to Darjeeling, but because it was a shared (rather that private) jeep. When they say "shared," they mean "shared." As in, people are practically and (in the case of a little boy who was supposed to sit next to me) actually sitting on your lap. It's not unusual for one or more people to hold on to the luggage rack and ride on the back of the jeep. Next time, we'll hire a private jeep.

The ride was about 4 hours long and very bumpy, but the views made it worth it! Tea estates everywhere you look, tailors and food stands and rickshaws in the towns, people walking along the road (sometimes carrying immense loads of tealeaves, clothing, vegetables, and all sorts of other things), breathtaking waterfalls and mountains, the tracks for the Toy Train (the Himalayas' first passenger train, still running on narrow-gauge tracks)... Absolutely incredible. Somewhere along the ascent, I turned to Natalia and said, "Can I just move here?" It's that beautiful.

By the time we got to Darjeeling, it was early evening and the weather had turned chilly. We hired aporter to take out bags from lower Darjeeling (where the shared jeeps stop) to upper Darjeeling (where our hotel is). It looks like lower Darjeeling is more for the locals and upper is more for the tourists. I'll look into that more soon. We passed through narrow, windy streets lined with tea shops, produce and meat stalls, craft vendors, "curio shops" (sellers of Tibetan crafts and such), a mosque, a library, and a church before (finally) making our way to the hotel.

After all the travel, the hotel welcomed us with a hot pot of Darjeeling tea. As you can probably guess, I like it here already.